Five still
unbeaten

Twenty-one games into Loudoun County's first girls flag football season, five of the seventeen schools have not lost.

Below is the first standings table the county has ever had. We have sorted it by record and nothing else, because Loudoun has not published a tiebreaker, and we are not going to invent one. Teams with the same record are listed alphabetically.

Corrected September 10, and again September 15: On September 10 we changed Tuscarora's opening night win over Park View from 46 to 0 to 39 to 0, because the district results listing had 39. We asked Tuscarora. On September 15 Tony Tallent, athletic director at Tuscarora, told us the school had checked and 46 is correct. The table above now carries 46, as it did when this issue was first published.

Records and scores are from the LCPS results system, checked school by school. Every score behind this table is on the schedule page with its source named. If your record here is wrong, tell us and we will fix it the same day.

The night the shutouts ended

Heritage and Tuscarora arrived at Monday, August 31 having played four games between them and conceded nothing at all. They played each other. Heritage won 19 to 12, and both teams gave up points for the first time in the same hour.

Heritage is the only school in the county still perfect at three wins from three with a scoring margin that has not been threatened. Riverside is the other unbeaten team with three, and it has done it differently: 23 to 6, then 19 to 6, then 7 to 0 against Broad Run on the same night the shutouts ended elsewhere.

Two points

Independence 6, Stone Bridge 2 is the lowest scoring game Loudoun has played, by a distance. It is also the only 2 that has appeared on a scoreboard in this county all season. Added September 3: we now have the rulebook Loudoun plays under, and in it a safety is worth two points and is the only way to put exactly 2 on a board without a touchdown. So Stone Bridge scored a safety. How it happened, we have asked Independence, and if you were there on Tuesday evening we would like to hear from you.

Independence are 2 and 0 and have won both games by a single score. Nobody else in the county has an unbeaten record built that narrowly.

Ahead

Three things on the calendar have changed since the last issue, and all three are on the schedule page with the change noted. Independence at Freedom has moved from September 10 to September 8. Briar Woods at Stone Bridge has moved from September 10 to September 29, at 7:00, the only 7:00 start of the season. And the September 8 game between Broad Run and Briar Woods is gone from every listing we can find.

One thing has been settled since this issue first went out. The district system showed Freedom playing at Briar Woods and hosting Independence at the same time on September 8. Kevin Weeren, athletic director at Freedom, confirmed on September 3 that Freedom hosts Independence. As far as any listing shows, Briar Woods does not play that night.

Saturday, September 19 is the only Saturday on the Loudoun calendar, and it turns out to be the biggest day of the season so far: the NOVA Girls Flag Championship at Heritage, sixteen teams from three counties in four pools, with a final at 5:00. Twelve of the sixteen are Loudoun schools. The full pool draw, field schedule and bracket are on their own page. Added September 3, from the schedule sent by James Totaro, athletic director at Heritage. This paragraph originally described the day as a 7 on 7 tournament called the Heritage Invitational.

Fairfax opens September 29. Twenty-five schools, Tuesday and Wednesday game nights, a county final at Robinson on November 14. That season is here.

Send us a score

If you coach, run an athletics office, or you are a parent in the stands with the final on your phone, we would like it. It goes up free, with the school credited, and we correct anything wrong the same day. The form takes thirty seconds.

Earlier: Issue No. 2, All seventeen, on the field · Issue No. 1, The whole fall in one place.