Proctor Journal

Proctor senior Caleb Maki is a nice guy, a very generous guy, and a real team player. In a nice gesture, the football co-captain generously gave teammate and co-captain Kevin Schubert the honor of scoring the first touchdown against the Eveleth-Gilbert Golden Bears in the Fri., Sept.21 road game.

Then Maki took over, rushing for three touchdowns in the 2nd and 3rd quarters as the Rails steamrolled the Bears 28-8. Maki scored with runs of 20, 7, and 25 yards. Schubert went for 25 yards. Maki was also perfect on all four point-after conversion kicks. All told, the Mighty Rail had a hand or foot in every Proctor score.

“I’m competitive by nature,” Maki told reporter Rick Weegman after an earlier victory over Hermantown. “My parents always taught me to be aggressive, too, no matter how slow you are. You can always be aggressive and have a competitive edge.”

Now Maki will be the first to remind anyone listening that without the powerful Rails offensive line opening holes and teammates in the backfield blocking for him he might be looking at goose eggs in his stats column for the evening. In a sense, Maki is right: the Rails were opening holes in the E-G defense the ISD #704 bus could have driven through—in low gear.

More importantly, it appears Proctor’s nasty habits of starting slowly and falling behind early, and mid-game slump that lets the opponent back into the game has been ousted from the unofficial game plan. The Rails scored all their points in the first three quarters before the Golden Bears got a late “pride” touchdown. Proctor started strongly and didn’t let up.

Before the season began, Maki had voiced his strong desire to help maintain the senior leadership that brought the Rails to the state tournament in 2006.

“Last year, we had good senior leadership,” Maki said while preparing for the first game against Mora. “This year, we need the seniors—and the juniors, too—to step up into that role.”

With Proctor unbeaten and leading the Sea-Range Conference, it seems Maki has, by example, generously shared his attitude of aggressive play with his teammates.

How nice of him.