As a player in the 2024 football season for California Lutheran University, I can confidently say it did not go as planned. However, coming from a different program, I learned a lot about myself this year. We only had one win, but each loss taught me how to become a better man on and off the field.
Former player, now Graduate Assistant Coach Zacharias Muhammad, spoke about his personal experience and insights from this season.
“Man, it makes me livid. It’s even worse as a coach, I feel, just not being out there to be on the field and do it, you wish you could go out there and do it for them sometimes but of course, things don’t work out. Back, past couple seasons, it hasn’t worked out either while I was playing so it’s familiar territory, unfortunately,” Muhammad said.
Muhammad said the “little things” are what is important and can add value to a team’s success just by their approach.
“They just gotta get the little things intact sooner than later … It comes down to the recruitment, to every little detail to put us in a position to win and maintain throughout a 10-game season with no bye weeks,” Muhammad said.
As a fan of motivational speaker David Goggins, Muhammad said he has taken aspects of Goggins’ previous speeches and applied them to the 2024 football season.
“His whole thing is staying hard and not being afraid to make the next move. If we’re in a constant cycle, you know, they say repeatedly doing the same thing and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity,” Muhammad said. “We’re in a constant cycle of disappointment, and if we don’t ever decide to switch stuff or make that move, then you can’t be upset of, like, the results. You cannot be upset at the results if you don’t put in the work.”
Muhammad adds that despite our team record, it does not reflect the growth and bond we created as a team each week.
“As an optimistic guy, as myself, just looking back on the season, 1-8 is tough but I’ma let them know, it did not feel like 1-8, besides Sunday morning,” said Muhammad. “I feel like that kinda adds to keeping us going, keeping us on the right track, keeping our head on straight to a degree because we’re still losing but just knowing you got guys that’s gonna show up every day regardless of the circumstances, regardless of the chit chat around the campus about how bad the team is and all of that, it’s, it’s just us.”
Kingsmen junior safety Billy Parra shares his experience on the team this year coming from Pasadena City College and reflecting on where he is now.
“The main takeaway I can get from junior college is just a grind, the mentality, that’s what really stands out for me. It’s every day, nobody’s forcing you to be there. You just gotta get up and handle your own and show that you’re meant to be there, that you deserve a second chance,” Parra said.
Parra said that the mentality he’s had coming from junior college helped make a difference when he reflected on this year’s several losses.
“Our record is what our record is, but that’s where that junior college mentality comes in, it’s a different mentality that you embrace and evolve into from junior college. Nothing is ever gonna be given to you there no matter who you are,” said Parra. “Where you came from, what you’ve done in high school, none of that really matters. It’s basically, like, kind of like survival of the fittest.”
Parra said that how players respond to adversity is different from the junior college perspective.
“Knowing you’re not performing the best you could perform, but knowing that you’re better than this. How do you get off that? That’s where that juco mentality comes from because nothing’s ever gonna be easy,” Parra said. “The way you respond to adversity is very important, which is why many juco players have the same mentality and just helps bring that culture together.”
Parra said there are several things that could be improved on and should be implanted in upcoming seasons.
“Although everybody has their own ego, you have to be one with the team. You have to put it aside and look at the team as a whole.Everybody has to be held to a certain level of accountability, which is how teams move forward, or how our team moving forward will get better,” said Parra.
Whether it’s Division I football or Division III football, losing is never well-received among players, especially when it comes to setting standards for the season.
In the article, “A Disaster Season Like No Other” by Alex Kirshner, Kirshner wrote about the poor season the Florida State Seminoles had. I found this highly relatable to what my team and I went through this past season.
“The Noles are 1–9. They have already finished dead-last in the Atlantic Coast Conference, and they will probably finish 2–10 only because they are paying a lower-level school, Charleston Southern, to visit Tallahassee,” Kirshner wrote.
I’m not used to losing in football, and considering how my junior year went at Northwestern Oklahoma, going 1-10, and now 1-8 this year at Cal Lutheran, hearing what the Seminoles are going through resonates deeply.
Kirshner went on to say that the Seminoles showed signs of great athletic ability this fall, but unfortunately, the results show otherwise.
“Literally never has an elite program gone from the penthouse to the outhouse with the speed that FSU has shown off this fall,” Kirshner said.
Knowing you have the pieces to the puzzle, but they may be in the wrong spot, does make you question the coach’s decision-making at times.
Kirshner wrote that the Seminole’s sole win against the University of California, Berkeley still doesn’t say much about their identity, considering that they’ve carried a losing culture this year.
“The losses have piled up with just one interruption (a narrow home win against Cal) since then. FSU has been noncompetitive in many of them, and the program has become a regular old loser with shocking speed,” Kirshner wrote.
On Saturday Nov. 15, we will take on the Laverne Leopards for the second time this season. The first time we faced them, we were able to achieve a victory and as Kingsmen, we were confident in our identity as a team.
Ultimately, our losses were rough to experience as athletes, but each one symbolized the growth and urgency we developed as a team. Each game had the potential to be an obtainable win and so, in upcoming seasons, I hope the Kingsmen can find their identity again and bring home a championship for Cal Lutheran.
