As a note before this story, I would like to say that our coverage of JV and Freshman teams isn’t very good, so when the JV Football team ended the season with the best record a JV team has ever had at West Brook High School I figured it was a good opportunity to extend our coverage.

Your probably thinking the same thing that everyone else does, well they’re Junior Varsity, it can’t be that hard. If you are one of the many that think this, don’t worry; you still have a chance to change your mind.

I don’t care if it’s the 9th grade Croquet team (I just made that one up so don’t get your hopes up freshman), if you’re the best in school history at what you do, you deserve to be recognized.

Now, most people attend the Friday night games at Durley stadium and watch the Varsity team play, cheering when their up, criticizing play calls or decisions when their down, but what no one sees don’t see are Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

The Varsity team doesn’t prepare for Friday’s by just going outside and running. Like every other team on every level, NFL, college, or high school, scout teams are involved. The JV team is a varsity scout team.

Most of the schools in our district have a JV coaching staff that works two hours a day on JV but West Brook doesn’t have the numbers to do that, we can’t practice varsity on varsity.

“We lose a lot of preparation time and we can’t do a lot of things we could do on both sides of the ball, but it’s a sacrifice we have to make,” said JV head coach Wiley McKeller.

The JV team runs plays they’ve never seen before, in formations never practiced before, against players that are more experienced, stronger and faster. Add eight weeks of losing and frustration to that and you get a pretty tough practice session. Why would someone want to go through this almost every day for 12 weeks? Love for the game.

The JV team finished with a 7-2 record and tied for 2nd in an outstanding 22-5A district. The Bruins defeated cross-town rivals Ozen and Central with scores of (47-14) and (42-0).

The team ran over Nederland and won by 34 points. JV did not get a chance to play Humble Kingwood due to a rain out.

West Brook then traveled to Spring to play one of the toughest teams in the district and won (33-22). The squad defeated Baytown Lee at home (15-8) despite 7 fumbles, within the 20-yard line.

The Brook then suffered their first defeat, losing to a very athletic Spring Westfield (40-0). Trying to pick their heads up from a devastating loss, the Bruins traveled to Humble and lost (20-14) in the final minutes of the game.

“It was hard coming back from back to back losses but I knew then that we wouldn’t lose another game” said McKeller.

Surprisingly, this statement was true and West Brook bounced back the next week stomping Baytown Sterling (48-26). Then, in the final game of the season, West Brook traveled to Port Arthur and faced a very strong and fast team with several failing varsity players and came away with a win, (22-14).

“Our willingness to work is a big key to our success, we have an overall team concept that most teams don’t have, the JV realizez you can play better with a specific purpose (the schoo,” said McKeller.

Their isn’t more talent on the JV then on our varsity, there isn’t more talent on the JV then most other schools JV teams in our district; it’s the overall togetherness and an unbelievable work ethic.

“Winning isn’t a some of the time thing, its an all of the time thing, you have to want to win everyday at practice, there isn’t one superstar on this team, its just a big family. Its all about the attitude you believe in,” said coach Robinson.

This team spirit will hopefully carry over to the next level and revive a struggling team from a (2-8) season to an (8-2) season and the chance of a long awaited playoff birth.

Congratulations JV on finishing the year (7-2). Thank you for the hard work.