Winds of change

Displaced by Hurricane Katrina, Brandon Price landed in Huntington Beach as Ocean View High’s quarterback.Early in the first quarter of Friday night’s football game between Ocean View and Estancia, Ocean View quarterback Brandon Price went around right end for a first down on an option keeper.

The lanky, 6-foot, 160-pound Price met the Estancia defense head-on, and the force of the impact knocked his helmet off. The 17-year-old seemed unfazed, popping up from the pile with a smile on his face.

Price knows something about resilience: He suffered a far more serious impact in late August, a vicious hit that sent him reeling across the country to Huntington Beach.

Price is a resident of Pascagoula, Miss., a city in the southeast corner of the state that was devastated by a 20-foot tidal surge from Hurricane Katrina.

The waters flooded the ground-level apartment Price shared with his mother, Danielle.

His grandmother, Carolyn Johnson, was even less fortunate: Her house was destroyed.

“We rode out the storm,” Price said. “When the winds started whipping, we were outside playing. I have never seen anything like it; it was crazy. It was just amazing at how fast something like that can happen.”

With the start of his junior year at Pascagoula High delayed by the hurricane, Price said his mother, who has relatives in Southern California, decided to send him West.

He settled in with an uncle in Huntington Beach and planned to attend Marina, but a cousin is a student at Ocean View.

So the track-and-field sprinter and football player -- who was set to inherit the starting quarterback job at Pascagoula -- ended up at Ocean View.

He became the starting quarterback for the Seahawks on the night of Oct. 7, for their homecoming game against Magnolia.

Price rushed for a pair of touchdowns as his team won its first game of the season, 31-24.

“It felt good to play football, to get my mind off everything that had been happening to me and my family,” he said.

Price said that the transition from Pascagoula to Huntington Beach -- the towns are “worlds apart,” he said -- is hard to think of as either difficult or easy -- it just happened. But the welcome mat put out for him at Ocean View has been a big help.

“I know all the cheerleaders and the players, and they’ve all been great,” he said. “I’m a pretty easy-going guy, easy to get along with. I’m homesick a little bit, but the people here at Ocean View have really helped me along. They’ve been great.”

Ocean View football coach Dean Yoshiyama, whose team had played four games prior to Price’s arrival, said the addition of the new player has been a nice fit in the program.

The Seahawks have gone 2-1 with Price at quarterback.

“It’s been a really, really smooth transition, mostly because of our kids,” Yoshiyama said. “The kids have been just great, and their attitude has been just awesome. They understand that Brandon is coming from a difficult situation, and they’ve really done everything they can to make this a positive experience for Brandon in the short time he’s out here. To his credit, too, he’s done a great job trying to fit in here. It’s got to be a culture shock for him.”

Price may present a cool façade, but he admits to some worries.

His home in Pascagoula is always on his mind. He worries about his mom, his grandmother and his cousins.

He knows he’ll be returning home soon. He says it’ll be sometime in December. He and his girlfriend are expecting a child -- a boy, to be named after Price -- in early January.

“There’s a lot that I’m looking forward to when I get home, even though things will be a lot different,” he said. “I’ll never forget this experience out here, but I have stuff to attend to back home. With all that has happened to me and my family, I know that from now on, I’ll never take things for granted.”20051027ioy4stknKENT TREPTOW / INDEPENDENT(LA)After Hurricane Katrina devastated his hometown in Mississippi, Brandon Price landed in Huntington and is now the quarterback at Ocean View.