Countdown to Kickoff: Blake Bengals

SILVER SPRING, Md. (DC News Now) — In 2023, Blake high school football head coach Bryon Marshall led the Bengals to their first undefeated regular season in program history.

The Bengals fell to North Point in the 4A/3A state semifinals last year, but hope to build on their 2023 success and take it another step forward in 2024.

“Now instead of doing the hunting, we’re the hunted,” Marshall said. “Our mentality is we’re still hunting, we’re still chasing the state championship. I think everybody has a target to go out and get us this year.”

Many players have moved on from Blake’s program, but according to Marshall, excitement as high around the program as around 90 players reported to the first day of practice on Wednesday.

“We all just gotta keep the same mentality that we had last year. We had a lot of players that were great,” Blake junior left tackle and defensive end Benji Wilson said. “A lot of them leaving, it kind of came down on us, gave us that leadership to build on that.”

The team’s leadership is eager to help the program grow even more.

“People didn’t believe in us so we just had to show them,” Blake senior wide receiver and defensive back Kai Cooper said. “And now this year we have another chance to get back even further than we were before and win states and that’s our goal this year.”

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