This was a rough season for Marriotts Ridge varsity football; although this was a winless team, they had some hard-fought games and many moral victories.
In week three, the team had a defensive battle against River Hill, the fifth-best team in the county, holding them to 0 points in the 1st, 6 in the 3rd, and 7 in the 4th quarter. At one point the Mustangs were tied 14-14 in the 1st half against Atholton, the 2021 county champions, and scored 21 points attempting to mount a 4th quarter comeback in the week 2 game vs Mt. Hebron.
Along with the moral victories, unfortunately, there were a lot of bad moments throughout the season.
“Half of our captains got injured,” sophomore Lukas Jonner said.
This was very demoralizing for the team because the captains are huge leaders on and off the field. When they weren’t on the field they could only do so much off the field to fill that captain role. The most obvious low for the team was going winless.
“Losing was the worst moment because the feeling of when the game was over and we were not on the good side of the scoreboard every week just sucked ,” sophomore Zolan Parker said.
“When we lost the homecoming game versus Wilde Lake, the students deserved a better performance than what we did,” sophomore Jelani Anderson said.
Something that hurt the players was when coach McCulloh died, he was a huge part of the team and that loss struck deep among the players.
“When Coach McCulloh died, it shocked our whole team and it wasn’t the same without him,” junior Mekhi Hurdle said.
Although it didn’t seem like it, there were some good moments in this past season.
“The excitement of the days leading up to the game and the game energy was really good. Also in the games, the team played with a lot of heart,” Jonner said.
“Everyone got better from this season between working hard in training camp and working hard in the season,” Zolan said.
This is a great positive because everyone who was on the team this past year and is returning next year will have a better understanding of how to have better performances than the previous season.
The team did not win a game, but had some that were very close.
“The most winnable game was Centennial because we were so close in getting our first win,” junior Mekhi Hurdle said.
Centennial seemed like the most evenly matched school all year and the game was close. The Mustangs only lost by 4 points in the 28-24 thriller, and even maintained a lead for a lot of the game.
“Mt. Hebron was our closest game because we had a very strong fight at the end that showed we can beat them,” Zolan said.
Even though there were a lot of losses Marriots Ridge came close a lot of times and showed that they can win.
This past season was a bad season but next season the team will look to have a bounce-back year and shock the county. Teams will overlook the former 0-9 Mustangs and think they will destroy them, that is when the team plays like they always could to play the underdog role next year.