COLUMN: THS ‘broken apart way too soon’

BRISTOL, Tenn.

They always tell you it isn’t easy.

It’s tough.

It’s not teammates you’re leaving in the locker room. It’s brothers.

“That’s a family,“ said Tennessee High quarterback Taylor Harmon.

And Harmon, a senior, found that it’s not easy to leave a family under any circumstances.

In a year where everything seemed to be coming together, the only question people were asking was not if the Vikings would maraud their way to a championship game, but when?

And after watching Daniel Boone do all the right things on defense, and after seeing themselves unable to take advantage of all but one of the Trailblazers’ mistakes, the Vikings left the locker room with an 11-1 record and shattered state-championship dreams.

It hit them as soon as the final horn sounded. As the Vikings walked off their sideline in front of fans that felt so low you had to scrape them off the stone bleachers with a spatula, T.J. Simmons openly wept. Shaking his head, saying “No, no, no,“ before walking away, delivering a roundhouse blow to the bench and then collapsing at the 20-yard line where he remained inconsolable.

It was the hardest punch the Vikings threw all game

There were times when the Vikes had the Blazers on the ropes during Tennessee High’s 23-14 loss Friday.

After avoiding an offensive mistake in the first 24 minutes, Boone coach Jeremy Jenkins spent the second half looking for steel-toed boots for his offense after they kept shooting themselves in the foot.

Despite three untimely interceptions by the Blazers, THS could only capitalize on one. That’s when Harmon hit John Ellis Davis for a 14-yard score one play after Cody Snyder’s second interception in three minutes.

The first pick by Snyder led to three straight incompletions and a punt. The third, a fourth-quarter snare by Dylan Crockett, led to one first down for the Vikes, followed by three more incompletions and a punt.

“That’s the way it is in this game,“ said THS coach Greg Stubbs before he hurried off to the locker room. “It’s get it done or go home. We didn’t quite get it done tonight, so we go home.“

It was a place Harmon certainly did not want to go.

Searching for words, he could only think of the brothers he said goodbye to in the locker room.

“It’s not a feeling I want to remember,“ he said as his mouth quivered, doing its best to fight back sobs and more tears. “I wanna get out of this moment as soon as I can.“

Amid the sea of red shirts and waving pom-poms on the other side of the field, Jenkins couldn’t hold back his giddiness with the win. He met the media with a perma-grin and talking like a 5-year-old hopped up on jellybeans.

His team didn’t have any stars, he said, but Tyler Shepherd’s gritty 13-yard-and-an-inch run on third-and-13 lofted him up to star status for a moment. On the next play, Dakota Whitson’s 15-yard scamper put the ball on the THS 18 in a two-point game, taking precious minutes off the clock before Crockett grabbed an interception the Vikes could do nothing with.

“Defense,“ Jenkins said. “Defense.“

And when his defense stepped up after that final offensive mistake, leaving the Vikes’ fans stunned and silent, senior Blake Shropshire followed his drag-five-Viking-defenders-along score in the first quarter with an eight-carry drive – his final touch provided the final points and assured the victory.

“He came over to me and said, ‘Coach, it’s my senior year. Give me the ball.’ And I said, ‘Get in there and get it, son.’

“He’s something. Boy, he’s something.“

Harmon never looked toward that side of the field. Not even a passing glance.

“I never felt this way in my life,“ he said. “It feels like … it feels like …“

Then he sighed and did all he could to collect himself.

“My heart is in that locker room right now and it feels like it got ripped out and left in there.

“That’s not my teammates, those are my brothers. That’s a family in there that got broken apart way too soon.“

Then he walked away into the arms of fans that had enough left in them to cheer and, once again, tell them to keep their heads up.

It didn’t look easy for anybody.