During the Sept. 28 game against Rolling Meadows, Prospect junior Michael Shafis ran the ball, caught a pass, made tackles, punted and returned a fumble for a touchdown.
Seemingly the only thing Shafis didn’t do was return kicks, and that was because his coach wanted to give him a break.
It was all in a day’s work for Shafis, a running back, linebacker, punter, kick returner and one of the Knights’ team captains.
“I just have to fight through it. Pain is temporary,” Shafis said of his busy workload. “I just keep going because I have to do it for the guys next to me.”
Also a two-way varsity player as a sophomore, Shafis played basketball until recently and set the school record in the high jump at 6 feet, 7-1/4 inches last year.
He has finished fifth in the high jump at the Class 3A state track meet the past two seasons.
“Michael is an amazing athlete, a talented kid,” Prospect football coach Mike Sebestyen said. “He plays with great effort every week. The kid has never come off the field and he doesn’t ever seem to tire. He just keeps plugging away, and you have to respect that kind of attitude.”
Shafis, who will not play basketball this year, says that his interest in sports began with his older brother Andrew Shafis, who was Prospect’s quarterback last year and is now a linebacker at Drake.
“I played basketball mostly when I was little, then my brother started playing football and I started football. It kept going: My brother did track in middle school, and I did track in middle school. I just started loving both sports.
“I love football. I love the atmosphere here at Prospect.”
During one Prospect possession on Sept. 28, Shafis rushed for 33 yards on five carries to set up a field goal. His 75-yard fumble return for a touchdown kept Prospect close before losing to Rolling Meadows 42-24.
“He’s a hard, downhill runner, tough to tackle on first contact. He’s very good at reading on defense,” Sebestyen said. “This year he’s really started to understand the game a lot better, and it shows in how he has performed.”
Shafis showed he had the ability to play on both sides of the ball last season.
“It really helped me progress from last year to this year because experience is the one thing you can’t teach,” Shafis said.
There are three games left for Prospect (1-5, 0-2 Mid-Suburban East), time enough for Shafis to hone his skills even further. Soon, it’ll be track season, and he’ll pursue his third consecutive medal in the high jump.
Bob Hurst is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
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