It would be like having a bye week, not a forfeit. Basically an exhibition game in the eyes of the VHSL. At the end of the season their total points would be divided by nine instead of ten.
Freedom - Woodbridge
- Thread starter pizzzzza
- Start date
Don't worry Freedom will play the best next year with Highland Springs moving up to class 6.
Highland Springs is not DeMatha. For that matter DeMatha could play both…. Have Highland Springs head coach contact Bill McGregor at DeMatha. In the mid 90’s Bill played Laje Braddock and Centreville on back to back weekends two years in a row. I am sure Bill would love the challenge. How about a double header at a major stadium: DeMatha vs Freedom of Woodbridge and Good Counsel vs Highland Sorings?
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I was wrong. It was Gonzaga that Catholic beat. They played Good Counsel just before Covid (L 7-0).
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I would love to see Highland Springs or Freedom play private schools if they would not get penalized for it. I believe it would be 2 good games. The fact is Private schools are popular in DC metro and Maryland but not in Virginia. In Virginia public schools are popular for high school football. Highland Springs gets plenty of their kids recruited to D-1 schools without having to play Private schools. Just check out University of South Carolina Juice Wells or Clemson University Malcolm Greene.
I would flip those two. Better games imo. But I don't guess it matters since it'll never happen 🤷🏻♂️
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I think the notion that DeMatha is that much better than our best teams in Virginia is completely misguided and untrue. There is absolutely no benefit or motivation for any VHSL school to play any WCAC school. The game is completely worthless. They played Phoebus two years after the Phantoms last won a D5 title when Phoebus' largest concentration of D1 talent had graduated and they only won by 4 points. If anyone remembers, the Hyattsville faithful went into that game falsely believing they would blow Phoebus out. This means had the Stags played one of Virginia's 2013 championship teams from D3 on up they would have most likely been stomped pretty easily at least twice.
I told him about it and he has no interest in what the national rankings say about his team. I’ve been talking to him on Facebook since Saturday
I have to agree with you because in every major national poll Dematha is ranked behind Highland Springs and only one or two spaces ahead of Phoebus. Same thing with Saint johns out of Washington DC.
You do realize, Highland Springs finished ahead of Dematha in the national ranking?! They also finished the head of Saint Johns. Good counsel also finished behind Highland Springs in MaxPreps but only five spaces Ahead of Phoebus.
I was told that DeMatha was going to approach Freedom about a regular season game.
If Jeff Overton has anything to do with the program, that is who I was talking to Saturday, and he said he has absolutely no interest in playing anyone out of the state!.
Is the link to the Washington Post report of the first Lake Braddock/ DeMatha game which DeMatha won in 1994. The next year Lake Braddock won. DeMatha was ranked #2 for both games and LB #5 and #3 in the second year. DeMatha also played and beat Centreville both years. Garfield had three games in ‘89, ‘90 and ‘91. Garfield, who won the division 5 state championship one of those years also beat DeMatha in one of them.
It is noted that up to ‘94 DeMatha had played almost 20 games with Northern VA schools with a record of 14-4-1 but this May date to the ‘50’s.
There have also been several more recent games with Tidewater and Richmond area schools.
It is noted that up to ‘94 DeMatha had played almost 20 games with Northern VA schools with a record of 14-4-1 but this May date to the ‘50’s.
There have also been several more recent games with Tidewater and Richmond area schools.
I can tell you that DeMatha went 3-1 against Stafford from 76-79 (played in the one win and one loss), they also went 2-0 against James Monroe in 78-79 (vaguely remembered this, confirmed on four seasons football site. Never thought about it back then but we played DeMatha, Good Counsel, Georgetown Prep and Bishop Ireton in 77-80, seems weird now, must’ve wanted to join the WCAC!
By the way, OldIndian81, you are “jailbait!” I am Silver Spring’s Montgomery Blair ‘64 and my wife is Arlington’s Wakefield ‘64.
The best years of your life are still ahead of you!
Well, “jailbait” made my day for sure! And after I just got a senior citizen discount at dinner!
How are you going to run up 112 points on someone and then refuse to play anyone out-of-state?
I would also ask him why he is not willing to play DeMatha in the regular ‘23 season since he scrimmaged them in August this year? DeMatha had one of their best defenses ever this past season…..
I kinda get it if there's some janky VHSL rule that's going to cost them points, though I don't think a team like that should have to rely on seeding. We play teams up there occasionally and only get credit for about half their wins.
Trust me seeding counts, no matter how good you are when playoff time rolls around. No good team such as HSHS, Freedom, Western Branch, or Oscar Smith wants to lose homefield advantage in the playoffs. If I were Freedom Coach he could opt to play Quince Orchard, they are the #1 public school in Maryland, Gaithersburg about 45 miles from Woodbridge. They are ranked 1 spot below Stonebridge on Maxpreps. It would be a good match up out of state and would help with points.
Ask him how many touchdowns first team Freedom scored on DeMatha? And how many DeMatha scored on Freedom?
