By Thomas Grant Jr.
A 4-0 start for the first time since 2017 and the highest poll ranking usually prompts plenty of self-back patting and reasons to boast.
For an Irmo High School football team with higher aspirations, any type of celebration is still a couple of months away.
If anything, the Yellow Jackets are finding “fuel” for motivation to keep their “Gas” moving forward. It came in the form of pregame discussion prior to last Friday’s game at previously second-ranked Hartsville which seemingly expressed doubt in their chances of winning in Kellytown.
Irmo proceeded to jump out to a commanding lead before defeating the Red Foxes 35-21 on their “Homecoming.”
“I just don’t care,” Brand said. “I just flat out don’t care what other teams think about us pregame. I care how they feel about us after we get done playing with them. I know Hartsville had a bunch of respect for us before the game and I’m pretty sure they had a lot more respect for us after the game.
“Just like everybody else. When I tell you that this was sort of personal too because I finally broke down and I read what people said about us going down there and it was disrespectful of how people thought we would go down there and just let some team beat up on us.
“I mentioned it to them. I mentioned it to them. Good thing they don’t know anything about Kellytown mystique or anything like that. They didn’t care. They didn’t care where we played. We could have played them on concrete. We could have played them on concrete last week and we would still try to have the same result.”
Irmo shut down Hartsville’s vaunted wing-T offense which had averaged 430 yards a game. The duo of Carmello McDaniel and Hakeem Waters were held to a total of 24 yards.
The Red Foxes had no answer for senior Jaden Allen-Hendrix who rushed for 201 yards and four touchdowns. It was the Gilbert transfer’s second straight game with over 200 rushing yards.
Quarterback A.J. Brand threw a touchdown to Donovan Murph, extending his streak of games without an interception dating back to last season. Ironically, his last interception came against Friday’s opponent Airport High School.
Irmo won 37-0 in the first meeting between the two Lexington County schools.
The Eagles enter the game with a 4-1 record which is their best start since 2015. Both their head coach Shane Fidler and Brand acknowledge that Irmo is the best team they’ve faced this season.
“We’re going to try to hit them in the mouth and get after them early and see if they can last,” he said.
However, Brand said his team is not looking ahead to next week’s Region 5-4A opener against Richland Northeast and focused on taking care of business this week.
“We’re going to treat this Airport game like it’s a Super Bowl,” he said. “Just like we do every week. Just like when we were going down to Kellytown. We want to treat everything we do like it’s the Super Bowl. We’re going to treat tomorrow’s practice Tuesday, which is very, very competitive for us, we’re going to treat it like it’s the last day of practice we have ever. That’s how our team has gotten to where we are right now. We just take every day and hold ourselves accountable every day and hopefully, it pays off in the end.”
The Palmetto State Sports Network will stream the Airport/Irmo game. It is available by downloading the app or visiting https://network1sports.com/station/pssn.
S.C. Prep Football Media Poll
Class 4A
1. South Florence (18) (5-0)
2. Northwestern (5) (3-1)
3. Irmo (4-0)
4. James Island (5-0)
5. Hartsville (4-1)
6. South Pointe (3-2)
7. Westside (3-1)
8, Midland Valley (5-0)
9. West Florence (3-1)
10. Greenville (3-2)
Others receiving votes: Lucy Beckham, Ridge View, AC Flora, Indian Land, Airport
Featured photo: by GoFlashWin.com Irmo quarterback A.J. Brand in last year’s game against Airport
