Riverside Military copes with life without football

When the football season kicked off earlier this month, one program with a lot of history knew it wouldn’t be taking the field.

In May, Riverside Military, a private academy in Gainesville, became the first GHSA school to announce it would not play football in 2020.

This would become the first high school football season since 1907 in which the Eagles, who were reclassified this year from Class 1A Public to 2A, wouldn’t play.

It was a tough pill to swallow for Eagles coach Nicholas Garrett and his team. Garrett was hired before the 2017 season and quickly took the program to unprecedented heights by guiding the Eagles to their first GHSA playoff victory in 2018.

Entering 2020, he had a strong senior class and was looking forward to building off last season’s 5-5 record as the Eagles headed into a new Region 8-2A. He first learned of the decision to cancel via a Zoom conference call with school administration.

“As soon as I found out, I called the 18 seniors,” Garrett said. “Some of them were brought to tears. They’d been here for years and were excited for their senior experience. Some were absolutely frustrated, and for good reason. They knew all the activities planned for the season, like senior night, wouldn’t happen and some also needed additional film to attract colleges.

"There’s no script for a call like that, so I just soaked it all in and listened to how they were feeling.”

As it turned out, all football-playing seniors transferred from Riverside to pursue their senior football seasons. If there was any good news to the cancellation, it was that the decision came early enough for those who wanted to move on.

That was one of the reasons the school made the decision when it did.

“As a boarding school we have students coming from all over the world,” Riverside vice president of operations Amanda Willis said. “We have parents deciding whether to send their kids back, and they needed to know if a football season would be played. Coming here is a significant financial decision (approximately $40,000 a year for boarding students). If they were going to sign a contract for their kid to attend school here, they needed a clear understanding of what’s happening. That’s why we had to make the decision early.”

One of the seniors who transferred was lineman and long snapper Wylie McDonald, who had been an offensive starter since he was a freshman. He became a two-way starter in 2019. With his father, Lauren McDonald, serving as a community coach on Garrett’s staff, he was the first Riverside player to learn there would be no season for the Eagles.

“I was in shock,” he said. “The biggest question mark, at that point, was my future. I started looking at schools that needed a center.”

Credit: Courtesy of Lauren McDonald

Credit: Courtesy of Lauren McDonald

McDonald transferred to his father’s alma mater, McCallie School in Chattanooga, Tenn., where the Blue Tornado are the defending Division II-AAA champions. In early August, almost 20 players on that team — most of whom were projected starters — contracted COVID-19, including McDonald.

But the bad luck ended there.

“There was never a discussion of canceling the season,” he said. “After we quarantined, there were no more cases, so really it was a relief that the outbreak happened when it did because now we should be good for the whole season, through the state championship.”

McDonald won the starting center position for the Blue Tornado, ranked No. 4 overall in Tennessee, according to MaxPreps.

For McDonald and the other seniors, playing their final season is vital for recruiting. McDonald has scholarship offers from Davidson and Hampden-Sydney, with interest from Dartmouth, Harvard and Yale, among others.

“Dartmouth is asking for more tape of me long-snapping,” McDonald said.

Riverside is moving past not having fall sports. Garrett was put in charge of the school’s fall intramural program, which includes 280 cadets and 14 activities, with football being one of them.

It’s not the same as coaching, but Garrett is adjusting to his temporary role.

“It definitely hasn’t been easy because (coaching) is my chosen profession,” Garrett said. “I’ve never sat out a season in 18 years of doing this. But I also understand that I have to be overly optimistic in my role as the coach, so I remain positive. I’ve found a new energy in running the intramural activities.”

Garrett still gets to wear his coaching hat this season. He’s in constant communication with the seniors who transferred, and with colleges, as he pushes to get the players recruited.

“We still talk once a week,” he said. “Just to see how they’re doing mentally and emotionally and how their transition (to a new school) is going. I talk with their families to arrange virtual college visits and work with the schools on scholarships — all of the things I’d be doing for them if they were still here. It’s my professional obligation to maintain a relationship with them as the head coach.”

The plan for the Eagles football program is to resume football activities as usual when practice opens in the spring.

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