Kelvin Leon is player of week after Owls' big win

photo Kelvin Leon

PLAYER OF THE WEEK HONORABLE MENTION(Coaches are invited to nominate players by emailing Ward Gossett at wgossett@timesfreepress.com by 2 p.m. each Saturday)• DK Billingsley, Scottsboro: He ran for 246 yards and five TDs in the Wildcats' loss to North Jackson.Hunter Maynor, Soddy-Daisy: He passed for 380 yards, completing 18 of 36 passes with three TDs, and also ran for two scores in his team's win over Tyner.• JaVaughn Craig, McCallie: He was responsible for five TDs, throwing for three while completing 9 of 12 passes for 146 yards and running for 103 yards and two scores in the Blue Tornado's win over top-ranked and previously unbeaten Ensworth.

Although he had been in tough spots previously, Kelvin Leon found himself on one of Tennessee high school football's biggest regular-season stages Friday.

He and his unbeaten Ooltewah teammates, No. 5 in the latest Class 5A poll, were on the road to face another unbeaten in Class 6A seventh-ranked Kingsport Dobyns-Bennett.

The Owls were down 34-28. It was getting late and there was little room for error, and Leon showed why he had won a quarterback battle to succeed Brody Binder, a contest that carried over two games into the season.

"His stats were outstanding, but on the drive that put us ahead 35-34 he had three plays that were big-time," Ooltewah coach Mac Bryan said.

Those plays and a 356-yard, five-TD passing performance earned Leon the Times Free Press Player of the Week honor.

"On that drive, we were looking at a third-and-20 and he converted it for a first down," Bryan recalled. "Then on a fourth-and-2 when we had a pass called, he elected to pull the ball down and he ran for the first down. Then on the pass to put us ahead, he threw a pass to the corner of the end zone, a perfect pass. He had three perfect plays that made that drive go."

His final scoring pass, coming with 2:07 to play, boosted Ooltewah's advantage to eight points and the final 42-34 score.

"It was a tremendous game to watch, I'm sure, and it was in a great football environment, but games like that are hard on a coach," Bryan said.

A 6-foot-2, 230-pounder, Leon was forced to bide his time for the better part of three seasons behind Binder, who wound up signing a baseball scholarship with Troy University. Then he competed with London Elrod for the starting job before getting it when he led the Owls' comeback against Siegel in the second game of the season.

"The first game Elrod started, but we played both," Bryan said. "Then the second game at Siegel one played the first half, and in the second half Kelvin led the comeback. All through the summer we thought we had two quarterbacks that could play, and we had decided to play both."

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There was nothing London, a junior, did or didn't do, but Leon performing under pressure allowed him to pull ahead.

Leon had been in the system longer and maybe knew it better, but it was more than that.

"He has gotten bigger and stronger every year, and he has consistently gotten better. It can be real tricky when a guy wants something and then working to develop it," Bryan said.

Leon has developed the know-how.

"The other night he threw a couple of passes away -- better to throw it away and live to fight another day -- but a lot of high school quarterbacks have trouble doing that," Bryan said. "But beyond that, he makes good decisions.

"A quarterback can be a number of things. Kelvin can throw the ball, and he can run. A quarterback doesn't have to be a sprinter if he knows when to run and his yards are meaningful. He got what we needed when we had to have it."

Contact Ward Gossett at wgossett@timesfreepress.com or 423-886-4765. Follow him at Twitter.com/wardgossett.

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