Oct. 15—HATCH — The story goes, this was likely going to be the final play of Doug Flutie’s football-playing career.

He was a back-up quarterback for the New England Patriots, who had just scored a late touchdown against the Miami Dolphins on the first day of January in 2006, which was the last day of the 2005 season. Pats coach Bill Belichick, having learned that Flutie could execute a dropkick, sent Flutie out to attempt one.

Flutie converted, the first successful dropkick in the NFL since 1941.

And it’s entirely plausible that Flutie’s effort was the last point scored in this country, at any level, via a dropkick.

Peet Bothma doesn’t know anything about Doug Flutie, but he does know all about the dropkick.

To that end, meet one of the country’s most unique kickers: Bothma, a Hatch Valley junior, is a 16-year-old with a rugby background from his days growing up in northern South Africa.

And Bothma drop kicks PATs for the Class 3A Bears.

“It’s pretty cool to watch,” Hatch Valley offensive coordinator Mark Thompson said.

A quick search reveals that the last successful dropkick in college football occurred when Jason Milligan of Hartwick College hit one in 1998.

Another search — and there’s no way to independently verify this, given the thousands of high schools in the U.S. — says the last successful dropkick at the high school level goes back to September of 1963.

The next time someone does a search of this subject, they might come across Bothma’s name.

“We had a little camp for the kids in the community (in the summer), and me and my buddies were kicking the ball to each other. I said, I’m gonna drop kick it,” Bothma said. “The coaches saw it. One coach looked it up to see if it was legal.”

Indeed, Hatch Valley ran this by the New Mexico Activities Association, which Thompson said had to check its legality.

That’s how rare a dropkick is in American football.

And this wasn’t even why Bothma, who moved to New Mexico two years ago with his mother and younger brother — to join his father, Malan, a chile farmer in nearby Salem, N.M., who had already been in Hatch for three years — started playing football. Like most kids in South Africa, he grew up playing rugby.

“I had no experience,” he said. “I just wanted to play something where I could hit someone.”

Bothma did not play as a freshman for the Bears, since he didn’t arrive here until that season was nearly over. He certainly was built for this sport. He’s 6-feet, 200 pounds and is, head coach Manny Rodriguez said, the toughest of the Bears players. Bothma also plays middle linebacker and fullback, not surprisingly. Plus he’s the punter.

But it was this aforementioned camp where his unexpected kicking opportunity took root, and he’s been doing it all season for the Bears.

“We were just messing around,” Rodriguez said.

Bothma has even attempted one field goal (his range is about 35 yards), which was blocked, but Rodriguez said Bothma’s distance goes up to about 35 yards.

“Dumb luck,” Thompson said of how this distinctive addition for Hatch Valley came to be.

So far for Hatch Valley, which plays district rival Hot Springs on Friday, Bothma is 24-for-36 on PATs, and that includes one game in which he was 6-for-6. He stands about 8 yards back in the formation, takes the snap, rolls the laces if possible so they are facing the goalposts, drops the ball from his waist, and waits for the nose of the football to hit the ground.

Then he swings his right leg — pretty much exactly he learned to kick the rounder rugby ball in his younger years.

“I just think it’s cool,” said Rodriguez. “I just like having a little piece of what we had back in South Africa. Now, it’s like normal.”

Bothma hails from Limpopo state, and a tiny town called Modimolle, a couple of hours drive north of Johannesburg. Modimolle is somewhat larger than Hatch with many more trees; the desert look of southern New Mexico, he said, took some getting used to. But he has acclimated, and after two years in Hatch, he has practically no accent whatsoever.

Picking up football took some time for Bothma, whose first name is technically Petrus.

All he really knew was rugby. Last year, 2024, was his first in pads. And, he said, it was a slow start. “It wasn’t easy,” he said.

“It was very tough at the start,” he added. “They were calling all these plays and I did not understand what was going on. Took me half of that season to learn the basic plays we run. This year, I’ve caught on to everything.”

The drop kicking does require one specific thing: the ground where he is standing needs to be level, else it might squirt off in an unanticipated direction when it lands.

“First game, I missed the first kick. I missed a bunch of balls before I started getting the hang of it,” Bothma said. “I got good at it.”

And he only practices this minimally during the week. If you’re accustomed to watching a high school placekicker approach a PAT from an angle, with a holder, then witnessing Bothma’s routine is a jolt. A fascinating, entertaining jolt.

“I have fun with it,” he said with a smile. And he, like his coaches, was unsure if he’d even be allowed to kick this in this fashion.

“I didn’t think it was legal, to be honest,” Bothma said. “That’s why I didn’t tell anyone about it.”