Culpeper's Harrison and Jones Commit to Apprentice Football (as seen on RecruitNoVA.com)

The Apprentice School football team has added two key cogs to its strengthened roster as Riley Harrison (c/o 2021, RB/LB, 5-10, 215) and Stewart Jones (c/o 2021, OL/DL, 6-0 230), both of Culpeper County HS, have formally committed to attending and playing football for the Newport News, VA school. 

Harrison, a first-team All-Northwestern District and second-team All 4B-Region player made the announcement on his Twitter account last Friday, while Jones committed three days later. Reached by RecruitNoVA.com last weekend, Harrison explained the thought process behind his decision.

“I learned about (Apprentice) through my coaches over the summer. I had seen a little bit on Twitter, but didn’t think much of it until we had a team meeting on a Zoom call with the coaches. Our team sat in our weight room and listened to Coach (Apprentice head coach John) Davis talk about the opportunities presented and the process of getting in. I immediately was interested and wanted to look more into it.”

Apprentice is a unique program that is linked with the Huntington Ingalls shipyard on the James River in the south end of Newport News. According to its Wikipedia page, the company, Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), is America’s largest military shipbuilding company and a provider of professional services to partners in government and industry. 

The school trains individuals in one of 17 trades linked to shipbuilding. Harrison will study pipefitting at Apprentice, which provides free education, as well as paying its working students upwards of $20 per hour for a career that generally begins with a salary of 50-60 thousand per year upon school completion in 4-5 years.

Athletics is an integral part of the “Builder” experience, and the school provides six sports for its 725 students. The football team has seen increased success in recent years with the hiring of Davis as head coach, and former NFL lineman Elton Brown as line coach and recruiting coordinator. Locally, Mason Tatum, former Stone Bridge standout at quarterback, has been leading the Apprentice offense.

Harrison said he hopes to play linebacker or running back for the Builders, but would be willing to play on both sides of the ball. Jones’ position with the Builders will be determined shortly.

L.C. Bird Boys Run Away With Class 5 Track Title

The feeling going into the Class 5 boys state meet on the first Tuesday afternoon of March was that it could turn into an invasion of the Birdmen – more specifically, the L.C. version.

Jayson Ward - (photo by Mary Ann Magnant)

On paper, the Skyhawks, led by All-State long sprint aces Jayson Ward and Matthew Spicer looked to dominate the 300, 500, and 4x200, possibly picking up as many as 40 points in the three events. Adding Luke Affolder and Jacob Plummer into the distance mix brought the possibility of another 18 points (1600), while Henry Asare was the top seed in the 55-meter hurdles. If the Hawks could pick up some wood in the field, they hoped to decide the outcome before the 3200. 

Even though the Hawks placed third in the 4x800 (8:29.48), it was William Fleming that took an early team lead, followed by Freedom-South Riding. However, the 1-2 punch of Ward (1:03.43) and Spicer (1:06.35) in the 500 gave Byrd 18 crucial points to boost their lead to 64–25 over Freedom, and put them in the driver’s seat to coast to the team championship on Tuesday at the Virginia Beach Sports Center.

Makai Lewis would move up from fifth with a 28.94 final lap to win the 1000 (2:39.50), and Affolder emulated his 1600 win with a victory in the 3200. 

Most notably, Ward and Spicer returned for the 300, just 30 minutes later (only because of a forced 12-minute break), and again finished 1-2. The effort left both runners sprawled on the straightaway inside of the track. Asked if that was their shortest ever rest between the two races, both runners breathlessly nodded in the affirmative.

When asked if they would be running the 4x400, Ward mirrored Lewis’ earlier response – “I hope not!”

Yet, Lewis came back with Ward to help Bird end the meet with an exclamation point, which ended with Ward out leaning Salem’s Camren Mitchell to take the day’s final event by .04 seconds in 3:27.04.

In all, Bird tallied 119 points, almost tripling the total of runner-up Freedom (42). Princess Anne pulled up to third with 40, and Fleming (39) and Atlee (38.5) kept the second through fifth-place competition interesting.