Sonuyi Proves a Quick Study

Temitope Sonuyi wanted to play football. He wasn’t sure why. He was big and strong and in eighth grade and maybe he just wanted to hit people. Who knows why eighth graders decide to do things?

For his birthday present, Temitope asked his father, Abayomi, and his mother, Labake, if he could try out for Pop Warner. Yes, his parents said. Temitope was made a nose tackle. And he liked it.

A year later, Temitope asked his parents if he could try out for the freshman team at Esperanza High. Yes, his parents said, you can play high school football as long as you get straight A’s.

Temitope is a senior now. He was Orange County’s leading rusher this fall. He gained 2,492 yards. He is 5 feet 10 and 205 pounds. He is still strong, still fast. He is senior class vice president. He has gotten nothing but A’s so far. Nothing less than an A would have kept him on the field.

That’s how much Temitope loves football.

Here’s how much Temitope loves academics:

He is willing to give up football to concentrate on studying when he goes off to college.

“He’s a special kid with a great story,” says Esperanza Coach Gary Meek. “He has the ability to play football at the high Division I level. He also has tremendous academic ability. He has his priorities straight.”

So far Sonuyi has been accepted at Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). With his perfect academic record and his score of 1,490 on the SAT--750 verbal, 740 math--with his extracurricular record, with his football stats and class office, with his story--there is no school that wouldn’t want Sonuyi.

His parents came to California from Nigeria in 1980. Abayomi has a degree in chemistry from Kings College in London. His father had been an accountant in Lagos, Nigeria. “School was the way to become successful,” Abayomi says. “Of course, we never heard of football.”

Abayomi is a chemical engineer for Boeing. Temitope’s older brother, Tolulope, is a UCLA sophomore majoring in biochemistry. Temitope wants to major in computer engineering. MIT’s computer engineering program is ranked No. 1 in the country. Cal and Stanford, which have also recruited Sonuyi, are tied for second.

If all goes perfectly, Temitope would be offered a full academic scholarship to Stanford. He would try to play football but if the demanding classes of his major and the demanding schedule of football practice proved too much, Temitope says he would step back from sports to study.

“You know, it’s a little funny to me that this is a big deal,” Temitope says. “When I said I might not play football in college, I didn’t think people would find that unusual.”

But some people did. And that’s an indictment of our time and our priorities.

Abayomi says he has no objections to his son playing football in college or the NFL, if that were to happen. But he also wants his son, wants all his five children, to understand what lasts and what doesn’t. A football career will not last. An education doesn’t lose a step, doesn’t tear up a knee, doesn’t fade away to unhappy retirement at the age of 35.

When he was a child, Abayomi says, “We were told over and over that if you had an education you were rich. Nobody could ever take your education away from you, no matter what happened in our country.”

So that’s what Abayomi taught his children.

“Focusing on academics doesn’t seem that strange to me,” Temitope says. “The most important thing for me is to be at the place where I can best pursue my class interests.”

It has always been this way for the Sonuyi children. “The summer before my junior year,” Temitope says, “I went to Stanford’s summer environmental science program. I missed summer lifting and training and I know people thought that would hurt me with college recruiters. But it was something I really wanted to do.”

Abayomi saw his first football game when his son played in high school. In the Sonuyi home, you will discuss chemical formulas or what’s on the Discovery Channel before you debate the merits of USC’s new football coach.

“I knew,” Temitope says, “that my father meant it when he said I could only play football if I got A’s. He knew what I was capable of doing and would stand for nothing less.”

And now the son has only great options in front of him. Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Cal, UCLA. Those are the schools that interest Temitope, and they are interested in him. Temitope will take his time sorting through his options. Football scholarship or academic. East Coast or West Coast.

“I like football now,” Abayomi says. “Except when it becomes real rough. If he’s qualified, my son will play football and study in college. If he chooses, he will do both. If he’s qualified, my son could play football in the NFL. But he will also have his education. Then when he retires, he can do whatever he wants.”

Not everyone can have the perfect two-parent family, and a child who doesn’t can certainly succeed. But when you see what a father named Abayomi does for a son named Temitope, then you know how much a father can mean.

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com

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Temitope Sonuyi by the Numbers

1: Class ranking out of about 700 Esperanza students

2: He’s class vice president

1,490: His SAT scores (750 verbal/740 math). A perfect score is 1,600

2,492: Orange County’s leader in yards rushing

328: Most yards rushing in a single game, a county season best, in 32 carries Oct. 12 vs. Fountain Valley

30: Season touchdowns