HAMILTON — Arvie Crouch isn’t spending much time worrying about who isn’t wearing a Hamilton Big Blue jersey.
His attention is on the players who are.
After an offseason that included roster movement in both directions, Hamilton enters the 2026 football season with a group Crouch says has embraced the work, the program and what it means to represent the Big Blue.
“We got a bunch of great kids that love Hamilton that are going to play their asses off for Hamilton, and we’re going to have fun with it,” said Crouch, who enters his fifth season at the HHS helm. “These guys show up every day.”
That attitude has become the foundation of Hamilton’s preseason.
The Big Blue are coming off a 4-7 season that featured a late surge. Hamilton defeated Fairfield 14-7, Middletown 14-10 and Colerain 23-10 to close the regular season before its three-game winning streak ended with a 30-0 loss at Lakota West in the first round of the Division I, Region 4 playoffs.
A year earlier, Hamilton went 9-3 and finished 7-2 in the Greater Miami Conference.
Those two seasons showed both the potential of the program and the difficulty of sustaining success in one of southwest Ohio’s most demanding leagues.
This year’s team will have a different look.
Senior receiver Caleb Ahonen said he is the only returning starter on offense, leaving Hamilton to replace nearly an entire unit while preparing for another GMC schedule.
“I’m definitely taking on that leadership role,” Ahonen said. “All of these guys, they don’t know what it’s like on Friday nights. So as soon as we get into the season, I’m going to prepare them, get all the nerves out.”
Hamilton spent the summer building that group through weight-room work, practices and 7-on-7 competition, including a trip to Florida.
Despite the lack of returning starters, Crouch likes what he has seen.
“I think that offensively we’re way ahead of every year I’ve ever been here,” Crouch said. “Our O-line is pretty good. Our D-line is pretty good. And I think that our O-line is the root of our team. I think they’re going to take us as far as we can go.”
That line could become especially important while the Big Blue work new skill players into larger roles.
The challenge is different on defense.
Hamilton enters the season inexperienced on that side of the ball, and Crouch isn’t pretending otherwise. Instead of building the unit around individual standouts, he wants a defense capable of consistently handling the basics.
“It all comes down to doing your job and tackling,” Crouch said. “We ain’t got no superstars.”
Senior defensive back Quaylen Hamilton is among the players being asked to provide leadership.
Hamilton said the responsibility has changed his approach because younger players are watching how the veterans handle themselves.
“Motivates me a lot,” Hamilton said. “I got a lot of kids to lead, build up, make the program better. It makes me come with a better attitude.
“Come together, be brothers, have a family.”
That connection has become particularly important to Crouch after an offseason shaped by the increasingly fluid nature of high school athletics.
Players transferred out. Others transferred in.
Crouch called it a “weird world” as social media, recruiting attention and the perception of better opportunities elsewhere increasingly influence high school players.
Rather than dwell on it, Hamilton has tried to strengthen the group that remained.
“We got players still,” Hamilton said. “Despite everything that happens on the outside, we still got people here to play. That’s ready anytime, any day.”
The Big Blue is scheduled to open Aug. 21 at crosstown rival Badin before beginning GMC play Aug. 28 at Colerain.
Ahonen knows what awaits.
“You always got to be focused,” he said. “It definitely motivates us because we know every single game we got to bring it. There’s no off games, no game where we can take it easy.
“If we give our 100 in practice, in the classroom, at weights, it’ll add up.”
“I think we just got a bunch of blue-collar, hardworking kids that fought for everything they’ve ever gotten in their lives,” Crouch added. “They’re just good, hardworking, blue-collar Hamilton kids.
“They want to do their best for us. They want to do what’s best for their teammates. And they care about each other. And that’s a big deal.”
