Ledyard - It has been celebrated in song — the Beatles, 1970 — this thought of JoJo getting back to where he once belonged. Talk about life imitating art. Imagine: a real-life JoJo yearning to get back one day. And it turns out that JoJo Shumaker's journey back to the 06339 has helped produce quite a memorable season.

A season that carries on today at 2 p.m. in the CIAC Class M-Small football semifinals for the top-seeded and unbeaten Colonels (11-0) against No. 4 Wolcott (9-2) at Bill Mignault Field.

But it was the middle of his sophomore season at Ledyard, Shumaker recalled earlier this week, when the unthinkable became the inevitable. He would return to Florida, where he attended high school as a freshman, for personal reasons.

"Leaving the guys in the middle of the year hurt," Shumaker was saying, now the happy owner of 1,789 rushing yards, 39 touchdowns and a state-best 238 points here in his senior season.

His coach, Jim Buonocore: "He was 15 years old, a sophomore, and his first game as a varsity player, he ran for over 200 yards and I said, 'Man, we have something special here.' But I knew he had some personal things going on. He came to me about a week prior to him going back. He left on a Wednesday. That's it, he was gone."

But hardly forgotten. Buonocore checked Shumaker's progress during spring football at Fivay High School in Hudson, Fla. More than 100 yards rushing. Figures. What, there's not enough talent in Florida, they have to take ours up here, too?

"About the second week of June, my cell phone rings, it's JoJo," Buonocore said. "He says, 'I'm coming back.' I said — well, I can't say what I really said — but I was pretty happy. I remember him walking into the gym during summer workouts. He jumped right in like he had never been gone a day. The rest is history."

The rest is current events. Shumaker has reinforced the run element to Ledyard's spread offense, creating heartburn for defensive coordinators. Stop the kid with 1,800 yards … or the passing game with quarterback Ty Ebdon spraying it all over the place?

"We saw the development of Ty from freshman to sophomore year and we knew we had some skill kids on the perimeter," Buonocore said, alluding to his choice to transition from the Power I after Alex Manwaring graduated. "Everything kind of evolved to where we are now. If you look at our offense over the last two years, the production we've had from multiple positions, it's really been dynamic. You could make an argument that JoJo is the centerpiece of this offense in terms of production."

Not bad for a kid who began as a defensive end in youth football. Now he's 182 pounds of explosives with a lit fuse. Several schools, including UMass, Villanova, Southern Connecticut and Delaware State, are interested. But who knows if Shumaker duplicates the regular season in the playoffs?

"During practice, you can miss a block or drop a ball," Shumaker said. "But as coach says, in the game, there are no do-overs."

Happily, Shumaker got his do-over at Ledyard. And he's come back to write a beauty.

m.dimauro@theday.com

Twitter: @BCgenius