SHEPHERDSVILLE – What was the new sport on the scene has become a good landing spot for a number of local players in the past few seasons.
Bellarmine University made another stop at Bullitt Central this spring to sign Joseph Sebastian for its sprint football program. That is the sport where no player on the field weighs more than 180-pounds. Otherwise, the game is much the same as the high school players are used to.
At first, Sebastian was not anxious to play at the next level. The main reason was that he did not want to play an interior line position. Once he talked with the Bellarmine coaches and they mentioned they saw him more as a linebacker, the position that he played with the Cougars. That opened up the chat and Sebastian opted to make the leap to the new sport.
“They contacted me,” the Cougar senior said after his signing in late April. “It was about a month ago. “I didn’t really want to play on the line. But they are saying I will play linebacker.”
Before the opportunity came up to play closer to home, Sebastian had been having some conversations with Kentucky Christian and Lindsey Wilson about playing the regular brand of football at those schools.
Being just up the road made Bellarmine attractive to Sebastian.
“The location and the fact that some other guys are going there,” he explained of making the final decision. “It is a smaller team than at Kentucky Christian so I could see the field sooner.”
Sebastian, the son of Christen Barnett and Jason Sebastian, will not turn 18 until August. Football started for the player when he was 6-years old and played with the Derby City Cardinals. He then played some middle school football for Stuart Middle School in Jefferson County, but then he moved in with his grandmother, Brenda Sturgeon who lives in Bullitt Central’s district.
With that change, which happened in the summer before his freshman season, Sebastian ended up playing four years of football with the Cougars with the last three seasons having him as a starter with the varsity.
While in college, Sebastian wants to work toward a degree in education with an eye toward teaching and coaching football.
Sebastian saw a lot of change in the football program while at Bullitt Central including the move to the new artificial turf field. That led to Sebastian’s biggest memory of playing with the Cougars.
“Winning the first home game on the new field against Garrard County,” he said without thinking about the question very long. “I caused the winning strip fumble in that game.”
While Bullitt Central only won three games over the last two seasons that Sebastian was in the program, the linebacker good numbers for the defense. During his senior season, he was second on the team in total tackles with 90 while playing in all ten games in the fall. That number included ten solo tackles and 80 assisted tackles. He also had three tackles for loss and one sack. The best numbers had Sebastian leading the team with four forced fumbles along with four fumble recoveries.
Those numbers were a big improvement over his junior season. He did compete in ten games that season, but he recorded only three total tackles.
Former Bullitt Central player Tyler White will be a junior with the Bellarmine football team this fall. Sebastian will be joined on the Knights by Cougar teammates Blake Draper and Aaryn Siroki in the freshman class.
Bellarmine is part of the Midwest Sprint Football League. The Knights have a scrimmage set for September 6 against Army in West Point, New York.
The Knights are coached by Harold Davis. This fall will be the fourth season for the program. Bellarmine is coming off a 4-3 record last season.