Everybody knows Johnny.

I found out I was the only one who didn’t know Johnny when I visited the Detroit Catholic Central campus a month ago for a game between the Shamrocks and Orchard Lake St. Mary’s.

There he was — little Johnny Liike, 13 years old, I’m guessing maybe not even a hundred pounds and 5-feet tall — running onto the field amidst the CC gridiron giants.

There he was racing out to retrieve the kicking tee to the delight of the crowd.

There he was, in perpetual motion up and down the sideline, something he’s been doing for four autumns, home or away. The Shamrocks next play Romeo in the Division 1 state playoff this weekend.

Johnny was born on March 5, 2002, the son of Tom and Annette Liike. The family also includes son Joshua, 12, and stepson Lucas, 25, a police officer in Warren.

“I knew within three months of my pregnancy,” said Annette, “that Johnny would be born with Down syndrome. Doctors asked us to consider an abortion, but our Catholic faith is important to us. We chose life.”

Annette, a youth and family counselor in the Oakland County Circuit Court — and “full-time mom,” she adds — says raising Johnny “is different, but it’s not any more work than I feared it would be.”

Johnny played his favorite sport for the St. William CYO football team when the Liikes lived in Walled Lake. They now reside in Farmington Hills, where Johnny is an eighth grader at East Middle School and Joshua in the seventh grade at Our Lady of Sorrows, the family’s parish.

Tom, a chemical engineer for Brenntag Coastal Chemical, wrote a letter to Tom Mach, CC’s legendary head football coach, asking if there was “some way Johnny could become a part of the Shamrocks’ tradition.”

Mack met with Johnny and brought him on board. “He does more for us than we do for him,” the coach says.

Fr. John Huber, CSB, president of CC, says the team adopted Johnny. “They love him,” he says. When Johnny was hospitalized in early 2014 with acute lymphoblastic leukemia at the Lloyd Carr Pediatric Cancer Center in Ann Arbor, he had a steady stream of players among his visitors.

“His room had full-size replicas of the players,” said Fr. Huber. “It looked like a locker room.”

Johnny takes a pill form of chemotherapy daily. “We’ve been told there’s a high probability he will be in remission by next April,” Annette said.

Johnny had “a special connection” with David Widzinski, 16-year-old sophomore linebacker who died in his sleep two weeks after the Shamrocks lost the 2012 state championship to Cass Tech.

“Johnny has helped the Widzinskis get through their loss,” Annette said. “They look at him and have good memories of David.”

When CC defeated archrival Brother Rice, 37-0, this season, Tom noticed Johnny wasn’t joining the celebration.

“Look over there,” Johnny said about the Rice team. “They’re so sad.” He went over and hugged assistant coach Richard Popp Jr. The coach responded with a long letter of admiration to Johnny. In his closing paragraph, he wrote:

“I have learned the greatest lesson of all from you. It is thoughts and feelings of others that often need to be put at the front of my thoughts and feelings. It is others and how they might perceive the outcome that is more important than my own.”

Johnny attends a religious education class and will be confirmed in the spring. Recently, the class visited a senior citizens nursing home, particularly those patients who were severely impaired.

“It wasn’t a pleasant sight for kids to see,” Annette said. Johnny volunteered to be the first to visit an elderly woman with a breathing tube inserted in her neck.

“Johnny wasn’t at all uncomfortable. He asked her questions, and she explained. You could see the joy on her face. Johnny showed his classmates they didn’t have to be afraid. They all had a great time.”

“It’s hard to put into words everything Johnny has meant to our family. He brings so much love and joy,” Annette said. “But God knew what we needed more than what we thought we needed.”

Don Horkey may be reached at [email protected].