In 6A North you don't get much bigger than Lake Braddock @ Westfield for Week 1. Lake Braddock is the largest school in Fairfax County (and the 5th largest in Virginia). They lost a lot from last year but as always they come back loaded. They have 8 winning seasons in a row and 6 of them were 10-or-more win seasons. IMO, the best program in the VHSL to never win a state title.
They did lose their long time head coach Jim Poythress in a controversial debacle – but they will be ready to play led by SR QB Jack Darcy. Their new HC Mike Dougherty was HC at Dominon (2003-2007), Stonewall Jackson (2008-2013) and W.T. Woodson (2014-2016). He got Woodson into the playoffs last year after a six-year absence. He also had two good years at Stonewall – 2012 & 2013 – they made it to the 6A North regional semis in 2013 behind the strength of the awesome two-way player Greg Stroman.
Westfield is obviously coming off back-2-back state championships. They have made the playoffs 15 years in a row and have 6 consecutive seasons with 11 or more wins. It will be interesting to see if this is a rebuilding year or just reloading as they did graduate the majority of their star players. Lake Braddock has won the last two regular season match-ups (in 2013 and 2014), but Westfield bounced LB from the playoffs 3 consecutive seasons (2013,-14 & -15). South Lakes upset of LB last fall prevented a 4th consecutive playoff meeting.
I don't know that I would pick Westfield to win this game with SO QB Noah Kim making his first varsity start. I think the last time a SO QB started for Westfield was 2005 - now Chicago Bear's QB Mike Glennon.