Just call Jonathan Jaramillo the Comeback Kid.

“Being back on the field has brought me back my happiness,” said the Coconino High School senior after his first game in nearly a year, a 26-24 comeback win over Cactus Shadows. “It’s brought me all this joy to be back with the team that’s doing so well this year. It just means everything for me.”

On one of the craziest Friday nights in the history of Arizona high school football Sept. 17, the former linebacker, who spent nine months recovering from two skull fractures and related injuries falling off the back of a moving truck in the high school’s parking lot, rushed for 119 yards, including the opening six points from six yards out, matching the number on his jersey and turning insanity into inspiration for the Panthers’ sixth straight season-opening win. 

“I was planning to play defense, mostly,” said Jaramillo, who as a sophomore had 56 tackles, two sacks, a fumble recovery and a 30-yard interception return. ”I didn’t ask to come back to be a running back; I just got offered the spot. That’s what I’ve been playing since youth [football], so I knew what to do.

"Offense has been a great switch, [has] been leading me on great paths, and [been] bringing joy to everyone.” 

Jaramillo’s heroics were just the latest response to a series of adversities weathered by third-year head coach Mike Lapsley’s program, forced to cancel its Sept. 10 season opener against Cactus after a Panther tested positive for COVID-19. 

“No scrimmage, either,” Lapsley said. “A lot of teams are on Week Three [of play]; we’re on Week One. We’ve had a really rough off-season.”

Evidenced seven weeks earlier, after flooding around Coconino disrupted July practices, swept a car away near junior Jacob Clouse’s house and forced the city to declare a state of emergency. Lapsley’s players helped fill and load sandbags to prevent further water damage to local houses. 

“The circumstances last year [were] upsetting, and we kind of rallied around it,” Lapsley said. “The competitors on our football team create that leadership. Everybody feeds into it, and then, the next thing you know, you’ve got a bunch of guys out fighting for one another.”

Clouse’s first reception--for 29 yards, sophomore quarterback Enoch Watson’s longest completion of the night--and subsequent one-yard scoring dive with 2:02 remaining, on just his second carry of the night, capped an eight-play, 80-yard drive, rallying the Panthers from their first, and only, deficit of the game, 24-20.

“Shoot, we need ones like this,” said Clouse, heavily favoring his right leg after the game for what he attributed to muscle cramps. “Games like this push us to be better. 

“Honestly, I trust these guys to go all the way. The sky’s the limit, we’ve got great chemistry, and I’m excited to see what we can do.” 

A great deal on the ground, at least. Junior Cooper French busted loose for a 72-yard touchdown run a quarter earlier for the only other Panther points in the second half. They came the first offensive play after Cactus Shadows senior quarterback Corbin Vasily’s six-yard touchdown pass to another upperclassman, kicker Brayden Hasher, narrowed a 14-3 halftime deficit to four points.

The 11-point lead was opened up 5:34 before halftime by Panthers senior fullback Tyson Fousel, whose five-yard run was the 15th play in a five-and-a-half minute drive.

It was supplemented by 58 more yards rushing from Jaramillo and aided by a controversial pass interference penalty on the Falcons on a fourth-down incompletion by Watson, outgunned by nearly 100 yards by his Cactus Shadows counterpart, whose touchdown pass to fellow senior Tate Andrus to give the Falcons their lead came with 4:45 remaining, necessitating Lapsley’s two-and-a-half-minute drill as well as a final stand by his defense. 

“I think it feeds into a belief that we can win,” Lapsley said. “It gives you that winning attitude. You start to expect to win. When it’s time to dig deep, that’s exactly what these guys do.”