In what was probably the worst display of sportsmanship I’ve seen in the 35 years I have covered high school football, Washington School beat Marshall Academy 53-6 to become district champions and advance to the top-tier championship bracket in MAIS AAA.
The bad sportsmanship didn’t result in any personal foul flags. It wasn’t committed by the winners in the lopsided game.
The bad sportsmanship came from Marshall Academy's lack of activity.
In what can only be described as a redneck move, Marshall head coach Chris Bunio sat at least 13 players, refused to attempt an offensive play in the second half, and lost on purpose.
While the move may have seemed brilliant to him at the time, I hope it results in his team being banned from the very thing they hoped to accomplish.
The MAIS competition committee restructured its playoffs for this season, and it created a two-tier state championship system. The winner of the game from Friday night would advance to the top-tier playoff for the real state championship, while the loser would fall into, and perhaps be the top seed, in the lower-tier, not-real state championship.
By losing in such a fashion, Marshall now gets to play for what amounts to a meaningless title.
And they seemed to revel in the decision.
One of the players on the sideline wore pajama pants while he watched his fellow teammates stumble and bumble through a hapless first half that saw them cross midfield only one time. That one time was for a touchdown only because the Washington defender fell on the play.
When Washington crossed the 35-point mercy rule in the first half and the clock began to run, Marshall took its time. There were five delays of the game penalties in the first half alone.
I stopped counting the number in the second half.
Washington’s longest drive of the game came on the opening drive of the second half. They ran nine plays with the backups in the game and scored. Turner Hitt even got a chance to kick the PAT and made it.
Those were the only plays of the second half.
Marshall, as they had all night, attempted to fair catch Reid Henderson’s excellent kickoff at around the five-yard line. They didn’t field a kick cleanly once.
Having already exhausted their three timeouts on the Generals’ first drive, Marshall then just stood behind the ball and took several delays of the game penalties.
Though those penalties inside the five-yard line could only be half the distance to the goal, making it physically impossible to cross the goal line going backwards, the referees somehow awarded Washington a safety.
Marshall then refused to attempt the free kick.
My son is a 10th grader on the team and has a decent amount of playing time in the mostly lopsided wins this season. My parents had driven 6 hours from South Alabama to watch him play. He spent most of the second half just standing on the field and waiting.
There were some highlights for the Generals. Max Morgan scored four touchdowns on his senior night. Rohan Thakare continued to be perfect on PATs this season, and he’s had a lot of chances with the number of points the team has been scoring this year. Cashion Doolittle scored his first varsity touchdown on a diving play into the endzone. Conner Parker got the biggest hit of the night on a kickoff return.
And the Generals played like they were supposed to.
They dressed everyone. They ran plays on both sides of the ball. They won the game.
Washington will now advance into the top-tier playoff and get a chance to play for the real state championship.
Everything else is just a consolation prize.
Jon Alverson is proud to be the publisher and editor of the Delta Democrat-Times. Write to him at jalverson@ddtonline.com or call him at 662-335-1155.
