QB Magazine Athlete Feature

Asked for the most memorable moment of his football career, Dominic Gonzalez picked a game his team lost.

It was a championship at 6U. His team was down seven with less than two minutes to go.

“I was able to score a touchdown on a long run to help us tie the game,” the Class of 2036 quarterback said. “Then on defense, I made a chase down tackle from the opposite side of the field to stop the other team from scoring.”

They lost anyway, by two, in double overtime.

“But I’ll never forget how hard I tried to help my team that day.”

There are two plays in that story, and neither one is the kind that shows up on a highlight reel with a trophy at the end. He tied a game he did not get to win, then ran all the way across the field to save a score in a game his team would lose regardless. He remembers it as his best day.

That is an unusual way for a seven-year-old to keep score.

Started as a Runner

Dominic has been playing for four years, since his dad signed him up for flag at four.

“I loved the feeling of running the ball and getting away from defenders,” he said.

That instinct clearly stuck — the play he remembers most is a long touchdown run and a chase-down tackle. But the reasons he gives for loving the game now have shifted somewhere else entirely.

“I enjoy making new friends through football,” he said, “and I like learning new things and getting better and better every time I practice.”

Friends and practice. Not games, not scoring. For a kid who got into this because running away from people was fun, that is real growth in what he values.

His definition of the position points the same direction: being a good leader, paying attention to detail, and always wanting to get better for his teammates. For his teammates — the improvement is framed as something he owes somebody.

The Work

For a second grader, Dominic has put in a serious amount of quarterback development. He has trained with Coach John at Throw First, Coach Caleb, and Coach Simba, and currently works with Coach Cut at Cut’s Elite QB Academy.

He has also been through the Left Coast Athletics MDW camp and camps run by NFL players Derwin James, Daiyan Henley, Ladd McConkey, and Kyren Williams — all four of whom play their home games in Los Angeles, a short drive from San Bernardino.

His favorite quarterback is a local pick too, and the reasoning is a nice snapshot of what an eight-year-old values.

“Justin Herbert. I admire his leadership, his toughness, and how far he can throw the football.”

Leadership first, arm strength third.

Dad

The person he credits above everyone has been there since the beginning.

“My dad. He has coached me since I was four years old, and he has taught me how to be a good football player,” Dominic said. “My dad makes sure that I always work hard and set a good example for my teammates.”

Setting the example, again. It keeps coming up.

His hardest test so far came at the Pop Warner National Championship Tournament last season, where the competition was a clear step up.

“Those games were very tough, the teams we played against were very good, but I did the best I could to play hard and never give up.”

This Season

Dominic is set to be the starting quarterback for the Rialto Hawks 8U Pop Warner team this fall, and he is looking forward to putting an offseason of work on display. His goals for it are simple and entirely within his control: clean up his throwing mechanics, learn his plays, get stronger, and make better reads as he gets older.

Away from football he plays basketball, spends time with his younger brother Damian, and gets to video games when there is time left over. He also earned the Principal’s Honor Roll award at school this year.

He is eight. He has a national tournament, a heartbreaking double-overtime championship, and four years of football behind him already — and the day he chose to tell us about is the one where he did everything he could and it still was not enough.

Kids who remember that game usually win the next one.

A Note on Memberships

Dominic is in second grade, with his first season as a starting quarterback just ahead of him. Nothing about his football future is being decided for a very long time.

What a QB Magazine membership does at this age is simply keep the record. A profile and an athlete graphic give his family a place where each season gets saved as it happens — the Rialto Hawks year, the camps, games like that 6U championship — so that years from now there is an actual account of how it all started. It’s a keepsake first and everything else much later.

Explore membership options at quarterbackmagazine.com/memberships.

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