Week 1 of the Texas high school football season saw four-star linebacker Prince Dorbah lead his Highland Park Scots against the Jaxon Smith-Njigba-led Rockwall Yellowjackets as they begin their quest for a four-peat in 5A Division I.
The Scots came away with the win in an offensive shootout for the ages, 66-59. Despite the poor defensive play from Highland Park and zero sacks from Dorbah, the 2020 commit did record an interception in crunch time that helped the Scots pull away in the fourth quarter.
Photo: Danielle Ellis
“Man, we have to get better as a whole unit,” Dorbah said about the defense postgame. “I don’t like getting scored 59 points on, we’re going to get back to work.”
The win gives Highland Park its third win in four years over Rockwall and a #1 ranking in The Old Coach’s Week 2 rankings.
Photo: Danielle Ellis
“I’m just glad we were able to find a way to win,” Dorbah said. “Everyone is just trying to find where they fit in with the new beginning and the new team we have.”
After Dorbah announced his commitment to the Forty Acres on July 9th, a domino effect started playing out as nine more have followed since then.
“As soon as I committed, a lot of guys started coming in. That’s one thing Coach Herman said, that I would be one of the leaders of this class.”
Since committing, Dorbah has taken on the role of recruiter, as he has been looking to bring on his fellow highly-ranked friends from across the country.
“I just do what I can do. I try to get a bunch of my goons that I’ve known for a while and recruit new guys. I’m still trying to recruit Jaxon [smith-Njigba], that dude is a dog. Whatever I can do to help guys feel better about Texas to come here, that’s what I’m going to do.”
As the 2020 class is beginning to take shape, Dorbah expressed his excitement for his future teammates already committed to play next season.
“I could name five or six guys to be honest: my dog Princely [umanmielan], Bijan [Robinson], Ethan [Pouncey]. We just got so many dogs coming in on defense, I’m excited.”
A big emphasis with Dorbah’s defensive class has been to set the mentality for future years when it comes to defensive performance in a conference that relies on offensive production.
“A lot of people say that the Big 12 has trash defenses, but they sleep. We’re going to wake them up. We just have to come in, put that chip on our shoulder and come in with the mentality that no one is going to come through us.”