High school football: Nathan Nunn, Garrett Shook and Evan Hathcock can't play, but will offer support for Medina

Nathan Nunn is putting up a strong front, but he's hurting inside. The same holds true for Garrett Shook and Evan Hathcock. All three players will be on the sideline tonight when the sixth-seeded Medina (10-3) football team takes on top-seeded and two-time defending state champion St. Edward (12-1) in a Division I, Region 1 final at Byers Field in Parma, but due to season-ending knee injuries they'll be wearing street clothes rather than shoulder pads and helmets. "It's very emotional and tough for me, especially in close games when I see I could have made a difference for the team," Nunn, a 6-foot-2, 260-pound senior defensive end who tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee in Medina's first game of the season, said Thursday. "At the same time, it's nothing but excitement to watch my friends go out and play. I'm jealous, but I grew up with those guys, so to see them play their hearts out means the world to me. "It's hard not to get emotional, but you have to realize everyone is getting ready to go to war, so to speak. My dad (Robert, an assistant coach at the University of Cincinnati) told me when the injury happened, 'Don't let 'em see you blink,' so I try to stay strong in front of the guys. It's devastating for me, but there's 22 guys on that field that all put so much effort in. They were all supportive of me, so you can't let it upset you. You have to be happy for them." Shook, a 6-2, 170-pound junior outside linebacker who tore the ACL in his left knee, and Hathcock, a 6-2, 280-pound offensive guard who also suffered a season-ending knee injury, know the feeling. "It's been really tough being on the sideline not doing anything to help the team," Shook said. "It really eats me up that I'm not out there, but I know I still have another year. It would have been worse if I tore it my senior year." Hathcock, like Nunn, does not have another year of high school football. "It's not a good feeling because I know I could make a difference out there," he said. "It sucks not being out there with the people I grew up with. It mostly hits in the pregame when everyone is warming up and putting on their football gear. It sucks not being able to put on the pads again, or the helmet." The son of former Medina lineman Matt Shook, an All-Ohio pick with the Bees, Shook originally got hurt in Week 3 against Wadsworth when someone rolled into him and his knee bent backward. "I got right back up and played the rest of the game," he said. "I was still running on it. It hurt a little bit, but it wasn't anything that stopped me from doing what I had been doing." Shook then got COVID-19 and missed a Week 4 loss to Mentor, but was back on the field the next week against Brunswick. On the opening kickoff he went to cut and his left knee buckled, with an on-site doctor telling him he had probably torn his ACL, a diagnosis that turned out to be correct. "It was some big news," he said. "I knew this was a big thing that had happened to me, but when I come back (next year) I'm not going to let it affect me." Hathcock, the nephew of the late John Bell, an All-Ohio lineman and Medina teammate of Matt Shook, originally hurt his knee while wrestling as a junior, but it wasn't until Week 3 of the football season that the pain resurfaced. He had surgery on his meniscus midway through the regular season, came back to play in Week 9 vs. Shaker Heights but got hurt again in Week 10 against Solon, ending his season. Like Nunn and Shook, Hathcock has tried to stay involved with the team. "I'm always trying to help out the O-line," he said. "I'm mostly watching (right tackle) Pete Jarvis and looking at the (opposing) defense, helping them get through the game and protect the quarterback. I'm just doing everything I can while I'm injured." While their injuries were heartbreaking, Shook and Hathcock can only shake their heads at the bad luck Nunn has endured in his high school career. As a sophomore, Nunn tore the labrum in his left shoulder in a regular-season game against Mentor but put off surgery and continued to play, only to suffer the same injury to his right shoulder in a playoff game against St. Edward. That required one shoulder surgery in January 2022 and another on the other shoulder three months later, forcing him to miss the first six games of his junior season. Nunn was such a terror on the defensive line in four regular-season and three playoff games that he earned All-Gazette honors, with an even bigger senior year and D-I college scholarship expected to be in his future. All that came to an end when his left knee buckled in Medina's season opener against Stow. "I can't imagine that," Shook said. "Hearing that news, that was truly terrible. When I first heard and everybody was talking about it, I thought, 'Wow, that's just awful.' He was going to be such a big asset to our team. I felt so bad for him." For Nunn, the emotional pain was worse than the physical discomfort. "It was like everything was lifted out of me," he said. "You work so hard for so long that it's almost like a death, really. In a way, I really didn't know what was next in my career. "I was nothing short of expecting it," he said of a college football scholarship. "I didn't think there was any shot in the world that I wouldn't get one. What happened was the last thing in my mind that I thought would happen." Refusing to let the injury keep him down, Nunn was on the field in street clothes the next Friday and gave his teammates a pep talk prior to their game against Olentangy. That practice has continued prior to every game this season. "There's no way I could not be around these guys," he said. "I had to be there, not only for the personal coping, but for how much my teammates were there for me the entire time and how much time we had invested in each other. My role as a leader, they needed me there." Nunn's teammates are quick to acknowledge that. While grateful he has continued to push and support them, they also realize he's hurting inside. "He still tries his best to be a leader," junior Camden Sokolowski said. "He motivates us and he's our hype man. He's always the first one to congratulate us after someone makes a play. "I can't really imagine what he's going through because of how much love we all have for football. I know it's been extremely hard on him and I feel for him, but I can't imagine it. I know it's been heartbreaking, especially after bouncing back from double shoulder surgery. He was really hoping this would be a big year for him, so seeing it get taken away from him is hard." Nunn won't plan the speech he will give to his teammates prior to the opening kickoff tonight, but he will certainly deliver an impassioned one. "I let the emotions come to me," he said. "I'll probably say how tough of a game it's going to be and that not a lot of people expect us to come out on top, but the adversities we fought through the entire year, all the sweating together, all the bleeding together, that's something they can't take away from us. We have to give it our best shot. "I won't plan a speech, though. It comes to me when I look them in the eye." Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4046 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com. Follow him @RickNoland on X.