Charger Rundown: John Morris 9/8/2026

0:00Hello and welcome to the Charger rundown, the show where each week we give you an update on all things Charger athletics. My name is Caleb Lee and I'm here to recap all the events in the Charger Sports World that happened this past week. The Hillsdale College football team started the season firing on all cylinders on Saturday, putting up its best offensive performance in years to roll past visiting McHenry, 55 to 24 and moved to 1-0 overall on the season. Hillsdale's 55 points were the most by the Chargers in a game since a 56-21 win over Alderson Brodus in 2019 and the most in a season opener since a 59-3 win over Ganon in 2007. The Chargers rolled up 497 yards of offense in the victory, including 314 on the ground, thanks in part to a huge day from Ben and Gisew. The sophomore tailback became Hillsdale's first player to go over 200 yards rushing in a game since David Graham in 2019, finishing with a career high, 212 yards on 18 carries.

1:07In Gisew rushed for 11.8 yards per attempt thanks to electric touchdown runs of 78 and 80 yards that saw him break multiple tackles and outrun the defense at the second level for scores that helped the Chargers pull away. Hillsdale started the game with a scoring drive, taking the opening kickoff in Marching 61 yards on 11 plays. Quarterback Colin McCarranon punched in the touchdown on a QB keeper from one yard out to get the Chargers on the board. McCrangery would answer later in the quarter to tie up the game at 7, but on the ensuing kickoff, the Bearcats made the mistake of kicking to the Chargers all-American return man, Shay Ruddy, who showed why he was named one of the best specialists in the country in 2025 by exploding through a seam and racing down the sideline for a 96-yard touchdown return to put Hillsdale back in front. The Bearcats tied the game up once again to start the second quarter, but Hillsdale dominated the rest of the half. McCrangery threw two touchdown passes in the quarter, a 35-yarder to Tut Caraco and a 7-yarder to Ruddy, and in Gisew added the first of his two long touchdown runs to give

2:10the Chargers a 35-14 half-time lead. Hillsdale continued to roll in the second half. The Chargers other quarterback, Eli Boyce, stood tall in the pocket against the rush to hit Ruddy on a 36-yard pass for the senior standouts third touchdown on the game. In Gisewy raced for a second-long touchdown to break 200 yards on the ground, and Boyce capped the victory in the fourth quarter with a two-yard rushing touchdown. McCrangery was 7-10 through the air for 109 yards and his two passing scores, while Boyce was 3-4 for 72 yards and his passing touchdown as well. Ruddy led the Chargers in receiving with 65 yards on five catches. Caraco added two catches for 45 yards. Freshman Will Simpson grabbed a 34-yard reception and senior Jonathan Metzger also made a nice 100-grab for 27 yards. Hillsdale played a solid game defensively led by junior captain Luke Pinola, who finished with a team-high 10 tackles, one and a half for loss, and a sack as well. Jadon and George A added a sack as well for the Chargers, Ryan Niska added a tackle for

3:11loss and a pass break-up, and Jonah Jensen chipped in five tackles as well for the Chargers, which held a dangerous McHenry passing game in check to help the Chargers pull away. With a win in hand, the Chargers will look to improve to 2-0 next weekend with another home contest against in-state foe Wayne State on Saturday at noon. It's the first meeting between the two programs since 2016 when Hillsdale moved from the Gliak to the G-Mac, but the 61st contest in a long series between the two programs that started in 1909. Be sure to come out this Saturday and support the Charger football team as they take on Wayne State. We're now going to cut to an interview with basketball player John Morris that Daniel and I recorded a couple days ago. So please enjoy. You're listening to Charger rundown on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. All right. Welcome to the Charger rundown. My name's Caleb. My name's Dan Daryngowski.

4:12And we have a special guest from the basketball team with us in our first interview of the season. Can you please introduce yourself? Hey, y'all. I'm John Morris. I'm a sophomore this year. I'm a power forward and a small forward. And I'm from Montgomery, Alabama. And these guys were nice enough to have me on the podcast. So yeah. Thank you, John. We're so excited and we're so grateful that you're here to be our first interview as we bring back the Charger rundown for the 2026-2027 season. Thanks for having me. All right. Let's get started. Just starting off. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself to give the audience kind of a feel of who you are? Yeah. Yeah. For sure. So like I said, I'm from Montgomery, Alabama. I found out about Hillsdale through when Jack Gokie beat Kentucky, those who years ago, that was a fun game to watch, but I found out about Hillsdale through that. And I loved playing basketball in high school, but didn't always know if I was going to be able to go to the next level.

