WYTHEVILLE, Va. – The George Wythe Maroons opened by winning four of their first seven games. They had a pair of losses to Class 2 playoff teams. The Maroons then caught fire, reeling off six straight wins, and capturing a Mountain Empire title along the way. In the Maroons 4 playoff wins they averaged 43 points per game on offense before falling in the state finals to six-time defending Class 1 champion Riverheads.
It was George Wythe’s first state final in a decade and the first finals trip for head coach Brandon Harner in his 9th season. The 1st and 10 Trophy Tour dropped in on the George Wythe high school during a signing day celebration.
Maroons Head Coach Brandon Harner is the 2022 WSLS 1st and 10 Coach of the Year. Coach Harner said all the hurdles during the season revealed a team that was set to be special.
“Each time that we lost those games our kids never got down. They never started blaming each other. They never started arguing with each other. We came in on Monday. We watched film and said all right – I gotta fix this. You know, I would get texts on the weekends. ‘Coach I messed up.’ And I knew that’s when you’ve got something special. And I didn’t care how far we went. When you have something like that, it means a lot.”
Harner and the Maroons graduate 9 seniors from a 10-4 team, that won the District and Region titles and finished runner-up in VHSL Class 1.