Charleses’ Brotherly Love Put on Hold for an Evening

Battered, bruised and dazed, young Deriek Charles returned for more punishment at the hands of his older brother, Joey.

Thumping sounds reverberated through the household as Joey threw Deriek to the floor, against walls and off furniture during their friendly games of football played on the living-room carpet.

“Yeah, I used to pound on him pretty good,” Joey said with a grin. “My mom always used to cry out, ‘Leave him alone, Joey,’ but Deriek didn’t want to stop.

“That’s what helped to make him as tough as he is now.”

Today, Deriek, 17, is a 5-foot-9, 170-pound standout tailback at Hart High.

Joey, 30 and a Hart graduate, is the defensive backs coach at Saugus.

The two will be on opposite sidelines at College of the Canyons tonight when their teams collide in a Foothill League opener that also is a matchup of the area’s two top-rated teams.

“We are real tight,” Deriek said of himself and his brother, “but we both have jobs to do and we know that. I’m going to do my best and he’s going to do his best.”

On the line for undefeated Hart (5-0) and Saugus (4-0-1)--ranked first and second, respectively--is a head start in the league race and Santa Clarita Valley bragging rights.

At stake for the Charles brothers is supremacy at home.

“It will be different going against my little brother and my old school, but I am looking forward to trying to stop them because no one has been able to do it so far,” Joey said. “But Deriek is going to go all out because he wants to show me what he can do.”

Deriek, Joey and their sister, Lisa, 26, live with their parents, Joseph and LaFaiol Charles.

Joey, a 1980 graduate of Hart and a standout running back, rushed for 1,230 yards as a senior. After attending College of the Canyons, he received a scholarship to Montana.

As a 5-10, 202-pound running back, Joey led the Grizzlies in rushing in 1983, his senior season, with 511 yards and four touchdowns. The following season he played with the Ottawa Rough Riders of the Canadian Football League.

He returned home in 1985 and was invited to training camp by the Dallas Cowboys and San Francisco 49ers of the NFL and the Arizona Wranglers of the defunct U.S. Football League.

Joey took a job as a campus supervisor at Saugus when he failed to make a roster. Before this season, he applied for a vacant assistant coaching position on Coach Jack Bowman’s staff.

“Coaching was always something that had been in the back of my mind. It was always something I knew I wanted to do,” Joey said. “I decided to give it a shot.”

He consulted with his brother before accepting the position.

“I sat down with Deriek and told him what I was doing because I knew we would wind up going against each other,” Joey said. “He told me he wanted me to take the job because he knew how much I wanted to get into coaching.”