Triple jump to triumph

While Carderick Johnson has many medals, championship rings and academic achievements to account for his success, the Junction City High School graduate faced many obstacles along the way that he said that he wouldn’t get through “without God.”

Junction City High School principal Joy Mason said, “He’s an outstanding athlete and student. He’s hard working. He’s pretty humble looking at all of his accomplishments. What sets C.J. apart is his art and how he cares about people. He definitely is driven. There’s not a lot that he would allow himself to say he can’t do.”

Johnson, who everyone smiles at and affectionately calls C.J., started his journey toward success as a Yocum Elementary Explorer. Teacher Monica Nash said that she remembers the young boy as “the fastest kid on the playground.”

“When I was really young, I stayed with my mom,” Johnson said. “They weren’t the best years for me. We were struggling at home. My mom didn’t have a job and she had food stamps, but she just didn’t really seem to know how to have it all together and take care of us. I’m not sure how my (younger) sister went through it, but I wouldn’t say she got picked on like I did. I got picked on a lot (for) coming to school dirty.”

Nash saw academic and possible athletic potential in the young student. She asked if she could help his mother take care of him and his younger sister, she said.

“We worked together … I could see that he just needed a little more structure and guidance,” the teacher said. “The next year, I taught an activity class so that I could still see him because I didn’t want him to not be in my room … He always says, ‘You changed my life,’ but really he changed mine. He opened my eyes to what kids could be if they were just given that chance.”

She said that she saw drive and determination in the “deserving student” who said, “I’m

“I’m thankful for her … and we still communicate today.”

Toward the end of third grade, Johnson and his sisters were taken into foster care and his older sister was placed in a home separately from him and his younger sister, he said.

“They just took us and said that we had to go with them. Imagine how that was being only eight-years-old and somebody just taking you away from your mom,” Johnson said. “We went to live in foster care for about year, half a year or something like that … In order to keep us from being separated … My older sister’s aunt took us in. We went to court and she filed for legal guardianship over us and I was thankful for that, too.”

Nash said that his aunt agreed that Johnson should finish school in El Dorado before moving to the border town. The teacher took personal days to see him and continued to check on him.

While living with his sister’s aunt in Junction City, a widowed mother of two, they were displaced for awhile after a house fire, Johnson said.

“A lot of people were helpful to us, but that was still hard on her, I know. She had already lost her husband, taking care of five kids by herself,” he said. “Her house had burned down, a house she had lived in for a long time. We had to go live with some of her people until she got a double–wide (trailer).”

He said that “she didn’t have it in her to take care of us anymore, but she still did it” and things just got worse over time. Her son attended church youth groups on Wednesdays and that’s when Johnson started attending Three Creeks Baptist Church.

“At the time, I wasn’t old enough, but I didn’t want to not be with him … Once I was old enough to be a youth group goer, I met Bubba (Curley). He was like really good to me. He was the one who saved me,” he said. “I still continued to go just because it was something for me to do to get out of the house … I didn’t want to be there, so every little thing I could find and do to get out of that house, that’s what I did.”

The youth group was also where he met Kyle Holmes, who filled the void his older cousin left empty. Though Holmes had known Johnson since the fourth grade, the family was introduced to him after taking him home from church, Lisa Holmes said. Kyle Holmes always invited Johnson to stay over his house because he understood his struggles, Johnson said.

“I knew (after) our first couple times hanging out he was different. He was one of those kids that help somebody out no matter what,” he said. “His parents were just as nice as he was and they didn’t mind it at all if I stayed.”

He didn’t get to play pee-wee football with his friends because his aunt couldn’t afford to pay the registration fee. While it broke his heart, he said that it “happened for a reason.” He started playing football in the seventh grade and was his only athletic activity until the eighth grade, when he joined the weightlifting team.

“As seventh graders, you have to lift weights … (During) my eighth grade year I don’t think I weighed 122 pounds, but I was strong enough to make the varsity weightlifting team,” he said. “By my ninth grade year, I was really strong for my size and very good for my size also. That’s when I started to see that God gave me talent and I continued to go to the youth group. Bubba, like I said, he spoke on it all. He made me realize that talent didn’t came from you, that it came from God.”