5:12But my spring of my senior year, I just, I really wanted to play and I loved Hillsdale. I had been on a couple visits just for the school and was looking at coming here just for the education. And I loved it so much. And so I just sent Coach Bradley film and was just like, I'll do anything. I'll walk on. I'll, whatever you need me to do, I want to be on the team. And he was nice enough to give me a partial scholarship. And yeah. So it was, it was, it's been a really fun year. This past year being a far from home is interesting, but it is so worth it here. And I love it. Yeah. Speaking of home, how are you adjusting to this Midwest winter? I mean, coming from Alabama. Yeah. I mean, oh my goodness. I didn't have a winter coat before I came up here. So my first weekend, I like went to Monards or whatever, which we also don't have down there. And I got a jacket and it was, I was not expecting it to be very cold.

6:17You know, at first, like these first, this month, not today. It's today is not a nice day, but this first month feels amazing. Oh yeah. I'll be able to weather it because I came, I think it was like 98 degrees yesterday, which is ridiculous. Like here, it's like 80. This is perfect. And so for about a month and a half, I was like, man, this is awesome. It's like, it's pull over whether it's, this is great. And then it just kept getting colder and colder. And then it felt like my face was falling off as I was coming to class. And y'all are probably used to it because you are tough and you're from up here, but man, I mean, that first winter was miserable. But I got some more winter clothes. So hopefully we'll be good this time around. Yeah, it's definitely an adjustment. Yeah. Going back to what you mentioned a little bit earlier, how did you come to picking Hillsdale and compared to other colleges, like what really made you decide this is the place that I want to go? Yeah, you know, again, I really at first found out about Hillsdale because of Jack

7:20Colkey. But as a, as a dug into it, it was really my mom that really looked into it because there was like some special on Hillsdale after they were like talking about Jack Colkey. My mom was, I kind of brushed it off, but my mom was like, hey, wait a second. That's a Christian college. I'm going to go check into that. So we looked into it. And I wanted a Christian education because my faith is extremely important to me. But then also I wanted a very difficult education because I want to be challenged and I want to grow. And so Hillsdale has the unique combination of both. And so I can learn with a Christian foundation so that I can actually pursue truth to its fullest and not just kind of point at the truth in indirect ways, but we can go all the way and be like, no, we know the God is the truth. But then also I get to be challenged rigorously academically. And I wasn't really aware of how hard it was going to be, but then it was really hard. But I love it.

8:21I'm learning so much. So yeah, for academic reasons, Hillsdale really stuck out to me. But then I also really wanted to play college basketball. I've loved basketball ever since I was growing up. I have a twin sister. She plays basketball at Sanford in Birmingham, Alabama. And we grew up playing together. And so she was a big motive for me to play college sports because she's playing college sports. So I really wanted to play. And so I get to go to Christian school, go to a really hard school. And then I have the awesome opportunity of playing basketball. It's just, it's really just a dream come true. I love it here. Yeah. And you mentioned the education, which so many people come here for. Yep. And it certainly is difficult. You're not exaggerating. How do you balance obviously being a collegiate level athlete with this pretty rigorous curriculum that you're studying? Yeah. It's a lot. I really had to learn a lot of time management.

9:23I'm still not great at it, but getting there. But yeah, it's just, I really have to be intentional with my free time because there's not a lot of it. So even my time in the mornings, like I'll have to, I'll read my Bible when I wake up in the morning, but then I'll also get a little bit of study in them before I go to the gym. And then in the afternoon, I really don't have a lot of time to, I get to hang out with my friends, but when I'm spending my free time, I'm like, okay, I'm not just going to waste time on my phone or just playing video games. I'm either going to a study and do what I need to do for classes or if I'm not studying, I'm going to spend that quality time with people. So it's a balance of school and athletics and relationships and my faith. And so I'm lucky to get to balance all of that in here. Like I get to go to church. I get to go to this great school, but it's definitely been a challenge, but I'm definitely

10:25still not perfect at it, but just being intentional with every moment and not wasting time is how I would say I balance it. Yeah. I like that you said too, like how blessed you are like busyness definitely is a blessing it is looking at all of these opportunities to in a positive light, right? I mean, that mindset. Yeah, I mean, we just had like a team meeting. I started going to go and we were all bringing up words that we were going to have as like a mantra throughout the season. And so many guys brought up just like it is a privilege to get to play basketball and it is a privilege to get to go to the school. And so it can be easy for us to fall into the trap of, oh, I really don't want to do this work today. I don't want to I don't want to do this. But yeah, I get to do this. And so it's hard to think of that in the moment, but if you keep consistently repeating that like, hey, I get to do this then, yeah, it really changes your perspective because then it's like, no, I when I'm going to practice, I don't have to dread going to practice. Like I can love going to practice.

