This is certainly not the big money world of college football. The 834 fans at Homewood Field who watched Johns Hopkins’ 52-20 rout of Western New England on Saturday afternoon in the first round of the NCAA Division-III playoffs attest to that.
So does the two hours and 34 minutes of real time it took for the nation’s sixth-ranked Division-III team to handle business against a top-20 opponent. There were no television timeouts or pre-packaged, in-game entertainment, unless you count what happened on the field. By the end of the first quarter, the Blue Jays led by two touchdowns and were on their way to a 38-0 halftime lead.
This is the best local football team you’ve never seen.
Jim Margraff, who decades ago played quarterback for Hopkins, lives in Timonium and is in his 26th season as head coach. The undefeated Blue Jays are in the second round of the 32-team tournament for the third time in four years. They host Wesley College (10-1) at noon this Saturday, November 28. A win would mark their 12th this fall, a program record, and match its deepest playoff run ever.
“We’re excited about it,” Margraff said Saturday. “When the year is over, you look back and reflect and maybe count things up, but right now we’re going to enjoy this one tonight and get ready for next week.”
So, how does this happen? Five-foot-six, 175-pound senior running back Brandon Cherry, who went to Boys’ Latin and has more than 2,500 collegiate rushing yards to his name, points to the program’s recruiting approach. Division-III football teams cannot offer athletic scholarships or likely NFL careers and generally lack the resources to recruit nationally, but a glance at the Blue Jays reflects the opposite: 88 players from 23 states, and only four from Maryland. Not even Mount Union (Ohio) and Wisconsin-Whitewater, winners of the last 10 D-III national championships, can boast such geographic diversity. Should Johns Hopkins win Saturday, a potential game against Mount Union awaits in the quarterfinals.
“You look at other teams and you don’t see the type of talent the coaches are able to recruit,” Cherry said. “It’s kind of crazy. With the SAT and GPA requirements here, it’s hard to find people who match that and are good players at the same time.”