After the 2013 season, he said that he received a 2A State Championship ring for football and the Green Team award for being the most helpful varsity football teammate during practice.

“He’s always upbeat, always bouncing around like a super ball. It didn’t matter. In practice if we’re on defense … he was always over there with me on Green Team and trying to make the guys on the other side better,” Coach Dave Carpenter said. “That’s one of the things that people don’t see … He knew he had to be stronger than everyone else because of his size.”

He said that he joined the basketball and varsity track teams in the ninth grade, when he received his only 2A State Championship ring in 2014. He also got a 2A State Championship ring for weightlifting.

“I didn’t help win the (football) ring, but I did help earn the ring because I put in the work at practice … In track, it was a little bit easier because I actually contributed and played a big role in the team,” he said. “I got my first three rings (during) my ninth grade year.”

In 10th grade, he received his second football and weightlifting rings, got an All-State Track honor and broke the triple jump record at the Gurdon Relays. He said that by then he knew that he could excel in collegiate sports. For years, Kyle Holmes begged him to “get saved,” but he loved going to church on Wednesdays and Sundays. Holmes’ prayers were finally answered in December 2014, he said.

“It took me forever finally to say, ‘I need that. I need to be saved. I realize now that it’s the only way that I’ll make it,” Johnson said. “I was fired up for it and I was ready for it. We got together and it was on a Wednesday night. I got saved and from then, I progressively grew from there.”

Soon after he was saved, he bounced between friends’ houses, but he decided that living with Holmes’ family was “the most suitable environment to live in,” Johnson said.

Kent Holmes said, “It got to the point to where he’d call us in the middle of the night to come get him because something had happened where he was living. At one point he was here and he just asked, ‘Can I stay here?’ … We went to talk to (his aunt) and it was kind of heartbreaking because I went in and she said, ‘I know why you’re here. If you want him, take him.”

“It wasn’t too late for me, but I couldn’t say that my sisters were as fortunate as me. Them coming along is something that would’ve been helpful to me and both of my sisters,” Johnson said. "I’m just thankful for them, because I definitely wouldn’t be where I am without them. To be honest, ain’t no telling where I’d be. I just don’t think I would be as focused and as determined without them being in my life.”

The multi-sport athlete started on the varsity football team in the 11th grade and by the end of the season, he broke the school’s record for the most rushing yards in a game with 392 yards. Football seemed to be the sport that he would play in college, he said.

“He’s been a very valuable part to our athletic program … When school starts, he doesn’t stop,” Coach Carpenter said. “He goes year round for us and he’s going to be a hard guy to replace.”

Though he broke records in track, he still focused on football and hoped to get recruited. He couldn’t stand being on the sidelines due to a minor ankle injury, Kent Holmes said.

Fortunately, after performing well at conference and state track meets, Southern Arkansas University offered Johnson an athletic scholarship in track. The Holmes family and Nash have cheered him on in Junction City, but they look forward to cheering him on at the Mulerider Track Complex.

“Seeing him sign for his scholarship at SAU was probably the proudest moment because I knew that could happen and I’m so proud. He’s so great,” Nash said through tears.

Junction City doesn’t have track facilities at its high school campus, Kent Holmes said. Holmes and Nash are excited to see how Johnson performs at state-of-the-art facilities and on-site trainers.

“The older I’ve gotten, the easier it is for me to understand it, to be thankful for it and to know that even though I didn’t start off like this, I’m still one of the fortunate kids to be alive right now,” Johnson said.

Johnson plans to attend SAU and major in English and education before starting a career as a coach and teacher. Carpenter said that good coaches never start learning and “keep up with what’s going on.”

Brittany Williams may be contacted by email at bwilliams@eldoradonews. com. Follow her on Twitter and like her on Facebook @BWilliamsEDNT for updates on Union County school news.