Lowellville quarterback Vinny Ballone might be Ohio high school football's best-kept secret

LOWELLVILLE, Ohio – In a village that calls itself "the best-kept secret in the Mahoning Valley," there is a quarterback who just might be the best-kept secret in the state of Ohio.

Lowellville senior Vinny Ballone has had one of the best seasons of any quarterback in the country, yet he has somehow flown under the radar.

Through nine games, the 6-foot-5, 200-pound senior has completed 70% of his passes for 2,655 yards and 44 touchdown passes to lead the Rockets to a 9-0 start. And if you notice that there was no mention of the number of interceptions he has thrown, that’s because there are none of which to speak.

That’s right – despite putting the ball in the air 233 times this season, he has yet to throw one ball to the opposition.

“It’s crazy to think about,” Ballone said.

The thought of a quarterback getting this far into a season in a pass-heavy offense without throwing an interception has his coach shaking his head as well.

“We are (through) game nine and he hasn’t thrown an interception yet,” Lowellville head coach Andrew Mamula said. “For a high school kid for as much as we throw, that’s a crazy stat.”

The two other quarterbacks in the country who are closest to Ballone in attempts without throwing an interception this season are Keegan Stover of Rabun County (Georgia) with 220 attempts, 2,400 yards and 27 touchdowns and Micah Alejo of Bishop Gorman (Nevada), who has thrown for 2,164 yards and 36 touchdown passes in just 155 attempts.

In Ohio, West Branch’s Dru DeShields has thrown just one interception in 262 attempts with 2,543 yards and 35 touchdown passes.

The fact that Ballone had not thrown an interception on the season wasn’t something that was even on the minds of his teammates until just a couple of weeks ago.

“Probably about Week 7, I was like ‘when’s he throwing that pick,’” Lowellville senior wide receiver Brady Bunofsky said. “I was waiting for it. But hopefully he doesn’t throw any.”

It isn’t like the Rockets are limiting the chances that Ballone throws an interception, either. That includes when Lowellville gets inside the red zone. 

While a lot of teams will abandon the pass game and try to move the ball on the ground as they close in on the end zone, the Rockets just don’t have the personnel to do that. What they do have is a quarterback they trust with the ball in his hands to make the right decisions.

“When we get to the red zone, a lot of teams want to pack it in and try to run it in and they don’t want to take risks, but we don’t see him throwing as a risk,” Mamula said. “He can run it if he needs to, he can throw it away. I think he trusts his receivers and he trusts our coaching staff that we are going to call plays to put him in a position to be successful.

“If it’s not there, he knows to throw it away and we have four downs. He knows we are going to go for it on fourth down most times.”

The trust of the coaching staff has been earned by the four-year starter as he continues to show improvement each year not just physically but mentally.

“As a junior and sophomore, he didn’t always make the right decisions,” Mamula said. “He made great plays because he is an athlete, where this year he is always making smart decisions.”

While the number that pops out is the zero in the interception column, Ballone’s 44 touchdown passes rank him first in Ohio, leading Medina’s Danny Stoddard by one. The 44 touchdowns would already rank him in the top 30 of all-time seasons in Ohio.

That’s not the only time his name will appear in the Ohio High School Athletic Association’s record book when the season is over. In a 62-20 win over Jackson-Milton in Week 5, Ballone threw nine touchdown passes to tie a state record held by nine other quarterbacks, most recently Drew Schiano of Riverside in 2019.

The numbers might show up under Ballone’s name, but he knows they don’t happen without the help of everyone else around him.

“You have to give a lot of credit to the coaches and the line blocking for you and the receivers too,” Ballone said. “I get them the ball and they catch it, they make a move and they down field and score.”

The Rockets are led by Bunofsky with 52 catches for 853 yards and 15 touchdowns, junior Mathew Lucido with 34 catches for 613 yards and eight touchdowns, senior Anthony Lucente with 28 receptions for 392 yards and 10 touchdowns and junior Braylen Dabney with 17 catches for 302 yards and eight scores.

