Valparaiso’s Julian Stokes thinks he knows how Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan must have felt. Stokes woke up Friday morning feeling miserable and was unsure how he was going to play in the Vikings’ Class 5A sectional championship game that night. But the senior wide receiver found much-needed inspiration in Jordan’s famous “flu game” in the 1997 NBA Finals.
“Everything he was feeling then, I was feeling it,” Stokes said. “I was weak, sweating, and I couldn’t breathe. But if he can do it at a high level in basketball, then I can do it too.
” Stokes shrugged off his ailment well enough to rack up 128 receiving yards and two touchdowns as Valparaiso won its seventh straight sectional title with a 28-21 victory at home against Duneland Athletic Conference rival Chesterton. The Vikings (8-3), who will play at Merrillville (10-1) in another Duneland Athletic Conference rematch in the regional final, built a 14-0 first-half lead before Chesterton (6-5) tied the game just before halftime. The Trojans tied it again at 21-21 in the fourth quarter, but the Vikings went ahead for good on a late TD run by senior running back Thomas Burda , who complemented Stokes with 155 rushing yards and two scores.
Each of Stokes’ TDs unfolded in a similar fashion. He flew down the middle of the field, running away from coverage and giving junior quarterback Kellan Hosek ample space to find the team’s leading receiver. “We run those plays in practice all of the time,” Ho.