0-5 Flint Hill football squad looks toward first win of 2024 season

This weekend, a victory for the currently winless Flint Hill Huskies is quite possible.

Host Flint Hill (0-5) on Oct. 12 faces the 0-6 Catholic Crusaders of Virginia Beach in a battle of private-school football squads. While Flint Hill has been competitive in most of its losses, Catholic has been blown out three times.

“We would like to win our first game and go on a 4-0 run in our last four,” Flint Hill coach Kirk Peterson said. “But we can’t take Catholic for granted. They have good players.”

As for players, Flint Hill is missing many because the Huskies have been hit hard by injuries this season. The team’s top three runningbacks are sidelined, along with three linemen. To compensate, wide receiver Damian Snell has been converted to runningback.

“We have multiple kids playing out of position right now and going both ways,” Peterson said. “We have the injury bug bad. I’ve seen nothing like it before.”

Coupled with the injuries, Flint Hill has played a difficult schedule against top perennial private-school teams in Virginia. The Huskies lost their previous game, 22-20, to 2023 Division I state private-school playoff runner-up Trinity Episcopal (3-2) and fell 24-8 to defending state champion Benedictine (4-2) earlier this fall.

Flint Hill lost to Trinity Episcopal in last year’s state-tournament semifinals.

“We were in both of those games. We’ve also been hurt by too many self-inflicted mistakes, like penalties, dropped passes and turnovers,” Peterson said.

Flint Hill’s wide receivers and quarterback Caleb West have remained healthy.

West threw touchdown passes of seven and 33 yards to Victor McNeal and Ty Harris, respectively, in the 22-20 loss to Trinity Episcopal. Snell ran seven yards for the other TD, and McNeal had a two-point conversion run.

Following the game against Catholic, Flint Hill plays at St. Michael the Archangel (5-1), another top state private-school team, then faces Mid-Atlantic Athletic Conference out-of-state rivals Maret (4-1) and St. James (4-2). Flint Hill is the defending MAC champion.