Welcome back to The Deep Post, a weekly column recapping the week past and glancing at the week ahead!
Week 1 is in the books which means we’ll have some of the best overreactions to look at as fans ride the high or consider their seasons over.
But first, the action.
Beaver Blues
Bluefield’s loss to Graham was disappointing. Not the result, the way it transpired. I am a West Virginia based outlet so I’ll dissect this more from the Bluefield side before wrapping back around and giving the G-Men their flowers.
The 2025 Bluefield team was one of my favorites I had covered in nine seasons because they were young and genuinely improved as the year went on. For a lot of teams that’s a cliche but by the time late October rolled around the Beavers were rolling.
So little of that progress was evident Friday. The Graham-Bluefield games are always mistake-marred to an extent. But this was a different level for the Beavers. I pulled my stats from a year ago when Bluefield won 20-10. The Beavers committed 10 penalties for 65 yards while Graham was at nine for 61.
This year Bluefield committed 15 for 132 while Graham was at 12 for 81. I shared Bluefield’s penalty yardage and I believe some of the Graham contingent thinks that’s a nod at the officiating. It’s not. It’s a nod at how undisciplined the Beavers were much of the night.
I expect that to an extent in Week 1. The games matter, technique needs to be refined and operations are still a work in progress. Bluefield’s case in particular creates more room for error. Their offensive coordinator calls plays from the box, so it goes to a middle man who relays it to the QB who needs to take it back and make sure everyone on the offense gets the call. That’s the tradeoff for getting a clearer view and it’s usually worth a few delay of game penalties.
I can accept somewhere between 40-50 yards of penalties in Week 1.
Not 132.
And then there are the two turnovers, which led directly to 14 points for the G-Men.
Add in the poor body language and the arguing and you have a recipe for losing a game in which you outgain your opponent 463-347. That’s almost 120 more yards of total offense the Beavers accumulated but when you’re minus-two in the turnover column and minus-51 in penalty yards it almost nerfs that advantage.
During my camp tours throughout August several Bluefield players told me there was a lot of arguing during the final sequence of their 49-42 loss to Frankfort in the state title game and they worked to clean that up.
That progress didn’t show on Friday.
I suspect the Beavers bought too much of their own stock and it cost them in Week 1.
Here’s what I wrote earlier this month:
“Can the young Beavers avoid getting lost in their headlines?
All of those aforementioned blue-chip players (aside from Wilson), as well as fellow all-stater Ethan Thompson (left tackle) are juniors. Youth can cloud judgement and redirect the focus from a team-first mentality to a me-first mentality.
As evidenced when the 2024 Bluefield basketball team walked off the court and left the state runner-up trophy on the floor, this program and school mostly judge your legacy based upon the result of the final game of the season. “
Fortunately for them it’s easier to get a reality check in Week 1 than it is in the playoffs. Take the pageantry of the rivalry away and it boils down to they lost to a good team that out-executed them.
The Beavers, alongside Independence, still sit a tier above everybody else in Class AA with Frankfort possibly in that mix so their long-term projection don’t change much.
They’ll have chance to completely flip the narrative and exercise some demons this week when they host the defending Class AAA state champs in Princeton. Maybe playing with a chip will produce the same team we saw run through November untouched.
G-Men on top
A year ago Garrett Palmer was thrust into action at QB as a freshman. Coincidentally enough it was the second consecutive year in which a freshman quarterbacked in that game.
Palmer was efficient all around as a true dual-threat player and distributed the ball well. I don’t know what the landscape of of 2A football in the VHSL looks like but I do know Graham is a good team that had a well-designed offense that effectively utilized its skill players by getting them into space.
Of the five or six Graham games I’ve covered I’ve always felt like they do a good job of game-planning and catering an offense to the strength of their personnel.
It’ll be a fun game when they host Princeton later this year.
The qualities of leadership
A great general can settle his troops.
Independence’s 28-21 comeback win against Armstrong, PA. on Friday was the latest example of how Independence’s staff keeps its kids collected.
Trailing 21-7 in the fourth quarter, Indy answered the bell late but answered nonetheless. It follows a trend.
Comeback wins against Roane County and Bluefield in the 2021 playoffs, settling in and playing Princeton tight after yielding a kickoff return touchdown to open that game, comeback wins against James Monroe (down 17-14 at halftime) and Phillip Barbour (down 10-0) in the 2024 playoffs and now a victory against a good Armstrong team.
The kids deserve credit but we’ve seen entire classes cycle through yet the results remain the same.
Patriot Power
My biggest takeaway from the past two weeks is that Independence’s offense isn’t going to drop off despite graduating first team all-staters at receiver and running back.
I believe Bluefield’s Pax Calhoun is the area’s best receiver.
Indy’s K.J. Viars and Carson Treadway are No. 2 and 3 in my eyes and having that level of talent at receiver in double-A is game-breaking. Most teams aren’t equipped to defend that.
Now add in Pax Myers who had a 100-yards as a receiver and rusher.
Having three guys that can give you 100 yards through the air is an insane luxury and the only comparable team we’ve seen in recent memory is the 2023 Princeton team with eventual Kennedy Award winners Dom Collins and Brad Mossor as well as all-state running back Marquel Lowe.
That’s a good offensive comp and with a competitive schedule I’m eager to see how it plays.
Overreaction or Reality
Part of what makes each football game so meaningful is there are 10 regular season games max and the result of each can greatly impact your playoff positioning and seeding. After Week 1 lets go over some of the storylines from this past week and weed out overreactions vs reality.
Greenbrier West will finish well over .500
Reality.
After getting a look at the Cavs it’s evident they have the formula necessary to not just be a playoff team again but possibly host a postseason game. After a dominant 45-19 win over Wirt County at a neutral site, West looks primed to run to an 8-2 record at worst if it can stay healthy. The defense was good, the offense has options in the run game and the special teams played well. Buy in on the Cavs.
Princeton’s offense can be as good as last year’s
Reality.
I say that but I believe the means in which the Tigers achieve their production will be different than last year. While Princeton’s offense has become synonymous with the term aerial assault, and rightfully so after claiming three Moss Award winners this decade, there was a shift toward the run game in the postseason.
That was an effort to maximize and utilize Brad Mossor more but it also leaned into one of the Tigers’ biggest strengths – their massive offensive line.
The line is still really good again this year and probably the strength of this Princeton team. There’s also the expected regression at receiver. After boasting a pair of 1,000 yard wideouts, Alex Cox is the top weapon in the pass game but also has skills as a runner, similar to the mold of a player like Mossor.
Last year Princeton essentially started the season with a third string running back while the top two players at the position missed time with injuries. Cox and Jake Belcher did a good job as runners but it was clear that Princeton was always going to be a passing team in the regular season.
Now they have two talented, explosive running backs and a quarterback in Belcher who’s played both skill positions, linebacker and safety. He’s an athlete that provides juice in the run game.
They’ll still be able to throw the ball as Belcher’s a really good player but I’d be surprised if they retain the same vertical element they’ve had over the last six years.
They’ll be really good again, even great. It’ll just look different for the program that modernized the approach to offense in Southern West Virginia.
Midland Trail is in for a down year
Overreaction.
The Patriots will need to replace a lot of pieces but they’re starting a freshman quarterback while replacing most of their offensive line. The first two weeks can come with a learning curve but after that the schedule eases up for an inexperienced squad.
There were some positive takeaways from their scrimmages that I expect to become more frequent as the year progresses.
I’m not sure where the playoff cutoff in AA will be but with a schedule that features a trio of triple-A teams, there should be plenty of opportunities for playoff resume-building wins.
