Apopka’s Isaiah Jackson has a state championship ring and will return to Orlando’s Boardwalk Bowl Entertainment Center for a rare fourth FHSAA finals appearance this week.
The senior left-hander was instrumental in the Blue Darters state title performance a year ago and in Apopka’s national high school championship victory last summer.
But what makes Jackson’s accomplishments in the sport even more astonishing is that sports success was the last thing anybody was thinking about when Isaiah was run over by a heavy dump truck at age six.
Isaiah was riding his bike on University Parkway in Bradenton, where the family lived at the time, and was following a woman biker on his way home. As they crossed the street, the truck driver saw the lady but never saw Isaiah. The truck smashed into the youngster and sent him sailing 29 feet across the road.
Sergio Jackson, Isaiah’s father, arrived at the location of the accident and watched his son airlifted to a hospital. Sergio was unsure of what the future held for Isaiah and feared the worst.
“I thought he was dead when I got to him,” Sergio said in an interview with the Sentinel last week. “I didn’t know if he was going to live or die.”
Isaiah was taken to All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg and went into a coma due to swelling in his brain. He had a stent installed to control the swelling. As Isaiah fought for his life, all Sergio could do was hope and pray.
While his son clung to his life, Sergio had to fight the emotions he felt.
“I was going to kill myself,“ he said. “I didn’t have anything else to live for.”
Sergio was hysterical and went outside the hospital to walk, where he met a homeless man.
“You know your son is going to be OK,” he recalled the homeless man telling him. “You just have to believe.”
The homeless man had Sergio write his name on the bench, and the two never crossed paths again.
“It was an angel for a homeless guy, who let me know [Isaiah] was going to be OK,” Sergio said.
From that moment forward, father never left his son’s side as he clung to the faith instilled in him from the conversation. A month later, Isaiah woke up. After spending three months in the hospital, he finally went home.
Ironically, Isaiah’s mother, Kalley Jackson, also was hit by a semi-truck at age 21 and was in a coma for three months (before Isaiah was born).
“It’s the greatest feeling in the world,“ Sergio said of seeing Isaiah wake up. “There’s not a feeling that can overcome that.”
Doctors told Sergio that Isaiah wouldn’t walk or talk again. But Isaiah beat those odds, withstood a grueling recovery and eventually improved to the point where he could compete in sports again.
He was accustomed to excellence as a wrestler, where he had won multiple age group state titles, earned All-American honors and competed for national championships. He remembers winning a tournament on Father’s Day, a fitting homage to his dad.
The elation that came with Isaiah’s wrestling accolades were forgotten when he was so badly hurt.
The traumatic brain injury that Isaiah incurred prevented him from returning to the wrestling mat. His search for a new sport led him to bowling.
Isaiah struggled at first. Even with the bumper rails up, he was repeatedly throwing gutter balls.
“You’re pretty consistent,” Isaiah recalled his father telling him.
Isaiah brought the same fighting spirit he had to survive the accident to learn the new sport. Under the tutelage of Palmer Fallgren, a former Professional Bowlers Association champion, Isaiah began to excel.
With no high school bowling programs to choose from in Bradenton, Sergio opted to move to Central Florida, and Isaiah tried out for the Apopka bowling team in 2020. Immediately, he caught the eye of veteran Blue Darters coach Doug Campbell.
“He’s a very dedicated bowler,“ Campbell said. “He just doesn’t stop. He just continuously tries to get better since he walked in the door as a freshman.”
As the sixth-place bowler in the 2022 state tourney and Apopka’s lone senior starter returner, Jackson is the leader for a team that started slowly but finished strong in the regular season.
The Blue Darters, who hold the state record for boys state championships with six in the past 10 seasons, won the District 8 tournament to again qualify for the state tournament, which begins Tuesday. Isaiah led his team with a 642 three-game series.
“No one expected us to do [anything],“ Jackson said. “We had to gear down, and we’re Apopka, so we knew we had to live up to a standard that is Apopka. So I think we did that.”
He plays the anchor role for Apopka in Baker system games, team efforts that determine bracket-play matches between the final 16 teams that compete for the state championship.
Isaiah was a Sentinel All-Area player as a freshman and junior. He spent his sophomore season playing for Tampa Bay HEAT, a squad of home-schooled students. He helped that team be the 2021 state runner-up.
With Jackson’s high school career winding down, he’ll set his sights on the college ranks. Bowling scholarships for boys are few and far between, but Isaiah’s 4.0 unweighted GPA positions him well for an academic scholarship that will allow him to pick the college program that best suits him.
And while the day Isaiah leaves for college is not far away, Sergio isn’t ready to be without his son.
“I thought I’d be able to kick him to college then not have to worry about it no more,” Sergio said. “But man, he’s my best friend.”
But in the grand scheme of things, Isaiah being able to pick the college program he wants to bowl for is nothing short of a miracle.
“It’s God’s will that I’m here,” Isaiah said. “I could not even be walking or talking right now. I could be in a vegetable-type state. To be here, it’s just amazing because you look back, I could not have gotten these opportunities if things were different.”
Varsity Content Editor Buddy Collings contributed to this report. He can be reached by email at bcollings@orlandosentinelk.com.
