MIKE BURKE
Allegany Communications Sports
It was a little more than a year ago Sunday as I was at the market buying produce for the week when an avid Fort Hill football fan struck up a conversation and with great concern asked, “How are they going to replace that line?”
“They” being the Fort Hill Sentinels football team that less than 24 hours prior had won the school’s 10th state championship in Annapolis, and “that line” being the offensive and defensive lines led by All-State tackle Carter Hess, who now plays for Fordham University, that was the most dominant part of one of the most dominant teams and dominating seasons in Fort Hill history.
“Why not just take some time to enjoy another state championship?” I suggested to my friend.
“I enjoyed it last night,” he said. “How are they ever going to replace that line?”
“Fort Hill seems to find a way to do that,” I said.
“I don’t know,” he said.
“I do,” I said. “It’s Fort Hill. It’s what they do.”
One year later, I did not see my friend at the market on Sunday. He must have been somewhere enjoying the Sentinels’ 11th state championship and fourth in a row, because that’s what Fort Hill delivered on Saturday at the Naval Academy with a 35-0 win over Northern Garrett.
And all credit in the world to the Northern Huskies, who despite the loss on Saturday, completed the most successful season in school history by reaching the 1A state championship game for the first time to cap an incredible fall season for Northern athletic teams, as the volleyball and girls soccer teams won their respective area championships, with the soccer team reaching the state semifinals and the volleyball team falling to state champion Clear Spring in five sets in the final.
Having covered Northern teams for over 35 years at the Cumberland Times-News, the school has long been one of my favorites because everybody at the school has always been so friendly and cooperative. On top of that, there is no better coach anywhere than Phil Carr, who coaches football and the great baseball program at Northern Garrett.
Numbers-wise, no one gets more with less than Phil Carr and all of the Northern teams do, but make no mistake, Northern is a school filled with quality student-athletes and people, and that was clear on Saturday as the Huskies controlled the clock against Fort Hill in the first half before going to the break trailing by just 7-0.
Fort Hill, though, put it to rest in the second with a big return by Tristan Ross on the second-half kickoff, a smothering defense and the spectacular and clutch running of Jabril Daniels, who concluded one of the great careers in Fort Hill football history with his fourth state championship, rushing for 247 yards and three touchdowns.
Daniels rushed for 302 yards in last year’s title-game win over Mountain Ridge and finishes his career with 80 touchdowns and just under 4,700 rushing yards. In the Maryland state playoffs era of Fort Hill football, name a great back – Steve Trimble, Shannon Trimble, Josh Page, Noah Read, Andre Pope, Ty Johnson, Brayden Brown, any of them – and Jabril Daniels is right there with all of them. In fact, there isn’t a season or a career record of theirs that Daniels hasn’t made his own.
As Carr said in his postgame media conference, Daniels has been the Sentinels’ money player. He’s the guy who delivers when the chips are down or, as Carr said, “He just bails them out sometimes when there’s nothing. He just cuts back, jump cuts a little bit and makes a big play. He’ll carry people, he’s a strong kid.”
Plus, the Sentinels did it with brand new offensive and defensive lines from a year ago with both units learning and improving on the fly against another very demanding schedule, particularly in the playoffs, using comeback wins against top-seeded Cambridge-South Dorchester in the quarterfinal and fourth-seeded Perryville in the semifinal.
Yes, the Sentinels, with a 7-2 regular-season record on the field, grinded through the state tournament in their road whites, having entered postseason play with a 2-7 record due to five vacated wins because of an ineligible player.
It was quite a demand to meet for a team that would have been the second seed in the class to being the bottom seed all through the playoffs, but head coach Zack Alkire and his staff again had their team up to standard, and the players did more than meet the historic challenge. They conquered it.
Alkire talked all season of this team’s “championship mentality,” as well as their desire to make their time together as teammates last as long as it possibly could because of their genuine love and trust for each other.
It’s been a team and a group of seniors who have faced unthinkable and painful adversity from the time they were freshmen at Fort Hill when teammate Saiquan Jenkins, the oldest brother of Jabril and Gamil Daniels, was stabbed to death down the street from the school. Yet they have depended upon each other and prevailed to make their time together as teammates last as long as it possibly could.
There has been no road too difficult for this team to navigate or to travel because they had each other, and while they are certainly as successful as any team at Fort Hill has ever been, this team will most certainly be remembered as one of Fort Hill’s most endearing teams.
Another season and another state championship in the books.
How will they replace that line? They won’t. They’re all coming back, sure to be joined by even more.
How do they replace Jabril Daniels?
You don’t replace Jabril Daniels. You remember him with fondness and respect, and you appreciate the four years you saw him play.
It’s nothing to take for granted, but it’s what Fort Hill does.
Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X @MikeBurkeMDT