Pursuing perfection: West Orange football still has room to grow despite convincing win

Whether you were following West Orange High football's convincing 38-14 win at Wekiva High from the visitors' bleachers, through social media or by scoreboard/stat-sheet watching, one thing seemed clear to those watching — especially after the Warriors jumped out to a 38-0 lead in the first half and rested a majority of its starters on both side of the ball in the second half — West Orange was playing lights out. 

For coach Geno Thompson, however, despite recognizing the positives from his team's performance, he thinks his Warriors still have plenty to improve on.

"I'm a perfectionist, so it's kind of hard for me to focus on the scoreboard when I think we're not meeting the standards we set for ourselves," Thompson said following the Week 2 win. "I know the scoreboard makes it look like we blew the standard out of the water, but we have certain expectations for this year's group and I believe there were points in this game that we made too many mistakes or we made mistakes we shouldn't have made. There were a lot of opportunities for us to make plays that we didn't and we left points on the board. So that's tough for me not to focus on, and I know that people will think I'm crazy for how I'm reacting, but first, that's just how I'm wired, and more importantly, we have high expectations of this team, and we just didn't meet them tonight as a whole."

It's easy to see why Thompson has high expectations for his team; these Warriors are really good at football. Along with the 2-0 mark in the record column after this impressive road win and a Week 1 win over what seems to be a good Evans High team at home, 28-12, West Orange has been just as impressive on the stat sheet in the early portion of the season. 

On offense, Quarterback A.J. Chung has been dissecting opposing secondaries in the early days of his tenure as starter — throwing for 524 yards on 32-of-50 passing with seven touchdowns and no interceptions — thanks in large part to his effective offensive line and plethora of weapons on the outside. 

Similarly to Thompson, his first-year starter at QB sees a lot of positives from this performance but also understands there were things the Warriors need to iron out of their game.

"Going into this week, we were preaching to the O-Line that we needed to be on the same page about protections and focus on understanding the type of fronts Wekiva would throw at us," Chung said. "I felt like my guys did incredible in providing me with time to throw. I never felt like we didn't understand what the defense was doing, which allowed me to sit back in the pocket with our five or six-man protections and go through my progressions and deliver the ball. Overall, I think we played smoothly on offense, but we can definitely improve in many aspects, and that starts with me limiting bad decisions and putting my teammates in positions to succeed. Still, though, putting up 38 points in the first half, that's pretty good and allowed us to rest our starters and get our younger guys experience."

Thompson and Chung didn't stop agreeing there, though; the performance from the West Orange starting defense was another point of pride from this win over Wekiva, especially the young defensive line.

"I do think our defense played well," Thompson said. "Obviously, when our starters were out there in the first half, they were able to hold them scoreless. I think in the first half, if I'm not mistaken, they had a total of two, maybe three first downs too. ... So I thought the defense played very well, created multiple turnovers, Michael Onorata had that scoop-and-score after the Namir Coleman strip-sack near the end of the half, but that's what we expected. When we watched the film, we saw opportunities for our team to be successful and I felt the defense in the first half did that."

From an offensive perspective, having a defense playing lights out as the Warriors have this season, helps create confidence that they're going to have your back if you make a mistake and set you up with opportunities to be successful.

"As a quarterback, knowing that our defense is capable of getting stops, forcing turnovers and making big plays every single drive they're on the field, gives me a sense of security and calm," Chung said. "Because I know that I can make mistakes and I don't have to force it every time we get the ball allows us to play looser. ... I'm very grateful to have the type of defense we have."

As the Warriors continue to develop as a team and pursue the standard Thompson and this staff have set for the rest of the 2025 season, it'll take a lot of leadership from the coaches on the sidelines and members of each position group in all three phases of the game. 

"I will say that I thought the effort was there from our guys tonight and that's something I'll always be proud of," Thompson said. "These kids gave phenomenal effort, and when the kids are doing that, the responsibility of fixing the mistakes we make obviously falls on us as coaches. We need to do a better job with our technique, and we need to make sure we're not making the same mistakes over and over again. All of that falls solely on my shoulders."

Although Thompson is the ultimate leader for the Warriors football program, the onus of leadership also falls on this team's natural leaders, such as Chung, the senior-heavy secondary — led by Devonte Anderson, Chakai Scott, Dylan Hoskins and Sean Cannon — and somewhat surprisingly on young guns like sophomore defensive lineman Matheus Kaminski Cordeiro and sophomore offensive lineman Fenway Cochrane. 

"We empower our leaders to be leaders here," Thompson said. "All of our guys have the opportunity to step up and take on a leadership role on this team, regardless of what grade you're in or position you play. Guys like A.J., Matheus, Fenway, are examples of young players, all of them being sophomores, who have run with the opportunity to lead our team by doing the right things, working their tails off, saying the right things and holding their teammates accountable."

Unlike Chung, who plays a position that is inherently considered a leader, and Cochrane, who has an older leader in his position group to lean on in senior Alex Castellanos, Kaminsky Cordeiro is in a unique leadership position.

As a freshman in 2024, surrounded by veteran defensive linemen, Kaminsky Cordeiro quickly established himself as a budding superstar, recording five sacks, 22 tackles for loss and 59 total tackles. This season, however, the sophomore pass-rusher from Brazil is the only returning starter on the West Orange defensive line and has enjoyed the opportunity to take what he learned last season and help lead this young group.

"The five guys that are rotating into our three defensive line positions are doing a great job so far," Thompson said. "Like any young group, they're getting better with every rep, and we know that we're not where we want to be yet, but we'll keep working to get better every day. Obviously, Matheus is the anchor of this line. You can see that on tape, he does a phenomenal job and I think after this year, he's probably going to have all the top college programs in the country coming after him because of how he plays with toughness and how tenacious he is. And to be that big and strong as a sophomore is impressive; he's power-cleaning 275 pounds already. The kid is a workaholic. He takes studying the game seriously; he just loves the process. He's going to make a lot of money playing this game in the future."

As his coach emphasized, the young lineman's focus as a leader for his group is all about harping on the details when the Warriors are putting in work, but in this new role, he's also learned that the time he puts in with his team outside of football has just as big an impact when the floodlights are coming down on Friday Nights.

"I think leading has a lot to do with making sure I set an example of doing the little stuff right and holding those around me to that same standard," Kaminsky Cordeiro said. "Getting those little details correct and focusing on them in everything you do has an impact on those around you, especially when they see the reward of that effort on Fridays. That's really what I try to do every day, just be a guy that practices hard and can be an example of how that practice translates to how I play. ... the other thing I've learned this season that is really important too is the time we spend together outside of football. Just hanging out together outside of football has been huge for us because we've developed really good friendships with each other in a short period of time. That friendship shows on the field and in practice because we can trust one another and we know we're going to fight even harder for our brother." 

As West Orange continues its pursuit of perfection, Thompson and his team will host the Titusville Terriers at Raymond Screws Field in Week 3 of the season.