This season the 5-4 Patriot varsity football team did something it hasn’t done in a decade–finish with a winning record.

A lot of the players said this season stood out to them; seniors specifically putting up a huge number of rushing yards, receiving yards and amazing stats from young guys on defense led to this sudden success.

After having a losing record for a decade, senior running back La’Ron Eason, who rushed for 1,450 yards and scored 12 times commented on whether that motivated the team. 

“Yes because of how the program is viewed by other schools but also changed the mentality of players when they first joined the team,” Eason said.

The Patriot community commented saying a large amount of our success this year has been from the number of experienced seniors on the team. Coach Kyle Whitcher said he doesn’t think the team will have trouble next year with all the seniors graduating. 

“I don’t believe in rebuilding, just believe in reloading,” Whitcher said. “We will be another year deep into the coaching staff and will be more comfortable with the system.”

The Patriots ended the season with a 5-4 record. Senior slot receiver Bennett Diehl hauled in 26 passes for a total of 347 yards this season talked about why this season was special to him.

“It’s my senior year and I wanted to do better than my junior year. It’s also fun to win,” Diehl said.

Unlike all the seniors, junior quarterback Eddie Ahern will still be on the team next year. He thinks that the sudden success of this team was caused by the team’s chemistry getting stronger.

“Everyone getting to know each other and trust each other has played a big role in our success,” Ahern said 

A Lot of the teammates agreed when everyone agreed that our defense came in clutch this season; A defensive player that played a huge part was sophomore linebacker Eliott Murphy with 61 tackles, and he’s only a sophomore!

“I realized that this team was going to be something good Towards the end of the summer when a lot of people were showing up it felt like a team,” Diehl said.