ROCKINGHAM – If one thumbs through the Richmond Senior High School varsity football team’s official 2018 schedule, it’ll bear a strikingly similar resemblance to the lineup that the Raiders faced last season.
As explained by second-year head coach Bryan Till, the Raiders’ 11 games slated for this fall will be against the exact same opponents from a year ago. The only major difference is that the location of the games will switch from where they were in 2017. The feeling of deja vu comes as a part of two-year scheduling cycles, which are agreed upon by both teams to face one another in a home-and-home series.
Fresh off the North Carolina High School Athletic Association’s second mandatory dead week, the Raiders are getting closer and closer to the season’s official Week 1 opener against Ronald Reagan High School at home on Friday, Aug. 17. But between now and then, Till and company are finalizing all facets of the team as the final week of workouts is underway.
Summer practices draw to a close
Players will workout every day this week, as Friday will serve as a makeup workout day for players wanting to achieve “100 percent club” status, which recognizes players who have attended every summer workout.
“I feel really good about the 100 percent club, as we have over 90 guys eligible (as of Monday afternoon),” Till said. “Last year we had only 34 make the club, and it’s so incredible how the kids have bought in and participated.
“We have a chance to have over 100 in the club, since there were some kids who missed just one workout,” he added. “If they go Friday to make it up, they’ll be in it. I’m proud of their dedication, and the kids have really taken ownership.”
This week will be the first week of regularly scheduled workouts that won’t see any 7-on-7 scrimmages. But there will be some next week as Richmond will officially begin its season on Monday, July 30. Till noted that the first week will still not be a “full-go practice,” as players must practice a certain number of days in helmets and pads before full contact is allowed.
In the meantime, Till said the team will focus “a lot more on offense and defense,” and incorporate some special teams drills with long snappers and punters.
“We’re really getting ready for next week as we start prepping for the start of official practice,” Till noted.
Richmond will have two more preseason scrimmages ahead of hosting the Reagan Raiders in Week 1. On Wednesday, Aug. 8, the Raiders will welcome in Anson County, Marlboro County (S.C.) and Mooresville high schools for a four-team scrimmage. Junior varsity will start at 5 p.m., followed by varsity playing all three of the other teams at 6 p.m.
The field will be broken up into two, 40-yard fields, as full contact will be allowed. The scrimmage will run on a format of 20 plays of both offense and defense against each team, which Till explained as almost getting a “full game’s worth of plays.” No special teams will be used during the games.
Two days later, on Friday, Aug. 10, Richmond will travel to BB&T Field at Wake Forest University to play East Forsyth High School (Kernersville, N.C.). Kickoff is schedule for 6:30 p.m., give or take a couple of minutes due to prior games, and the Raiders will play two full quarters of legitimate football. The full field will be used, as well as special teams, and Till said both scrimmage dates will be a good way to assess and prepare players for the season’s first game.
Breaking down the 2018 schedule
Before being hired as Richmond’s head football coach two winters ago, the Raiders’ schedules for 2017 and 2018 were already locked up and laid out upon his arrival. And while he was hard at work this spring setting up the schedules for the 2019 and 2020 seasons, Till’s primary focus is on the 11 games that separate Richmond and the NCHSAA 4AA state playoffs.
The Raiders will start with four non-conference games, two at home and two on the road, before closing the season with seven consecutive Sandhills Athletic Conference games. Following Reagan at home, the Raiders will travel to two-time defending state champion Wake Forest High School (Aug. 24), host Pine Forest High School in Week 3 (Aug. 31), before hitting the road to David W. Butler High School for Week 4 (Sept. 7).
“We’ve got an outstanding strength of schedule,” Till noted of this year’s lineup. “Reagan is a good program, and they have players who were on the 4×200 state and national championship team this year. They have a lot of speed guys — the track team is doing great job of training guys.
“Wake Forest and Butler are both top programs that are perennial powerhouses,” Till added. “Some people are projecting that either one could win a state title this year — but we like that because we get to test ourselves against powerhouse teams. Wake Forest is so businesslike, and I told head coach Reggie Lucas how impressed I was at how they handled themselves. We want our kids to see how to prepare for a championship, and we want to test ourselves against those caliber teams — that’s important.”
