The Salem High football team plans to be back in action this Friday as the Spartans make the short trip to Roanoke to take on William Fleming.
The Spartans are still looking for their first win after losing to Martinsburg and COVID in the first two weeks of the season. After dropping the opener to the visiting Bulldogs Salem was scheduled to host Franklin County last Friday, but that game was called off on Thursday afternoon as the COVID cases mounted at the Rocky Mount school.
“I understand they had about 900 students quarantined,” said Salem High coach Don Holter. “Up until Thursday afternoon I thought we had a pretty good chance to play.”
Salem is hoping to make up the game. The Spartans have their bye week on October 15 and are hoping to make up the game with Franklin County the following Tuesday, October 19. They would then have just two days to prepare for a game at Cave Spring on Friday, October 22.
“We absolutely want to get that game in,” said Holter. “Our kids only have 10 regular season opportunities to play and you want to play every one, especially after missing games last season.”
The game is also important to both teams as far as the Virginia High School League point system is concerned. Franklin County is a Class 6 school and a win over the Eagles would be huge for the Class 4 Spartans. Likewise, Franklin could get valuable points by either a win or loss against Salem, as the Spartans are certain to have a good record at the end of the season.
Franklin’s bye is October 1. If Salem and Franklin played on the 19th the Eagles would have to play three games in eight days with William Byrd on Friday the 15th, Salem on Tuesday the 19th and William Fleming on Friday the 22nd. Of course, all this depends on how the COVID situation plays out in Franklin County over the next month.
“We want to play the game,” said Salem athletic director Drew Barrett. “It’s our home game and we hate to give up the revenue.”
Meanwhile, the Spartans are preparing for William Fleming this week. The Colonels are off to an 0-2 start with losses to Heritage(33-18) and Albemarle(30-23) in the first two weeks of the season. That’s coming off a spring campaign that saw Fleming finish 6-3 and advance to the Class 5 state semifinal before losing to Stone Bridge.
Jamar Lovelace is in his fourth year with the Colonels and he’s turned a struggling program into a winner. Fleming went 1-19 over the 2017 and ’18 seasons but made the playoffs in 2019 and then advanced to the state semifinal in the spring after the 2020 season was moved back.
“They have good size, good speed and they’re very athletic,” said Holter, who spent some time as an assistant at Fleming when former Spartan player Lee Johnson was the head coach. “They look very similar to Franklin County.”
The Salem jayvee game was also postponed last week and the jayvees are scheduled to host Fleming tonight. The Andrew Lewis Middle School eighth graders had William Byrd at home on Wednesday, and next Monday, September 13, they go to Blacksburg. The seventh grade team will host Byrd on Monday.