From the Bates brothers to Ka’Deem Carey to Bijan Robinson, Southern Arizona has produced many dominant running backs. A couple will face off in the regular-season finale.
At 7 p.m. on Thursday, Desert View (9-0, 5-0 5A Southern) hosts Flowing Wells (7-2, 3-2) with FW senior running back/linebacker Jayden Simmons and DV sophomore running back/free safety Jaylee Abraham likely playing starring roles.
“It’s amazing and it’s a joy to watch him and his teammates go through the season, the things he’s accomplished,” said DV head coach Robert Bonillas about Abraham. “He’s got great vision out there on the football field, so I’m looking forward to seeing what else he can do.”
Simmons has 1,100 rushing this season, on 106 attempts, an average of 10.4. He’s averaging 122.2 yards per game, has seven 100-plus yard games and 18 rushing touchdowns.
Both backs recently surpassed the 1,000 yards rushing mark for this season, Abraham in the Jaguars’ 41-7 win over Canyon del Oro on Oct. 17 and Simmons last week in the Caballeros’ 43-0 win over Sunnyside.
In his career, Simmons has 2,497 yards, getting 506 as a sophomore and 891 last year.
“It’s definitely been a goal of mine from honestly, my freshman year,” Simmons said about getting to 1,000. “But to get it, it’s kind of underwhelming now, if I’m being completely honest. Now that I’ve gotten it, I feel like I want more.
“It’s a little bit greedy and a little bit selfish to say, but I feel like I can achieve a whole lot more if I just keep playing my hardest, honestly.”
Simmons hopes to play in Division II for an HBCU next year.
Abraham has run for 1,299 yards on 129 carries, an average of 10.1. He’s averaging 144.3 yards per game, has seven 100+ yard games and 25 rushing touchdowns.
He also has 20 catches for 361 yards and three scores. He has 1,897 all-purpose yards, and on defense, he has 33 tackles and two interceptions.
Abraham feels that he can be the next Carey or Robinson and was very aware of when 1,000 yards was near.
LEFT: Desert View’s Jaylee Abraham (5) runs through the arm tackle attempt from Sahuaro’s Lamar Howell (78) on his way to a 60-plus yard touchdown run in the second quarter on Sept. 5. The Jaguars, behind Abraham, won the battle of the cats, dropping the Cougars 45-7.
“It felt great but I was trying to beat it the week before, but I came up short, but it felt great,” Abraham said. “Because as a sophomore, a lot of sophomores can’t do that, especially playing 5A football, so it felt great to do that and with my team, they celebrated for me and felt amazing to me personally.”
Last season, Simmons was second team All-5A Sonoran, and he was an honorable mention in 2023.
“He’s having a phenomenal year,” said FW head coach Brian Hook. “It’s been fun to see his progression, he played the last two games as a freshman, now he’s a senior now and he just kept growing, developing, and he’s a big part of what we do.”
Abraham made his varsity debut last season when he scored three touchdowns in the second half of their 29-28 win over rival Sunnyside after playing in the freshman game the night before.
The win started Desert View’s current 10-game winning streak that has led the Jaguars to get off to the best start in school history and their first region title since 1987, when they were 3A Division II.
It takes a pile of Sahuaro players to finally bring down Desert View’s Jaylee Abraham (5) during the fourth quarter, Sept. 5, 2025.
“It felt great,” Bonillas said about the school record start. “Obviously, you get to see how your hard work pays off, all the hard work of our coaches and our kids, from the summer on, so it felt good to see your community be proud of our boys.”
Meanwhile, Flowing Wells got off to a 6-0 start, the school’s best since 2015. The Caballeros won five games in 2024, three in 2023 and 2022.
“It’s huge, it was a lot of fun,” Hook said about the 6-0 start. “We got used to winning and it was just part of our what we do now and culture and it was a fun run.”
Flowing Wells dropped games to Mountain View and Cienega, but on Friday beat Sunnyside in time to right the ship before their trip out east.
Impressed with his younger rivals like Abraham, Simmons sees more elite running back battles in the Tucson area’s future with Marana’s Jeffrey Smith III, Mountain View’s Drake Davis and with Abraham being just a sophomore.
“I think everybody has a pretty solid running back,” Simmons said. “It’s just a lot of talent and a lot of young talent … So this next, like, what is it gonna be? Class of 2028? There’s gonna be a bunch of monsters coming out.”
