Kennedy Catholic football has ‘unfinished business’ entering 2021 season
Kennedy Catholic High School coach Sheldon Cross has been counting.
By the time the Lancers take the field for their season-opener Friday night at Tahoma, it will have been 475 days since they last played a football game.
While practice got underway on a chilly afternoon in Burien earlier this week, Cross took a moment to reflect on Kennedy’s most recent game.
It was Nov. 23, 2019. The Lancers were undefeated, having swept their Class 4A North Puget Sound League schedule with ease and routing their first two playoff opponents. They were the top seed in the 4A bracket, and favored to advance past eighth-seeded Woodinville that night at a packed Renton Memorial Stadium.
But, they didn’t.
The Falcons opened up an early four-touchdown lead, and despite a late second half push, Kennedy never caught up, dropping the contest, 55-42.
Kennedy became the first No. 1 seed bounced from the state playoffs in 2019, and the first eliminated before the semifinals in the WIAA seeding committee era.
“After we lost that game, they had unfinished business,” Cross said. “The last time they played … was a heartbreaking day. They haven’t stopped thinking about it since.”
The Lancers, with much of their core returning, set their sights on 2020, and looked forward to making a run at that coveted state championship trophy the following fall.
But, the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March, and eventually wiped out the football season.
It seemed for a while Kennedy’s talented group of seniors — which includes several players bound for Division I programs who could have opted to skip this season and enroll at their respective colleges early — would not get a chance to play another high school game.
But, when it became clear play would resume — though seasons would be shorter and programs would primarily play within their own leagues — the group returned, looking to end their careers on a more positive note.
“We wanted one more year,” senior receiver Junior Alexander said. “Our junior year, we thought that was going to be the year we would win it all and bring the school back their first (football) state championship.
“But, it wasn’t the outcome we wanted, so we wanted to stay back another year and just finish strong.”
Alexander, a four-star recruit and quarterback Sam Huard’s top target last season (67 catches, 1,328 yards, 24 TDs) has signed with Arizona State.
Huard, a five-star quarterback and the top pocket passer in the nation in the 2021 class, who threw for 4,172 yards and 56 touchdowns in 2019, is set to continue his career at Washington.
Four-star receiver Jabez Tinae (45 catches, 964 yards, six TDs in 2019) will also join the Huskies. Receiver Reed Shumpert will head to Washington State, and linebacker Shane Aleaga will play at Eastern Washington, among other seniors planning to play in college.
But, they still returned to Kennedy Catholic this winter for the opportunity to play as seniors.
“We have some unfinished business,” Huard said. “Before we all want to move on to the next chapters of our life, and take that next step, we know that we still have some stuff to finish up here, and we wanted to finish it out the right way and go win some games.
“We don’t have an opportunity to go win our first state championship, but we can go be the first undefeated team in this school’s history.”
All eyes will be on Huard during this shortened schedule, as he closes in on career state passing records he likely would have shattered in a normal season.
Entering the season, he is 746-of-1,218 passing for 11,475 yards and 132 touchdowns with a completion percentage of 61.2 in 32 career games with the Lancers.
He needs 1,300 yards to pass Shadle Park’s Brett Rypien — now with the Denver Broncos — for the most career yards in state history. Rypien threw for 13,044 in 39 games between 2011-14.
Huard is further away from Rypien’s career completions mark (1,006) and the career touchdown passes mark (173) set by Prosser’s Kellen Moore — now the offensive coordinator for the Dallas Cowboys — in 44 games between 2003-06 is also out in front of him.
Huard currently ranks fourth on the all-time passing yards list, fifth in completions and tied for fifth in passing touchdowns.
Huard said it would be an honor to be mentioned in the same sentence as quarterbacks like Rypien and Moore, but record-chasing has never been his priority.
“Just going out and playing the game I love is what matters, with the best teammates I could ever ask for, and going to play for Coach Cross and all of these amazing coaches — that’s what’s important to me,” he said.
With only six games on the schedule, Cross said the Lancers are treating every week like a championship opportunity, and his players have embraced that mindset.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve played, but this team’s hungry, we’ve been ready for over 400 days now,” Huard said. “We’ll be ready to go.
“It’s just so great being out here with this team. I love all of these guys. We’ve been putting in so much hard work, and we’ve just got to keep building on it every day, and keep getting better.”
Huard remembers that season-ending loss against Woodinville, too. He said he remembers walking out of Renton Memorial Stadium “like it was yesterday.” Now, nearly 500 days later, he and the Lancers can use that loss as motivation.
“We learned a lot from that game,” he said. “We’ve learned a lot every year. I felt like we were right there, we could taste it, and we could feel how close we were. So, with no state championship and no playoffs this year, we’ve just got to do what we continue to do and treat every game like a championship.”
This story was originally published March 12, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
