Talk of Jamestown High athletics to begin this week should be about the girls cross country team’s Class 4 state championship Saturday. That gives Jamestown a staggering 41 state titles in 10 sports during its 26-year existence, far more than any of the other 19 Peninsula public high schools that opened earlier.
But the buzz on the internet and social media, locally and nationally, is about the Jamestown football team’s 104-0 loss to Phoebus on Friday in the Class 4 Region A playoffs. It’s a travesty the game was even played, or at the very least that all four quarters were played.
So, before heaping some deserved praise on Jamestown athletics, let’s unpack some baggage from the football debacle.
We’ll start by disputing two notions popular among online jockeys: that the Virginia High School League is at fault for this game happening and that Phoebus, which has won nine state championships in the past 22 seasons, “ran up the score” on the Eagles.
Yes, the VHSL approved football playoff expansion to as many as eight teams per region years ago, but it does not require eight and allows each region to determine its number of playoff participants. Class 4 Region A has only nine schools, and a perfectly allowable six-team playoff, with first-round byes to the top two seeds, would’ve ensured that unbeaten Phoebus (10-0) and perennially weak Jamestown (1-9) did not meet.
Just because region athletic directors were unwise enough to vote for an eight-team playoff does not mean this game had to happen. After Jamestown lost its final regular-season game 84-0 to a Warhill team that reportedly agreed not to rush the quarterback as a nod to sportsmanship, word is some Eagles’ parents floated the idea of forfeiting to No. 1 seed Phoebus.
Phoebus coach Jeremy Blunt says he hoped for that because his team had nothing to gain, and injuries to risk, by playing. The idea apparently did not gain enough support, and Eagles second-year coach Scott Lambin believes not honoring the bracket would’ve been a bad message.
“Despite mismatches or anything, we will never quit,” Lambin said.
Fair enough. Teaching athletes not to give up amid adversity or long odds is a worthwhile life lesson.
But, after playing four quarters against Warhill, then falling behind 84-0 at half against Phoebus, hadn’t the point that the Eagles are not quitters been proven? Was playing the second half and risking injury (apparently there were none) and a triple-digit defeat with the inevitable national attention that ensued, necessary?
Blunt said he signaled his administrators he’d be fine if the game were stopped with the score 56-0 after one quarter. He was surprised the Eagles chose to play the second half with the score 84-0.
Clearly, the Phantoms attempted to surpass 100 points when they had the ball and the opportunity in the final seconds of the fourth quarter, but to that point they had not “run up the score.”
Blunt did not even play his University of Maryland commit, defensive end Anthony Reddick. The Phantoms scored their first 11 touchdowns on only nine offensive plays. It would’ve taken just eight offensive plays to score those 11 touchdowns, but a punt-return touchdown was called back by penalty and Phoebus scored on a 53-yard run on the next play.
The Phantoms scored twice on punt returns, twice on intercepted passes, and scored the other seven of their first 11 touchdowns on one or two plays — all of them runs, save two swing passes. Jamestown lost four fumbles in that span on botched handoffs or punt snaps.
In short, Phoebus scored its first 77 points almost effortlessly. No Phoebus starters played on offense or defense after the first 16 minutes, and virtually all to play after the second quarter were third-string or junior-varsity call-ups.
That, and the running clock, slowed the points deluge, and the Phantoms scored only two touchdowns in the first 23-plus minutes of the second half to lead 98-0. Blunt, who rarely allows displays of flamboyance among his players, admits he gave in to his seniors when they asked him to let the reserves go for 100 points in the final seconds.
“I knew I’d get flak and I admit it’s not my best moment, but those kids wanted to make history,” he said, frankly, of the 29-yard touchdown pass on the game’s final play that made Phoebus the first Peninsula-area team in the Desegregation Era to score more than 100 points.
As Phoebus continues its quest for a state title three-peat, the game will be quickly forgotten by its faithful. That might not be so for Jamestown.
The Eagles’ 84-0 loss to Warhill generated no widespread discussion, so walking away at halftime against Phoebus would’ve prompted little more than shrugs. A triple-digit defeat tends to gain national attention.
USA Today and MaxPreps featured the result prominently. A post of the final score on X, formerly known as Twitter, by 757Teamz — The Pilot and Daily Press high school handle — generated more than 250,000 views.
“That’s going to hurt as they try to rebuild,” one area football coach said. “Their players are going to go to school and hear about that score on Monday, and some aren’t going to think that kind of thing is worth going through again.”
Not quitting is one thing. Absorbing punches in a fight you shouldn’t have been part of in the first place is another.
Hopefully Jamestown, which has been a state champ or runner-up (28 times) in 16 sports, will not long be remembered for that football game.
Jamestown athletics should be revered for producing some of the most legendary coaches in area history: Bob Artis (boys tennis), Doug Meredith (golf), Bobby O’Brien (boys soccer), Molly Shandling (swimming) and Tom Stephenson (girls volleyball) among them.
Its signature should be the students who show up in droves year after year to support basketball, soccer and, yes, football in numbers many other Peninsula schools can’t touch. Remember the raucous “Gang Green” crowds that filled the gym nightly during the boys basketball team’s run to a state final six years ago?
And, of course, the talk should be about the school’s phenomenal athletes. Athletes like individual runner-up Kylie Brooks, Raini Mayo, Emily Dahl, Claire Bauer, Hailey Shearer, Nettie Haines and Annabell Harris, who won the girls cross country state championship Saturday.
Forty-one state titles in 26 years is a number worth remembering.
