LUV BASEBALL. Nope, the catcher pretty covered 90% of the base path BEFORE the ball arrived on the one-hop. He would have definitely been safe had he not had to check-up to avoid the collision. The runner would have had to make a serious hook slide with mega arm reach to have a chance at the plate given the base path blockage. Which, I think, goes above and beyond for typical HS play. And if he trucked the catcher he'd rightly be out.
By your logic (which I get and makes sense), the catcher should always block the base path because odds are, the runner will make a bad hook slide and NOT try to take him out. And if he does take him out he still gets the out. Seems like that goes against the spirit of HS baseball and no more collisions at home. But that's just my opinion. Which still gets back to: Can the catcher block the plate BEFORE the ball arrives? .