There were many open questions about the Yorktown Patriots prior to the start of the high-school football season.
That’s common any time a program undergoes a big head-coaching change, especially when the former team leader steps down after 40 years at the helm, winning hundreds of games and multiple championships.
Two girls fall teams at Yorktown High School enjoyed success in recent Liberty District tournaments, with each recording upsets along the way.
The second-seeded Patriots’ field hockey squad won the district title for a fifth straight time, with the third-seed volleyball unit finishing second in its tournament.
Few high-school golfers from Arlington teams have participated in the annual Girls State Open since the competition began in 2002.
This year, three broke through and qualified — the most in any season.
A fifth straight defeat resulted in a double-whammy of bad news for the Wakefield Warriors in Liberty District high-school football action on Halloween eve.
Wakefield’s 42-22 road loss to the Herndon Hornets officially eliminated the Warriors (3-6, 0-5) from a region playoff berth, and means the team will have a losing overall record in its final regular-season contest no matter what.
In existence since 2008, the Arlington Wrestling Club now has more growth potential after officially becoming a certified nonprofit organization in August.
“We needed to set up the club this way to follow more guidelines and make it [easier] to operate,” said club director John Leinberger, also the head wrestling coach at Wakefield High School. “This gives us opportunities for expansion and fundraising, and wrestlers can practice, work out and improve year-round.”
Sparked by a rookie runner’s success, the Yorktown High School girls cross-country squad earned a berth into the Virginia High School League’s upcoming Class 6 state championship by placing third in the 6D North Region meet on Wednesday afternoon.
The state meet is Saturday, Nov. 8 on the Oatlands Plantation course in Leesburg. Yorktown’s runners will be coming off two successful competitions, having earlier won the Liberty District meet on the same 2.98-mile Burke Lake Park course where the region meet was held.
The Yorktown Patriots won the Liberty District crown with the squad’s biggest victory of the high-school football season Thursday night (Oct. 30).
The host Patriots defeated two-time defending district champion and county rival Washington-Liberty Generals, 31-24, in a seesaw offensive clash that went into overtime.
Even if it’s just for bragging rights, there always is a lot on the line when hometown rivals Washington-Liberty Generals and Yorktown Patriots meet annually in high-school football action.
This fall, though, there will be much more at stake than just chest-thumping pride. The winner of Thursday night’s 7 p.m. showdown at Yorktown could end up being the outright Liberty District champion.
A blowout victory over the visiting Herndon Hornets has given the Yorktown Patriots the chance to win the Liberty District football championship in their final regular-season contest.
Yorktown (6-3, 5-0) will host Arlington rival Washington-Liberty Generals (7-1, 4-0) in a showdown Thursday, Oct. 30 at 7 p.m.
The most recent defeat for the Wakefield Warriors during the squad’s ongoing four-game losing streak was probably the most disappointing for the high-school football team.
The 21-7 setback at home to the Marshall Statesmen came Friday night (Oct. 24) in a Liberty District home game. Marshall (4-4, 1-3) had the worst record of the four teams during the losing stretch, and entered the game tied for last in the league with Wakefield.
The strategy of running as a tight group for large portions of the race helped the Bishop O’Connell Knights win two significant boys cross-country championships this fall.
The most recent was a state title, coming Tuesday afternoon (Oct. 21) in Newport News when the Knights won the nine-team State Catholic Cross Country high-school crown on the flat and tight-turned 5,000-meter Newport News Park course.
Having not played well on the same course two weeks earlier, Finn Watson said he had “no expectations” when returning to the Bristow Manor Golf Club to play in the Class 6 state tournament.
He proceeded to make the most of the second chance.
