A sea of fans filled a good portion of the visitor stands at Carlisle High School’s football stadium.
They showed up to watch the New Miami Vikings play the C4 Lions — a club program formally Middletown Christian — on one of the few grass fields left in the area.
New Miami’s Mara Field is also grass, but the Vikings weren’t there on Saturday night. They were on the road for their Week 3 contest — surrounded by The Village faithful.
Yet, the Vikings still felt at home.
“Did you see the stands?” senior Dalson Hayes said on Saturday. “Did you hear how loud they were?”
The team in green has already given its community plenty to cheer about during the young season. The Vikings secured their third win in a row this past weekend — a 32-21 victory over the Lions — and are now 3-0.
It’s something New Miami hasn’t seen since 2020.
“It means everything to us. It means everything to the Village,” Hayes said. “It’s an away game. The stands were full. It’s awesome for the Village to come together and do that for everybody.”
Hayes and his fellow seniors won two games during the 2021 season. This year, they’ve passed that mark. In between that was a 21-game losing streak the Vikings have long forgotten.
“It’s all about hard work — belief,” New Miami second-year coach Chris Fogle said. “Most of it is relationship building with the kids. These kids haven’t won. These kids are beginning to understand that you don’t have to hang your head when the other team scores.
“They don’t have to do the old New Miami stuff. Winning is a new thing for them, and I’m hoping they continue to make it contagious.”
Hayes was an eighth grader when New Miami won its first-ever playoff game in 2020. The year prior, the Vikings hosted their first-ever playoff game. Those triumphant times were something Hayes wanted to be a part of.
“I remember all of that,” Hayes said. “This is a hard spot to fill — that 2020 team.”
But the Vikings are doing it with the usual blue-collar grit, a full roster and a winning attitude.
“I haven’t had to keep these kids grounded. They’re keeping themselves grounded,” Fogle said. “They keep reminding themselves, ‘We don’t want to go back to losing. Winning is good. Winning is fun.’ We want to keep doing that and keep going.
“They’re just slowly believing — slowly thinking that we can,” Fogle added. “We don’t necessarily have any huge superstars. They understand that they have to play as a team and rally with each other.
“Somebody makes a big play here. Somebody makes a big play there, and they get up on it. They know that it’s going to be like that — not just one kid making a difference. They’ve all be doing it.”
And all the Vikings get to do it again Friday night against Dayton Christian on the grass at Mara Field.
