“Show Out For Santi”: Beau Chene Named GeauxPreps Football Team of the Week

by Marshall Loeffler // GeauxPreps.com

Beau Chene is 4-0, and that is great news from a football perspective. For a program that went 1-8 a year ago and plays in a competitive parish that has produced elite football teams and players all around them, the Gators’ perfect start is not something that has happened much recently. 

Beau Chene has defeated East Iberville, Basile, Port Barre and Helix Mentorship Academy while outscoring their opponents by 100 points so far. And while coach Buck Harris is quick to credit the players for buying into the program, the fourth win came during Homecoming Week, when the football team and entire campus suddenly had to stop everything else and lean on one another.

LEANING ON ONE ANOTHER

The Gators were preparing for Helix and the entire week’s busy plans when junior Santiago Solis-Nava, a letterman for Beau Chene, died Thursday, Sept. 24, following an accident earlier in the week near his home. Santiago was 17. His obituary describes him as “loving, funny, caring and protective, a young man who made friends easily and cared deeply for his family, his school and his teammates.”

“It was a busy week,” Harris said. “It was Homecoming, festivities, and the tragic loss of Santiago, a two-way player for us.” Obviously, that made an already significant football week something entirely different. The Gators were 3-0, preparing for Homecoming and trying to keep a remarkable start going, while also dealing with that sudden loss and trying to balance the tasks at hand with finding time to grieve and process.

Harris said the players were emotional, understandably so, but they also found a way to turn their attention toward the things they could control. “The guys, they really took the time and got focused on football when they needed to,” Harris said. “They were running emotionally high, but they still contained themselves and still played football.”

That meant going back to practice and going about the game week as “normally” as they could manage. Harris said the team met, talked through what had happened, and then went to work. “We told them, look, there’s nothing you can do right now,” he said. “And we’re gonna practice.”

And, according to Harris, they did. “I mean, they went to it,” he said. The team felt a slight increased amount of attention from their success, and even before the accident, had elevated their understanding of what it was going to be like playing “in front” and having a win streak to preserve. For the players, Harris said, there was something helpful about being together and doing something familiar. “Practicing, it helped the guys,” he said. “They’re just doing something they like and keeping their mind off of it at the same time.”

The school and the team somehow made it through the hospitalization and Santiago’s final hours with his family…and then came Friday night, when Beau Chene took the field for its Homecoming game against Helix Mentorship Academy with a lot of weight and even more emotion surrounding everyone at the stadium. But like Coach Harris said, “there was a game to be played, and everyone decided they wanted to play it.”

The Gators won 53-36.

“They really wanted to show out for him,” Harris said.

MOVING FORWARD TOGETHER

That victory was the fourth straight for a team that is beginning to look and feel different from the one that finished 1-8 last season. Harris said the biggest change has been players staying with the program and believing in what the coaches are asking them to do.

“Before I got there, there was … a tendency of young guys playing, and then kind of not sticking it out through the end,” Harris said. “So it was a lot of young guys playing on varsity. Now we have some of the older guys; they are sticking with it and playing for the program.”

The work started in the offseason. Harris said the coaching staff put together a strong summer program and began to see attendance and consistency. “I think the guys are seeing that now,” he said. “They realize it, and they see it, and it’s paid off for them.”

The results certainly suggest that, even if it is still early.

Quarterback Braydon Marks has led an offense that has scored over 50 in two straight weeks, and has been able to move the ball in every game. Against Helix, he completed all seven of his passes for 144 yards and three touchdowns, while also scoring on the ground and adding a two-point conversion. Running back Christian Wheeler rushed eight times for 122 yards, continuing a season in which he has been averaging more than 100 yards per game.

Defensively, Kendrick Chavis and Isaiah Cisneros have stepped into important roles at linebacker, and Tyreon Henry has been an emerging mainstay in the secondary. Henry had two interceptions against Helix and returned another one for a touchdown against Port Barre. “A lot of guys have been stepping up,” Harris said. “They’ve been some playmakers, and one getting better leads to the next guy following that. We’ve been both offense and defense, just almost simple-minded,” he said. “You’ve got to block. You’ve got to get off blocks. You’ve got to tackle.”

The players are learning that the little things add up. “Basically learning how to win,” Harris said.“We’ve been harping on attendance, consistency,” he said. “And I think the guys, you know, are seeing that now.”

District play will bring tough teams against programs that have been 4-0 consistently, but the Gators have already put themselves in position to make this a season worth remembering, even if there are parts of this past week that, for some of them, will always hurt.

Harris knows what that can look like. He remembers being a junior at Beau Chene when the Gators started 5-0. Now, he said, his players have talked about making some history of their own. “They want to be part of history,” Harris said.

At 4-0, they have certainly given themselves the opportunity to do that. That is why Beau Chene is the Team of the Week. Not only because the Gators have won four straight for the first time in a while, but because they got that fourth one during a week when their football family lost one of its own. They practiced, they played, and they leaned on each other. At least for now, the Gators are still unbeaten and are moving forward together.

Thank you to Melancon Funeral Home for sharing Santiago’s obituary, and to the Beau Chene school and community for sharing photos, stories, and memories of him.