How Enochs twins navigated a new school on their way to football success
Anyone who attended the Modesto City Scrimmage couldn’t miss them.
Between 6-foot-4, 205 pound receiver and defensive back Kolawole “Kola” Babalola climbing opposing defenders to make a catch or 6-foot-1, 225 pound running back and linebacker Aboyomi “Yomi” Babalola running through tackles, Enochs made its presence felt that Friday afternoon.
Yomi and his fraternal twin brother, Kola were forced to start over when their dad got a nurse practitioner job in the Modesto area, leaving their friends and family behind in Houston, Texas.
When they arrived in Modesto, the brothers didn’t know anyone. But football was the one thing that helped them get more comfortable with their new environment.
“Football made it way easier because we met people over the summer.” Yomi said.
Said Kola: “We met a bunch of people before school even started in the summer conditioning program and then when school started, we exchanged friends.”
The twins have the same group of friends and they have all of the same classes. Yomi admits that his younger brother is the more outgoing of the pair.
“They were originally his friends,” he said.
Aside from being shorter, Yomi, who was born two minutes before his brother, looks every part the older twin. He’s working on a full beard. He enjoys working out and it shows, his shoulders fill out his pads already. Kola has a more wiry frame, perfect for a wideout who makes plays over the top of defenders, similar to what he does when he plays Madden.
The twins’ differences continue on the field. While both are standouts on defense, Kola enjoys making plays on offense.
The older brother relishes opportunities on the other side of the ball.
“I like hitting people.” said the linebacker, who has 61 tackles, a forced fumble, a fumble recovery and an interception.
The normally quiet Yomi is anything but that on the field. He announced his presence early on in his high school football career on the Eagles’ freshman team when he took the ball on a jet sweep handoff.
“I watched him just run through three players,” head coach Tracey Traub said. “Just lower his shoulder and run through them and I’m going, ‘This guy’s a player, he’s gonna be something.’”
Kola’s story starts in a similar way. The coaches sent him on a deep route and quarterback Keith Orona threw the ball up.
“Kola would just go make the play,” Traub said.
“There were two people there, and I caught it over them,” Kola recalled. “It felt good. I didn’t know I was going to catch it. The crowd was going crazy.”
“We knew after their freshman year that they were athletes and were going to be impact players for our program.” Traub said.
Their sophomore year, they skipped JV and were pulled up to varsity.
“Which was a bummer (for me),” said a laughing Traub, who was the JV coach at the time. “We were 8-2 and we could have been a lot better.”
The pair have taken their playmaking abilities as stars on the freshman team and turned them into college interest as seniors.
Both have earned Central California Athletic League First Team All-League honors in football and are rated as two star prospects, according to 247Sports.
Kola and Yomi compete on Enochs’ basketball and track teams. According to his Twitter bio, Yomi holds records in shot put and discus.
In their senior seasons, Yomi and Kola are two of the most productive players on the Eagles, whose 4-0 start was the best in team history. They’ve lost their last two games to Gregori and Pitman, and play first-place Downey on Friday.
Yomi has more than 595 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns on offense to go along with his stellar defensive output.
In his first three three games, Kola caught 17 passes for more than 589 yards and eight touchdowns.
The Babalola brothers are a big part of Enochs’ offensive and defensive game plans. Yomi keeps mobile quarterbacks from getting out of the pocket and running for additional yards while they rely on Kola’s athleticism at defensive back to play man on opposing team’s receivers.
On offense, if the two playmakers and Orona, who has had a breakout senior season as well, stay on the same page, they believe they will have success.
“We want to get the ball in the athletes hands and let them make plays in the open field,” Traub said.
Traub knows that the next four CCAL opponents are important as his team looks to make the playoffs for the first time in a decade.
“We’ve been telling our players ‘Our playoff run starts now, every week is that step to playoffs,’” Traub said. “Every week has playoff implications big time for us.”
Beating the Knights will be a tall task, but Kola texted Traub after the loss to Pitman saying he was committed to proving to people the Eagles’ fast start was not a fluke.
“I was really impressed with him to reach out to me,” Traub said. “It was good for me to hear from him to say ‘Hey, I ain’t cashing it in, coach. I’m ready to play.’”