The Wake Forest Cougars have won back-to-back NCHSAA 4AA state titles in 2016 and 2017, and haven’t lost a game since being eliminated in the second round of the 2015 playoffs (31-0 in that span). If Wake Forest beats Millbrook High School in its season opener, the Raiders will march in looking to end the streak.
With Butler, Till noted that the sense of a rivalry has started between the two schools. Richmond has fallen to the Bulldogs in each of the last three seasons, and dating back to 2010, the Raiders are 1-5 against in six matchups against the boys from Matthews, N.C. Till says his players “expect and like to play against Butler.”
Hoping to go 4-0 in that span, and coming off a bye in Week 5, Till knows that the schedule doesn’t get any easier as the Raiders enter SAC play. Last year, six of the eight SAC schools made playoffs: Jack Britt, Pinecrest and Richmond made the 4AA bracket, while Purnell Swett, Scotland and Seventy-First qualified for the 4A tournament.
The Raiders will travel on back-to-back Fridays for Weeks 6 and 7 to Purnell Swett (Sept. 21) and Pinecrest (Sept. 28), before returning home to host Jack Britt (Oct. 5) and Hoke County (Oct. 12) in Weeks 8 and 9, respectively.
“The SAC is tough, and there are no cupcake games in our conference,” Till noted. “We had one of the toughest schedules in the state last year, and we’re repeating it again this year. There’s no off week in our conference. Purnell Swett has a good receiver in Chandler Brayboy, and the next week we’re at Pinecrest, which is a rival.”
In 2017, Richmond beat Purnell Swett, Pinecrest and Hoke County, and is looking to avenge a loss in what Till called his team’s “worst defensive performance” against Jack Britt. He’s hoping his team will put together the type of defensive stands it made against Pinecrest and Seventy-First last year.
In Week 10, the Raiders will travel to Lumberton on Oct. 19, and face “one of the best athletes in the conference” in Pirates quarterback Braylan Grice. Till also said most of Lumberton’s offensive line is returning, and a new head coach may shake things up a bit.
To cap off the regular season, Richmond will travel to Seventy-First in Week 11 (Oct. 26), before trying to defeat arch nemesis Scotland for the first time since 2010 in the season finale (Nov. 2).
“And then of course, we end the season with two perennial powers back-to-back in Seventy-First and Scotland,” Till said. “It’s always a challenge to have kids prepared physically and mentally for those types of games, but that’s the difference in a state championship type team and those that aren’t.
“It sounds cliché, but I always look forward to Scotland – but I don’t look forward to one game over the other,” he added. “The Scotland week is fun – but we’re going to go a week at a time, and I don’t get amped up two weeks ahead because I get sick to my stomach thinking we’ll overlook a team like we did with Jack Britt last year. If we value our opponents, winning and hard work means something.”
And while his roughly 70 varsity football players have been putting in work since spring workouts, Till and his team need a little bit of help from the surrounding community.
“The big thing is that we have the first game of the year at home and we really want to see the well-known crowd fill the seats,” he concluded. “The boys have shown a clear commitment level to this program, and we want to see that same commitment out of our fans.”
Below is a complete week-by-week schedule of the Raiders’ season. Home games are bold, while SAC games are denoted with an asterisk.
Week 1 — Friday, Aug. 17: Ronald Reagan High School vs. Richmond, 7:30 p.m.
Week 2 — Friday, Aug. 24: Richmond at Wake Forest High School, 7 p.m.
Week 3 — Friday, Aug. 31: Pine Forest High School vs. Richmond, 7:30 p.m.
Week 4 — Friday, Sept. 7: Richmond at David W. Butler High School, 7 p.m.
Week 5 — Bye
Week 6 — Friday, Sept. 21: Richmond at Purnell Swett High School, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 7 — Friday, Sept. 28: Richmond at Pinecrest High School, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 8 — Friday, Oct. 5: Jack Britt High School vs. Richmond, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 9 — Friday, Oct. 12: Hoke County High School vs. Richmond, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 10 — Friday, Oct. 19: Richmond at Lumberton High School, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 11 — Friday, Oct. 26: Richmond at Seventy-First High School, 7:30 p.m. *
Week 12 — Friday, Nov. 2: Scotland High School at Richmond, 7:30 p.m. *
NCHSAA Playoffs Round 1: Friday, Nov. 9, TBD
