It hasn’t taken long for Brian Bartholomew to get used to playing two sports this fall.
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Few athletes are afforded such an opportunity, but the Kaneland senior is playing soccer and football.
Bartholomew hadn’t played football before. But with a strong foot and a desire to try something new, he landed on the roster.
He split duties with Andreas Matarangas in a 56-16 victory over Brooks in Week 1 and converted his four extra-point kicks.
“The sports are a lot different,” Bartholomew said. “With soccer you’ve got 80 minutes and it’s a game of freedom where you never know what’s going to happen with non-stop action. Football’s pace is different and I’m standing there cold just waiting. In soccer, I’m hot running around all game.”
Having a soccer player handle kicking duties for football isn’t unprecedented, especially for the Knights.
In 2015, Drew Franklin played for both teams and delivered a game-winning field goal in the final minute to beat Belvidere North in the playoffs.
The trend at Kaneland actually goes back at least 10 years when Chris Ott found success. Other soccer players caught on and several approached former football coach Tom Fedderly about taking over Ott’s duties after he graduated.
Chad Swieca then rose to the occasion, kicking field goals and PATs as a freshman and scoring goals for the soccer team.
It helps that Fedderly was an advocate of soccer players kicking and new coach Pat Ryan certainly knows the importance of the kicking game. He coached one of the all-time bests at Driscoll in Rich Albreski, who holds the record for most consecutive PATs (64 in 2002) and kicked the third-longest field goal (58 yards in 2004), according to IHSA.com.
“It’s such an important part of the game,” Ryan said. “It just seems like something we’ve done here. (Soccer coach) Scott Parillo has been great. We’re flexible and work well together with balancing the schedule and stuff like that.”
Ryan had no idea Bartholomew was interested until they had a team meeting in the summer.
“I was surprised to see him sitting in the meeting room,” Ryan said. “He said he wanted to try kicking and he’s been working on it ever since.”
For now, Bartholomew will continue splitting duties with Matarangas. Both have similar abilities, according to Ryan.
Soccer penalty kicks are the closest pressure situation Bartholomew has faced athletically. In the run of play in soccer, he’s generally reacting in a matter of seconds to either make a pass or take a shot.
Now on Fridays, he’s pacing the sidelines waiting for his number to be called for a field goal, PAT or the ensuing kickoff. Despite this all being new, he feels he’s prepared.
“I really haven’t thought about all the pressure,” he said. “We do a lot of pressure kicking at practice where the guys will yell in my ear as I’m trying to kick. We try to make it as much of a game-like scenario as possible so I’d like to say I’m ready.”
And despite this new passion for football, it likely won’t surpass his love for soccer where he’s already scored two goals.
“I couldn’t tell you how long I’ve played soccer, but it feels like forever, while football is new,” he said. “I’m just going to try to enjoy this as much as I can. It’s a lot of work to be a part of two teams, but I like it. After soccer practice I’ll go kick for a bit so I’m pretty used to my schedule now.”
C.R. Walker is a freelance writer for The Beacon-News.