Another successful season is nearly over for Panther JV football.
In just his second season as JV head coach, FHS graduate Landon Potter has had his work cut out for him, in everything from instilling his own culture to missing time due to Hurricane Helene. With just one game remaining and a chance at a third straight winning season, Potter says Panther fans have reason for hope in the future.
“This is a super, super, super-talented group. Obviously in middle school they had so much success, and this is just a taste of that age group,” said Potter of Macon Middle’s unbeaten seasons in 2022 and 2023, which they extended to three straight last week. “Of course you have Garrett [Young], Damion Bowles, Anderson Terrell, Lance Parker, Mac Sinclair – all those guys are these guys’ age, they’re just already up on Fridays. We have a handful of guys like Daiveon [Hall] and Gabe Harrison who I think could easily be playing on Fridays already, so I’ve been super-fortunate to work with those guys, and it’s gonna be a super-interesting group to watch moving forward. Very competitive, hard-working, they push each other in practice.”
With a 4-4 record including two losses of three points or less, the JV Panthers have been competitive in nearly every game they’ve played. Even without their best underclassmen, Franklin has made the most of a difficult schedule.
“I don’t want to jump on the injury bug, but we’ve had some really untimely injuries,” he said. “We started off the year with a really gritty win against Rabun County, which is a really good team. We went over to Sylva and had two quick injuries to two of our starters, and they jumped on us quick. I think it was 20-6 at one point, but we came back and won [29-22]. We just refuse to give up in those types of games.”
In hard-fought wins over Rabun and Smoky and routs of East Henderson and R-S Central (Rutherfordton), Franklin has proved that it has talent and moxie to spare. In losses to Asheville, West Henderson, Tuscola and Pisgah, the team has learned some valuable lessons.
“The losses have [largely] been, we’ve been winning for 39 minutes and then they get us in the last minute or so,” said Potter. “I think the strength of this team is they just hit the ground running – it doesn’t take them long to lock in. I think the weakness thus far is just the finishing – obviously, when you’re winning the whole game you expect to be winning at the end, so I think just figuring out that it takes one guy to make that play on the last drive. It takes one big moment to end a game like that, so we’re just looking for that moment and for guys to step up and do it.”
Despite losing several players to injuries and the varsity team, the JV Panthers are still among the Mountain Seven’s best, suffering their only multi-score loss in the conference at Pisgah. But while winning is always preferable, JV coaches’ main job is to prepare their teams for every situation.
“It gives kids chances to play positions they probably wouldn’t have in the past,” said Potter of playing without their best underclassmen. “With those guys down, who knows if Gabe would have ever been a featured receiver – the guy we throw to when we have to? Other guys, 10th graders who might not have got a shot on the O-line have had a chance, so it’s given a lot of kids that chance to break out. There’s gonna be so much talent moving up the next couple of years to that varsity team – I think it’ll be the deepest roster we’ve had in a really long time.”
In a Nov. 7 home rematch of their comeback win at Smoky, Franklin has a chance to end the year with a winning record at 5-4. Regardless of wins and losses however, Potter says this year especially has brought some perspective.
“They were getting a little angsty for a while, but I think helping with all the relief efforts and helping unload the truck really showed them how hard of a time some people were having,” said Potter of forgoing practice to help unload aid shipments after Hurricane Helene. “After that you could tell they were super-thankful to be there, and super-thankful to still be around each other. And then every game we’ve gotten to play since then wasn’t guaranteed, so I feel like we’ve played hard because we’ve felt like we are lucky to even be playing these games. At a lot of schools [the idea has been], ‘Hopefully we can play JVs, but we’re definitely playing varsity,’ so we’ve just been super-thankful to the schools that have been able to play us.”