11:26Or if I'm studying, it's not like, oh, man, I have to study at night. It's like, no, I mean, I have friends who are busing their butt working at nine to five back home. And I get to code a college and play basketball. It is just such a blessing. Yeah, kind of jumping off. You said you came from a team meeting earlier where you guys were bonding and you did it. How does that go on in the season is through practice and then out the whole year, how are you guys getting together to work together to deliver results on board? Like how do we build team chemistry? Yeah. Well, I had the privilege, my freshman year, I lived with my teammates and I was right next door to the guys in my class. And so we got really close through that. But even with the guys that I'm not living with, I'm not living with any of my teammates this year, we just spend quality time together outside of basketball. Like obviously you spend time together in basketball practice and you fight alongside each other and you grow closer through just this shared experience of pain.

12:29But then you go and you eat together and you just spend just little moments, quantity time equals quality time. I don't have that quality time with my guys if I'm not just spending other moments outside of practice. So just intentional moments. And we can't always do that. We have busy schedules like I just said, but just little moments eating together, we eat a lot of meals together, especially dinner. That's probably where we bond the most. So just eating meals together, just going over to a guy's house and just not even having something to do. You just hang out with them. It means so much to people just for you to show up and be there with them. It's really good to hear. Yeah. And they put up with me. So it's fun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned your living situation. Yeah. You're in the sweetest year. I am. And you're in R.A. I am in R.A. But that's like, again, we talk about trying to balance basketball, academics.

13:29What's it like being in R.A. in the sweets? You know, I've only done it for about a couple of weeks now. But it's a pleasure. Again, I get to do it. The head R.A. Mac Moore, he was my R.A. Insumpson. He's Daniel's roommate. And he's a great guy. He encouraged me to sign up for being R.A. And it's just a privilege to get to. I don't want to be a police. I don't want to be a cop. I don't want to be like, hey, I'm a leader of you guys. Clearly, I'm not. But I just want to be a friend to the guys in the sweets. And it's gone good so far. I'm lucky to the guys that I am roaming within my room or football guys. They're great dudes. They're studs. And so it's nice to have those guys to kind of back me up. But it is a sacrifice being in R.A. I have to last weekend, I was on duty. And I couldn't go spend time with the guys on my basketball team because I was in

14:30the lobby of the sweets. But it's worth it. And I am just again, just so blessed to get to do that. So it's hard, but it's worth it. Going back, talk about some classwork. Hillsdale's a rigorous school. Right. You make a lot of memories with the struggle and embracing the challenge. Talk about favorite class, favorite pro, favorite essay. What academic things have you brought out that's really important to you? Right. So I'm trying to be a history major. And so I would have to say the history classes and some of the English classes too. I've probably been my favorite. My first history class was with Dr. Stewart, just Western Heritage. And it was just such a great way to kick off. That was the first Hillsdale class I ever went to. It was 9 a.m. on Monday morning. I had no idea what my classes were going to be like. And I got to Dr. Stewart's class. And I was just like, I didn't stop writing the whole time.

15:31There was just no, it was just so much information, but it was also interesting to me. I've grown to love history. So Dr. Stewart, who's now my advisor, his Western Heritage class was so awesome and really inspired me to keep going in that pursuit of me being a history major. So American Heritage with Dr. Smith, he is hilarious, but also just again, riveting. And that was really cool. So those two guys are probably my favorite two teachers right now. My favorite, I think my favorite assignment. I had to write my last great book's paper was on Confessions by Guestan. And that was for Dr. Fredericks. And I loved writing that paper because that book was so interesting. And I was just talking about how Augustin is the every man. And we can identify with him in our story of salvation. When he's in the garden of any picks up the book and he reads it, it's like God is speaking

16:34to him and he warms his heart. And he removes his heart of stone, gives him a heart of flesh, and he brings him to salvation. And that is just a microcosm of all of our stories. And so that's what I remind I say about. That was my favorite essay I've ever written. So yeah. I think it speaks to the specialness of this place. We've got obviously a talented athlete like you, but talking about Augustin. It's just such a crazy combination, but so impressive. Obviously, we're still a little bit out from the basketball season, but looking ahead, I know Daniel and I are excited. We're hoping to call some games. But we wanna know when you're on the road, what it's like to travel for games, because obviously half the season, you're not gonna be home. Right, right, yeah. It's difficult, you know? Again, I was a freshman last year, I was a red shirt, so I maybe haven't experienced it quite in the same way as the guys who are playing all the minutes all the time last year, but it is difficult.