I mention again: Mike Smith, head coach of ‘96 and ‘97 Hampton (Virginia’s best ever) wanted to play DeMatha very badly but the game could not be arranged. Mike Smith believed he would beat DeMatha-or anybody else. Bill McGregor, DeMatha’s head coach (started in ‘81) would play anyone. And has.
For me ‘96 Hampton was legendary. 76-12 and 51-0 in the state final four. Ronald Curry was like the Gonzaga/USC qb who just won the Heisman. Except Curry played every down.
OS did this just last year wdym lol. They got absolutely demolished and proceeded to roll the rest of the state with nobody coming remotely close to challenging them and they did it from the comfort of home until finals.
But again, for all the talk, nobody besides OS is willing to really challenge a true contender OOS. Not a pretty good team, not a great team, an elite team. Lots of people here have never bumped their head against the glass ceiling before so they think it doesn't exist.
It wouldn't cost them points, it just wouldn't count in the ratings at all. With Freedom having low player numbers I can see why they wouldn't want to risk injuries playing a big-time opponent for what amounts to an exhibition game.
But it’s not an exhibition game. Freedom is in a DC suburb. So is DeMatha. At a time when soccer games have crowds as large as hs football it is important that the 12 year old know which sport he and his parents wants want him to pursue. Several hundred people in the stands (I live 50 yards from South Lakes hs in Reston) is not the same as five or ten thousand. Or more.
Freedom needs to be tested. They need to find out how good they are. And also to see if they can actually beat, in the regular season, the one team that shut their first team out in the preseason. The DeMatha scrimmage was Freedom’s qb’s first game. He will be back in ‘23 with 950 points under his belt. But so will the DeMatha qb and one of the best defenses anywhere.
Hyattsville is just the other side of the beltway from Woodbridge. From one perspective this is as simple as beating another DC area school-not going cross state or cross country.
It is also not about losing a player to a private school. Today it may be about losing a player to another sport- to what the rest of the world calls “football.” And America calls “soccer.”
I don’t know the Freedom coaches. But this is a game they need to play. I grew up with football, not soccer. Games like Freedom vs. DeMatha are necessary today. If they are not played Friday night, a few years down the road, may be played with a soccer ball in the same stadium as “football” today. The Argentine victory last Sunday morning was truly meaningful. The one+ million on the streets of Buenos Aires will translate to an American stadium.
Freedom: play DeMatha in 2023. Regardless of the result the sport needs the publicity and passion a game like this will generate. A game like this only comes along once in a generation.
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I took it to mean it'd be treated as an exhibition game in their ratings.
From what I’ve been reading, they have absolutely no interest,whatsoever,in playing any private school and anything other than a scrimmage game. Their schedules will look very similar to the one they played this year. Seems to me, they don’t like private schools pillaging their program.
Again, I note the real pillaging may come from soccer going after the same athletes in the same school. And fans in the stands or on the sidelines. Many schools have fewer, perhaps far fewer players come out for a sport like football and many more for soccer.
Freedom vs DeMatha is a chance to generate interest, to attract both athletes and fill stands
Freedom vs DeMatha is a chance to generate interest, to attract both athletes and fill stands
Trinity. They finished 11-0 . Virginia Private school state champs. The Richmond area produced 3 undefeated State Champions (15-0) HSHS, (15-0 Dinwiddie), (11-0 Trinity.)
I saw that 96 Hampton Crabbers team play. That's the best high school team that I've ever seen play. I know Freedom was tough this year but I really doubt they could mess with that Ronald Curry lead team. The defense that Hampton had that year was ridiculous. Jarrett Green was a man among boys. Muffin Curry was a lock down CB. Freedom would have a big problem with Hampton.
ESPN you need to look at what may be the biggest public vs private matchup of my lifetime. I am 76 and go back to 40,000+ in the stands at RFK stadium for city championships. This is now the Mid Atlantic but has national appeal. Freedom is in league with ‘96 Hampton and Ronald Curry (they return their 60+ td pass qb.). DeMatha is loaded returning an outstanding Soph qb and jr tb and many others. I must note that in the many decades of USA Today ranking hs football only CA De La Salle had more top 25 finishes than DeMatha. Bill McGregor started this national excellence at DeMatha in 1981. He will still be on the sidelines as DeMatha’s head coach 42 years later vs Freedom.
This is an extraordinary matchup. A public vs private World Cup.
Deserves ESPN.
This is an extraordinary matchup. A public vs private World Cup.
Deserves ESPN.
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I’m not sure if Dematha has any top 300 prospects,but I know freedom doesn’t. there really aren’t very many top 300 prospects in Virginia period.
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From earlier in this thread, out of state, and/or private schools can provide VHSL ratings points, provided that the school meets certain criteria. Paramount to that is that they can not be a “residential” school.
Freedom may want to give their best player security and place guards at his house with a Not For Sale sign cemented into the front yard until the clock reads zeros and that kid has his Freedom diploma in hand. Good luck to the Eagles.
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