CCAA Preview: Stone Ridge Christian Hooker hopes to build on impressive year

MERCED Football is the ultimate contact sport.

But playing the defensive end position is mainly about avoiding contact; it’s about knowing how to navigate around all the bodies and getting to the opposition’s quarterback.

Stone Ridge Christian’s Mark Hooker knows a thing or two about making his way around large numbers of people.

He’s a quadruplet.

“It has its ups and downs,” said the 6-foot, 208-pound Hooker, who helped guide the Knights to an 11-2 record and the Sac-Joaquin Section’s Division VII championship last season. “You don’t have a lot of stuff to yourself. But the upside is there’s always someone there for you. If you’re having a hard time, you know that your brother or sister has got your back.”

Hooker pretty much flew under the radar last season, a fairly difficult feat considering he led the section with 22 sacks (tied with Sacramento High’s Lonny Powell), a total that was good enough for fourth in the state and 16^th in the nation.

But he’s used to that, too.

Both of his brothers – one of the quads is sister Erin – play for the Knights. Travis, the first-born of the four, checks in at 5-10 and 180 pounds, while Adam, No. 4 behind Mark and Erin, respectively, is listed at 5-11 and 180.

This season, they’ll be joined by little brother Jordan, a 5-2, 150-pound freshman, who, get this, is a twin. That’s right, the Hooker family has a set of quadruplets and a set of twins (Laura is Jordan’s womb-mate) … all in high school.

Perhaps that gives a glimpse as to why Mark plays defensive end in the first place. You pretty much have to sack somebody just to get a meal in the Hooker household.

Whatever Hooker’s reason for playing the position, Knights head coach Art De Jager is glad that he does.

“When he walks onto a football field, the other team knows that they’re in for a tough, physical football game,” said De Jager, who took over as head coach in 2012, a year after SRC posted an 0-10 record.

Tough and physical. Traits learned around the Hooker dinner table? More likely at the Diamond H Dairy, the family-owned operation in Chowchilla, south of Merced.

“I think working on a dairy makes you a little tougher,” said Hooker, who also will play tight end for the Knights. “A lot of players live in the city and don’t work. They wake up late and sit around. My job keeps me physically active. I like that … and I can make some money, too.”

On the gridiron, Hooker earns his keep by sacking the quarterback. And nobody in the section did it any better last season, though even Hooker himself didn’t know how well he was doing.

He was surprised to find that he ranked so high.

“It was the last game of the regular season and one of my teammates said to me, ‘Mark, have you looked on MaxPreps? You’re, like, 18^th in the nation,’ ” said Hooker. “That’s when I first looked.”

So what are the expectations for 2015?

“My personal goals are just to do better than I did last year,” Hooker said. “I can always one-up myself. Not necessarily with more sacks, but just by being a better player for my team.”

Maybe it’s a good thing that Hooker isn’t aiming to better his sack total from a year ago. That seems nearly impossible, especially when you consider he’ll be a marked man after opponents read this article.

“Perfect,” said Hooker. “Let them know my name so they know who I am and they know who to watch out for.”

This story was originally published August 27, 2015 at 11:58 AM with the headline "CCAA Preview: Stone Ridge Christian Hooker hopes to build on impressive year."