17:35You have to, I mean, the road trips are long, you have to, again, you can't waste any moment. Even when you're on the bus, there's a big temptation, it's just like, I'm on the bus, I don't really wanna do homework, but no, you have to be intentionally, you have to do homework, you have to mentally prepare yourself for playing basketball. And then on the road, playing basketball in a different gym, it's some of these gyms are similar to our gyms, and a lot of them are not. And like the spacing, like I always talk about, there's like some gyms that are shooters gyms, and there's some gyms that are just not. And like if there's like a big space behind the goal, it's not a shooters gym, because you get the depth perception, it's off, but then if it's like a closed arena, like you and these arena, I love that place, because it's just like, I don't know, it's like nostalgic, it's like an old arena, it's so cool looking, but you know, it's hard to go on the road because it's a big sacrifice, you have to miss a lot of class, you have to make up a lot of work, and it's mentally and physically exhausting,

18:39getting back at like two a.m., and then you gotta go to class the next morning, and then you still gotta go practice, but again, it's worth it, but it's just you gotta embrace it. And yeah, it's hard, but I keep repeating that, it's hard, but it's worth it, but you know, it is. I'm very insightful, I'm learning a lot about, you know, it's kind of mentality that you have to have as a basketball player. Right. Looking ahead to this season, obviously you've got, and we'll circle back to this after this question, you've got three new freshmen. Yeah, four, four, four. Actually, yeah, so three recruits in a walk on. Yeah, yeah. What do we have to look forward this year for the Hillsdale men's basketball team? Yeah, I mean, those, I love those freshmen guys, they're awesome, they just, they bring an energy and a light to the team, they just are already just falling in, and just the team chemistry is already there. Uh, I think we're really gonna have a bounce back year. Obviously we didn't have the best record last year, we had some injuries and we had just some rough patches

19:40last season, but we really are working a lot harder this fall than we did last year. Coach Bradley has been emphasizing like, we're not gonna be complacent. He says the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. And he's like, we are not gonna do that. And so we have been bustin' our tail this fall, and we've been switching it up, but it's been good. We're wrapping up this first week of practice, and it was significantly harder than the last fall, but I really think it's gonna be, it's gonna be good for us. We have a lot of older guys, we only lost three guys from last year, so we have a lot of returns, and that's what's special about Hillsdale, the basketball team, we don't transfer anybody out, and we don't transfer anybody in. We grow as a team together. We are not like in this, in this day and age of NIL, there's just so many teams are, are piecemeal just together, and they kind of feel like A.U. teams, almost, where it's just like you're here just for a little bit,

20:42just because it's good for you, and as soon as they get and gets bad, you're out. We are not like that. We grow together as a unit and as a team, and because of that, we have a special bond that a lot of other universities don't have. And so because of that, and we have a lot of great leadership from the older guys this year, a lot of our, all of our front court is returning pretty much, and so they will just be so solid this year. So I have really high expectations for the season. Well, Daniel and I are both super excited, worry, just can't wait for these games to start. Yeah, me either. Before we close this interview, I want you to give a message to students, fans, charge your nation, whatever. Let's give me like a pitch, give me an encouragement. Let's get them, let's get them to these games, right? What would you tell them? What would you say to them to get them to show up, pack the stands? Oh, yeah. I mean, it makes such a difference when guys come to the games like our arena

21:44when everybody's gone for winter break is just not the same. It is not. But when guys are shown up to the games, like we just get hyped. Like guys from other sports show up to our games, and they're sitting on the other side. They're heckling the other teams bench. They're getting hyped when we get hyped, and they just, they feed off our energy, and then they give it back to us. Whereas if there's nobody there, then our energy is kind of fates. It's hard to maintain that energy. But when people show up, man, it is so exciting. And you know, I mean, it's fun to watch basketball. Like you should come just because it's fun to watch basketball. We have a great team. But just the environment, when we really get a lot of people in that place, it is special. And I just get chills just like thinking about when we have those packed out games, and everybody's just going nuts. We're in the warm-ups even, and like before we even started the game, and like you can just feel it, there's just a buzz in the air. And so come to the games. If not just for watching basketball, come for the environment,

22:44and just come to support us, because we appreciate it so much, and we need it, and it helps us out so much. Last question. Yeah. Oh. When we want to see, when is the first Hills O'Man's basketball game? Right. We kick off November 9th this year, versus Michigan Dearborn. It's home. So come support. It's our first game. Please come out. We would really appreciate it. They're going to be a hard team. But again, things are different this year for us. And we've really been making an effort to be intentional across the board of just working our tails off in the preseason. So if you all come to this game, I promise you won't be disappointed, because we have been working so hard to prepare for it. John, thank you so much. Thank you all. First interview. Thank you. Thank you. I think it did. For everyone out there, you've been listening to the Charger Rundown on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.