Still the underdog, Mount Vernon looks to extend season after remarkable turnaround

November 10, 2016 Sports
Mount Vernon football team

Mount Vernon and head coach Monty Fritts (center) face Centreville in the first round of the playoffs. (Lori Heltzel photo)

After clinching its first-ever 6A playoff berth three weeks ago, Mount Vernon has been brought back to earth in consecutive blowout losses to Lake Braddock and West Potomac. It’s a sign of how far the Majors have come, and how far they still need to go to compete with the best teams in the state.

Unfortunately for the Majors, their first-round playoff game offers no break from elite competition. Mount Vernon (5-5) travels to Centreville (8-2) on Friday to take on another one of the region’s superpower teams. This season, Centreville is the only team to beat Lake Braddock, and relies on a strong running attack to overpower opponents.

Mount Vernon senior center Chris Lambert knows what the Majors are up against, but said this year’s squad enters the heavyweight matchups with a mindset that anything can be accomplished.

“We’ve seen them on film, and they seem like a real big and powerful team,” said Lambert. “We’ll need everybody giving 110 percent and doing what they need to do and just fulfilling their job on the field.”

Lambert is part of what first-year head coach Monty Fritts calls Mount Vernon’s “Foundation Class.” It refers to the Majors’ seniors, including players like Lambert who have stuck with football even as the team took a lot of lumps in previous seasons.

Lambert credits Fritts for finding a way to optimize the team’s talent and motivating them to keep improving.

“We’ve always believed that we could be a lot better than we have been in the past,” Lambert said. “As a team [this year] we’re more united and have definitely practiced a lot harder.”

This year’s playoff berth marks Mount Vernon’s first in the 6A classification, which was established in 1986. It’s Virginia’s highest classification, and it’s meant that for the past two years Mount Vernon has been playing a schedule far more difficult than Majors teams in previous years.

Lambert said the achievement isn’t lost on him or his teammates, especially those who were part of the 0-10 season of two years ago and last year’s 2-8 campaign.

“We’ve never played in the Division 6 playoffs,” Lambert said. “It’s amazing.”

With a heavy heart

The Mount Vernon community is mourning the death of 2016 graduate Amari Newton, the sister of Majors junior star Derrian Newton.

Amari Newton, 18, died in an auto accident Saturday morning on Interstate 85 in Brunswick County, Va. Newton, a cheerleader and standout track and field athlete at Mount Vernon, was a freshman at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.

Derrian Newton will not be with the team Friday, but he has been on the minds of the team all week, Lambert said.

“This week we’re playing for Derrian and his family,” Lambert said. “It’s another reason why me and my brothers are going to go out there and give even more effort.”