Game Time Blog

I’d like to welcome all the readers on the inter-web to a new weekly feature on the Game Time Blog, Four Days to Friday.

What I and the other News & Messenger sports reporters (but mostly me, likely) hope to accomplish is to bring you more information on high school football in the form of quick, light nuggets Monday afternoons and evenings.

First, a quick explanation of the feature’s name. After mulling it over for most of tonight, a couple of us poor reporters came up with what we came up with. So why? Because Monday is just four days until football, of course.

Except this week. Six area teams will play on Thursday due to the observation of Rosh Hashanah on Friday. Prince William County teams don’t play on the Jewish New Year as it is considered a day of rest. However, three teams will play road games out of the county on Friday and one will play Saturday. The game Saturday? Between Fairfax Home School and Pope John Paul the Great, so maybe that was just scheduled that way.

With that out of the way, on to the first update here on FDtF (feel free to use that abbreviation yourselves, too).

Panthers’ Thomas recovering, could play Thursday

Potomac quarterback DeAirius Thomas was held out of Friday’s game after dealing with a stomach flu almost all of last week.

Coach Tony Lilly said Thomas “was in no shape” to play against Stafford and the Panthers fell 10-7 in the game and to 0-3 for the year. Not a good start for a program that is used to winning and just two seasons removed from playing in the state final.

Thomas worked out in shorts and his practice jersey and no pads Monday, but he was making all the throws necessary for the offense.

“I’m going to keep him a little light for a bit. I don’t want him to over-heat his body,“ Lilly said at practice. “I talked to him on the phone last night and he had a 103 temperature. He felt better this morning and came to school.

“It’s just my move that, as a quarterback, he doesn’t need pads on right now.”

David Grimm, a junior, replaced Thomas against Stafford and you’ve got to think the combination of how last-minute the change was made and the loss of Thomas’ experience contributed to the Panthers just scoring seven points.

Nothing against Grimm—for whom I have yet to see stats—but having Thomas under center might have meant breaking the early skid.

“I think we would have had a lot of opportunities,“ Lilly said. “Having a quarterback coming off a game like [Thomas] had against Battlefield (24 of 47, 297 yards) we kind of found ourselves in our offense.“

Lilly said Thomas could be ready for Thursday’s home game against North Stafford.

Things you didn’t know before reading this
Yes, this is a not-so-subtle rip-off/parody/tribute to Sports Illustrated’s senior writer Peter King and his Ten Things I Think I Think (click and scroll down to read this week’s edition). King’s version is a small part of his weekly Monday Morning Quarterback column on the NFL. It includes his thoughts on what just happened on Sunday, what could happen coming up and just other things rolling around in his head.

If you haven’t seen it yet, well, it’s almost required reading if you follow pro football.

Anyway, this is going to be aimed at that goal. The idea is to give you, the reader, an inside look at what I and our other reporters see at games, updates on players and teams and, like King, some random thoughts once in a while.

Now that I’ve rambled enough to earn that comparison to King as well, I’ll get to the point.

> After Friday’s 14-0 win over Osbourn Park, coach Mark Cox admitted that, although the gameplan was to limit OP’s time on offense, Battlefield missed opportunities to score.

The final could have, in my view, easily been closer to 28 or 35 to nothing than what was eventually recorded. After intercepting Dominique Terrell for the first time in the third quarter, the Bobcats fumbled during their ensuing drive, handing the ball to the Yellow Jackets on their own 5 yard line. Had Nagee Jackson held onto the ball, that could have put the game out of reach.

But it wasn’t just Jackson’s turnover. JoiQuan James gave OP the ball back on his third interception of the night. James was just about able to waltz into the end zone before getting caught at the 5 again. All that followed up a Bo Revell fumble at the OP 35 on a previous drive.

The Bobcats will have to shore up those mistakes or else they’ll be in for another short postseason.

> Speaking of Battlefield-OP, did you catch the gameplan against Terrell? The Bobcats basically dared the junior QB to throw the ball at all against them.

They lined up usually no more than six yards off the ball and stayed along the line of scrimmage while Terrell scrammbled. The defenders never over-pursued and kept Terrell contained, limiting his cut-back opportunities. He couldn’t keep the defense honest with his throwing, either, completing nearly as many passes to Battlefield (four) as to his own team (five).

If the rest of the Cardinal District wants to know how to beat this dynamic threat, they need to watch this game tape.

> OK, Stonewall’s defense officially scares me. The Raiders were waxed in their opener, falling 31-17 to Martinsburg (W.Va.), but since they’ve only allowed a total of 16 points, with 13 coming in a five-point loss to Gar-Field.

Stonewall held Hylton, a team that we expected to an offensive powerhouse this year, to just three points. Hell, they stonewalled—did you like that?—the Bulldogs by twice intercepting Jabari Dukes at the goal line. Hylton didn’t even score until the third quarter.

Of course, Stonewall’s offense scares me just as much—maybe more—and not in a good way. The Raiders didn’t cross the goal line until the fourth and against Gar-Field it was incredible how ineffective the passing game looked. Stonewall might be in a lot of games thanks to its defense, but the offense is going to be no help this year.