And just as the wide receivers make the quarterback’s job easier, the receivers would argue that the quarterback makes their job easier as well.

“Having a quarterback of his caliber, as a receiver you can’t ask for anything else,” Lucente said.

For the quarterback and his receivers, it is like a childhood dream come true to be playing football together on Friday nights. The group has been playing together since they were little kids, with Ballone throwing the ball to his friends who are now his high school teammates.

“It really does help,” Ballone said. “Playing backyard football when I was little with Anthony, Braylen, all of my receivers, it really helps.”

Not only have the friends been hanging out since they were little, they started playing organized football as a group and created a chemistry on the field that has rolled over to their high school games.

“We have been playing with each other since fourth or fifth grade so it kind of builds over time,” Lucente said. “He kind of knows where we are going to be, and we know where he is going to throw.”

Those days of growing up together in a small town and hanging out with each other tossing the ball around forged a bond between these friends who see themselves as brothers. When one of them does something on the field, the others celebrate for him. There is no jealousy or animosity among the group.

“We are like a family. It’s not like we are just paying with a bunch of strangers,” Lucente said. “We are pretty close, and we get excited when somebody else scores and somebody else has their moments.”

That feeling of family is real for the Rockets, not just lip service. These are kids who have grown up in Lowellville, who hang out with each other and play video games together when they aren’t in school or on the football field.

“Some people call each other family and they get kids from all over the place, but we are actually family,” Bunofsky said.

And while it takes a group to have the kind of season the Rockets are enjoying, the focus will usually be on the guy who has the ball in his hands on every play. 

 But that hasn’t stopped Ballone from being himself. According to Mamula, his starting quarterback is just a quiet, humble kid.

“You look at him and he is the All-American boy,” Mamula said. “The kid that you let date your daughter. He gets good grades, and he says the right things. He is just humble. He likes to hang out with friends, and he is goofy.”

Well, that’s at least how Ballone is off the field. On the field? That goofy and quiet kid disappears.

“You wouldn’t know seeing him outside the kind of athlete and competitor he is on the field,” Mamula said. “Because on the field, he is cutthroat. He hates losing. But off the field he is a just an enjoyable personality.”

Ballone hates losing so much that he often wants to be in on defense, where he has picked off three passes this season as a defensive back. He also feels that playing defense helps his play on offense.

“I really actually like playing defense,” Ballone said. “I feel when I play defense, I play better on offense for some reason. I don’t know if it gets my blood going, if it gets me moving around better. I really like it.”

His coach is all for having Ballone play on both sides, as Lowellville – a school with just 61 boys total in the school – has 40 players on the team. And Ballone is one of the best on both sides.

“There are high-leverage situations where we put him out there because he is one of the best 11 (players),” Mamula said. “At the end of the day, you want your best 11 on the field, and he is one of the best 11. He saved our butt against Springfield because he made a great defensive play. He keeps producing, so we have to keep putting him out there.”

After going 7-2 and losing in the first round of the playoffs last season to Malvern, the Rockets set their sights on getting deeper into the playoffs this year. They will be one of the top seeds in Division VII, Region 25 when the postseason begins next week.

“It is really important to us,” Ballone said. “We came into this season after last year with a first-round exit. That is really what has triggered us into this year. That loss last year is really driving us to make a nice playoff run this year.”

A deep playoff run could also trigger more interest in the quarterback from colleges.

Ballone, who also runs track and plays basketball for Lowellville and carries a 3.94 GPA, hasn’t been on the top of the recruiting charts. He has received interest from a couple of Division II and Division III schools, but he knows that what he does in the regular season isn’t what schools will be looking at.

“You have to win those playoff games first,” Ballone said. “You have to show them that you can win, that you can lead a team on a playoff run.”

If Ballone can lead the Rockets deep into the playoffs, the state’s best-kept secret will get out.

Photo gallery (photos by Jeff Harwell)