Mike Vukovcan As the high school football season gets closer, Vikings Sports Now continues with our position-by-position preview of the 2025 Hopewell Vikings.
Earlier in the week, we gave a little preview of the Vikings defensive line and linebackers, so today, we’ll take a look at the secondary.
With the way offenses have evolved and rely heavily on their passing games, Hopewell’s ability to defend the pass and prevent big plays down the field will be important.
The encouraging thing is that Hopewell’s secondary will return many players from last season and have also added a huge talent.
Earlier in the summer, VSN told you about the awful news of senior defensive back Julian Baldwin breaking his leg, which will force him to miss the entire season.
Baldwin was the ‘quarterback’ and vocal leader of the secondary, making all of the calls, so someone will need to step up to do that.
This is no doubt an unfortunate loss, but Hopewell returns a lot of talent and will have to employee the ‘next man up’ mentality.
VSN was able to talk with Hopewell HC Matt Mottes about some of the players he’ll be relying on in the secondary this season.
While Hopewell will be down Baldwin, they will be getting back a player that missed all of last season with a broken ankle in senior Kingston Krotec. Throughout his high school career, Krotec has been a quarterback but that will change this season as he’ll play on both sides of the ball, at safety and wide receiver.
“Having Kingston back this season will be huge for us,” said Mottes. “We missed him a lot last year and with his injury, we threw James (Armstrong) into the fire, which he responded pretty well. This year, I expect Kingston to play a lot on both sides of the ball. I’ve said this time and time again; he’s one of the best athletes on our team. I’m excited to see what he does this year.”
Like with DL Keith Young (transfer from Keystone Oaks), the addition of sophomore Nasir Wade (transfer from Aliquippa) will be a huge impact on both sides of the ball. Wade is a player with tremendous speed and will be someone that will make a ton of plays on both sides of the ball. It’s not an exaggeration to say that he’s a threat to go the distance every time he touches the ball. Despite just starting his sophomore season, Wade already holds two D-1 offers.
Hopewell’s Nasir Wade and James Armstrong
“Adding Nasir Wade at safety, I think will be a really big help for us,” said Mottes. “Nasir is someone with a very high football IQ. He breaks on the ball extremely well and looks great when he does it. He’s someone that’s able to see a play as it’s developing. So far, I’ve really liked what I’ve seen from him.”
As far as the rest of the Hopewell secondary, the biggest strength that they appear to have is depth.
“With Julian being out for most of the season, we’re going to have a void there but having a returning starter like Josh Brunton is going to be big, because he’ll step up. Mike Gargiulo, a kid that came out late last year, is going to be a senior this year and I expect big things out of him. Vinny Boris is our utility man and is able to do whatever we ask of him. He’s a kid that always works hard and I expect him to be on the field as a defensive back as well. Another player that I haven’t brought up yet is Brian Olden; he’s a gifted young player that I believe can compete at a high level as long as he stays focused.”
“Like we have upfront, I believe we’ll have a constant rotation of depth,” said Mottes. “A lot of coaches would give anything to have 20 to 25 kids that are capable of playing on a Friday night.”
