NEW PALESTINE — For a brief moment, the New Palestine Dragons might have thought their coach had lost his mind.
When the team gathered for practices in the summer, the defense had a question for him. It was a big one.
What do you want us to do about Charlie Spegal now that he’s on our team?
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“I expect you to put your shoulder pad right in his sternum, wrap his legs up, and drive right through the tackle,” New Palestine coach Kyle Ralph jokingly told his team.
Their response?
“They looked at me like I was insane,” he said.
The Dragons defense was well-acquainted with Spegal before the junior and his family moved to New Palestine and he joined the team. The last two years when he was at Delta, they had to gameplan specifically to slow down the standout running back.
“All the kids that have tackled him for two years now, they realized how difficult of a job that actually is,” Ralph said. “Usually what we did to him when he played at Delta, we cut tackle him or go right through his thighs or knees to chop him down.”
That, pretty much, is a team’s only chance of stopping Spegal. Listed at 5-foot-10, 221-pounds, you aren’t likely to bring him down with a conventional tackle.
The way the Dragons attacked Spegal as an opponent wasn’t an illegal play, but the defense wasn’t sure if they were supposed to treat their new teammate that way.
Really, though, they didn’t have much of a choice unless they wanted to give up touchdown after touchdown in practice.
“If you’ve watched him play, you can’t tackle him high,” Ralph said. “That’s not a tackle. A high tackle on him is a missed tackle.”
The impact Spegal has made on his new team can be quickly measured with eye-popping statistics. He broke the New Palestine school record for touchdowns in a game in less than a half in the season opener against Kokomo, with seven TDs.
He’s rushed the ball 81 times for 830 yards in “four” games now — he only played one half in two of them and three quarters Friday — good for 10.2 yards per carry, and he has amassed an absurd 21 touchdowns.
That touchdown number doesn’t just rank Spegal first in Indiana. The Dragons junior is first in the nation in rushing touchdowns, three ahead of second place, a senior from Alaska who has played in five games already this year. He has scored more rushing touchdowns by himself than all but 10 teams in America.
Spegal has been so good, so dominant, that the Dragons have only handed the ball to last year’s running back, Luke Canfield, two times in the first four games of the season.
Canfield had a monstrous year himself in 2017, rushing for 1,764 yards and 29 touchdowns. But with the arrival of Spegal, who had 2,385 yards and 35 TDs last year, Canfield has taken on a different role this year.
That’s been a big benefit to the Dragons on both sides of the ball.
“Not only helping with running the ball and what he’s done on the offensive side of the ball, but allowing Canfield to play cornerback has helped us a lot,” senior offensive lineman Alex Cotterman said. “We lost a lot of senior DBs last year.”
Earning his spot
The job was not handed to Spegal just because of what he accomplished in his two years at Delta, putting up impressive statistics and making the all-state team as a sophomore.
He came to the Dragons without expectations, knowing he would have to work to earn a spot on the team, let alone a starting role.
“It means a lot,” Spegal said of his starting spot. “I came in, I knew they worked their butts off, there wasn’t a question about that. I came in knowing that I have to earn a spot and work and work. I tried my best and it made me a better player, just working so hard to earn a spot. It made me stronger, faster, gave me a smarter football IQ.”
Coming in to a new team, eventually taking a starting spot from an incumbent player, could create friction or resentment within a football team.
That hasn’t been the case at New Palestine.
Spegal’s work ethic has been apparent from the start to his teammates and coaches on and off the field. He’s put up huge numbers in the weight room, and his mindset, attitude, demeanor and willingness to put in the work quickly earned him the respect of him team.
“He just showed up the first day and immediately was just all work,” Cotterman said. “Not that he wasn’t here to have fun, but he was here to make this football team better and make himself better.”
“I think the moment Charlie got here, our kids liked him because he was a hard worker,” Ralph added. “He came in, he worked hard, he put the time in, he earned his job, and they respect that. His talent is one thing, but when you combine that with his work ethic, his coachability his desire to be a great player, you can get something pretty special out of him.”
Show of respect
The respect runs in all directions with the Dragons. The team has a tradition where whoever is the head guy of the running back position group gets to lead the start of drills.
Last year, Canfield did that as a sophomore. The seniors on the team stepped back so he could take that role.
This year, despite Spegal being in the feature back role, Canfield again runs the drills. It’s a sign of camaraderie and teamwork between the backs, and a show of respect from the team and the players toward each other.
The two are the latest in a line of extremely successful running backs at New Palestine in Ralph’s six years at the helm.
That started with James Young, who Ralph said was a hard-working, tough-nosed, inside zone runner that could grind out yards. He had over 1,600 yards and 35 touchdowns during the Dragons’ championship season of 2014. Following Young was Nick Brickens, a smaller back who Ralph said was a good slasher with great vision. Brickens also surpassed 1,600 yards his senior year, with 20 TDs.
Duron Ford moved into the district in 2016. Ralph said he was tremendously explosive, lightning fast, another different style of running back. Ford rushed for over 1,800 yards and 32 TDs his senior year.
That led the Dragons to Canfield last year, a smaller, quicker, much shiftier runner with tremendous vision.
And now Spegal, who is more of a bruiser but still has great moves and is agile in the open field.
“We’ve had some great kids come through here, especially at the running back position,” Ralph said. “The hallmark though, of all of those guys, is they are tremendously hard workers, very coachable, physically and mentally tough kids, and they have the respect of the team. They’ve all been unselfish, they’ve all been hard workers, great in the weight room.”
Spegal fits that mold perfectly, and it’s making New Palestine a more dangerous team all around.
“He’s all downhill, he knows where to go,” Dragons quarterback Zach Neligh said. “It helps up front that our guys are doing a tremendous job, we’re more mature this year. Having him around really just helps everything with the run game and kind of pushes our guys up front to do even better, be a little better than what we were last year.”
Having someone like Spegal behind them also gives a boost to the offensive line.
They want to open the holes for him. They want to give him the room to run wild, to bust out for a big play, for yet another touchdown.
Every week, the numbers Spegal is putting up are something the offensive line can take a good deal of credit for and satisfaction from.
“It gives us a sense of pride. Up front, you just want to come out every game and just push the other guy around and completely dominate the line of scrimmage,” Cotterman said. “Charlie’s a great player and he can run over people, but it’s even better when you can get him to the second and third level without even being touched.
“He leads by example. He shows up, he works, he does what they ask him to do. You can’t ask for anything more.”
Bigger impact
Having Spegal around in practice proved invaluable for the Dragons in preparations for their biggest regular-season game in school history, Week 2 against Center Grove.
Even though they are different types of runners, Ralph said Spegal is just as difficult to tackle as Carson Steele, the Trojans standout back.
Ralph was impressed with how well his defense has taken to stopping Spegal in practice, and how well they stopped Steele in the Week 2 win.
“He makes our defense better on a daily basis,” Ralph said of Spegal. “If you can tackle him, I think you can probably tackle about anybody we’re going to play.”
Even though it’s been a pretty important life change for him, Spegal has taken to New Palestine well.
He’s faced a bigger level of competition in the first few weeks. He’s getting used to a new high school and new community.
He said he wasn’t surprised by the success his new team has had to start the season, though. He sees the hard work everyone puts in, the work the coaches do to prepare the team.
Through all the change, there remains one constant — Spegal is a workhorse on the football field, and nobody has figured out how to stop him yet.
“I feel real good. I’m getting to know everybody, playing a lot better, knowing how New Pal does things,” Spegal said. “It’s been great. Ever since I’ve been here, everybody wants to get to know me, been friendly, been nice. They just accepted me right away.”