By Daniel Carr, Staff Writer
Despite their loss in the state semifinals, River Hill celebrated a historic season. They went 9-1 in the regular season, and advanced to the state semi finals for the first time since 2014.
After Digital Harbor and Poly were disqualified because of an incident during their game, the Hawks played the Wilde Lake Wildcats. These teams had just matched up 2 weeks prior and the Hawks won 41-14. Senior Captain Nico Lancashire rushed for 2 touchdowns to give the Hawks the lead. He explained “Wilde Lake is a great team, I just feel like me and the rest of the Hawks wanted it more, the win meant more to us than it did to them.” Lancashire wanted to remember the final regular season game of his senior season and he made it a memorable one by finding the end zone twice.
In the playoff rematch, River Hills defense made a statement, posting a shutout against the Wildcats, beating them 35-0. Senior Captain Matthew Behrmann had a big part in this win at safety,and receiver, having a 40-yard receiving touchdown over the defender. Also, he had five amazing tackles, two of which were touchdown saves. “I just wanted my revenge game from freshman year,” Behrmann said, “when I was a freshman we destroyed them in the regular season, and when playoffs came they beat us, but this time we wanted it more” Behrmann liked the way the offense and defense were moving and he wanted that to be the case for the rest of these playoff matchups.
After beating Wilde Lake, the Hawks next opponent was an out of county team. The Franklin Indians went 7-3 during the regular season, but in the playoffs they really stepped up by upsetting the number 1 seed in the region, Bel Air.
After an intense game, the Hawks defeated the Indians 7-0. Their touchdown was scored by a long run by senior running back Eje Okojie. After beating Franklin, River Hill faced Damascus. Damascus is known for being consistently one of, if not the best team in the state. Coming into this game with 1 loss and 1 less win, Damascus was the three seed, but everyone on the Hawks knows that they can’t pay attention to seeding because Damascus is a huge team.
When Friday came, unfortunately, River Hill lost 42-7. Players and coaches were upset. Senior running back Ethan Burnett said, “This was a great season and although we didn’t get the outcome we hoped for, I had fun with my teammates and hopefully even without the class of 2023 River Hill can still be a good team.”
Burnett also explained that the team still has lifting in order to get better and stronger. This is mainly for the underclassmen because the seniors won’t be on the team next year.
This season is definitely one to remember for the Hawks. They have not made it to the state semi-finals since 2014 when they won the entire state. When asked about the team this season Coach Breaon explained, “I am extremely proud of these boys with 10 wins and just 2 losses and being the last Howard county team to still be playing is a great way for the seniors to go out.” Congrats to the team and hopefully they can be back and better next season.