Menchville, Bethel standouts sign for full athletic scholarships PD wrestling canceled except for Gloucester Mike Smith third on all-time list
Menchville basketball standout Allen Strothers and Bethel track and field sensation Jahnelle Saunders, Peninsula District stars in their respective sports since they were freshmen, recently committed to full athletic scholarships.
Strothers, a 6-foot-2 senior, will play for East Tennessee State University in Johnson City. He averaged 14 points, six rebounds, six assists and three steals at point guard last year in helping the Monarchs win the Peninsula District title and reach the Class 4 Region A semifinals.
“Some people say he should’ve tried to go to a bigger (D-I) school, but I teach my kids ‘you want to be enamored by the size of the opportunity, not the size of the school,’” said Lamont Strothers, Strothers’ dad and Menchville’s coach. “The opportunity for him to get on the court right away is there.”
Strothers said, “It’s a school I can see myself playing four years for. They get up and down the floor like we do, and I can handle the offense like I do here, so I feel like I can fit right in with their playing style.
“I feel like it’s lifted a weight off my shoulders and I can just go out and do what I need to do for the (Menchville) team to win this year.”
Saunders, a Bethel senior who has won nine individual track and field state titles even without the benefit of a spring 2020 season, has committed to compete for Hampton University.
HU coach Maurice Pierce says Saunders — who has won state titles in the long jump, high jump and hurdles for Bethel and Phoebus — is the best recruit he’s landed since 2005, when Bethel’s Francena McCorory signed with Hampton. A short list of McCorory’s list of accomplishments included NCAA indoor and outdoor titles at 400 meters, an indoor world championship at that distance and two 4x400 relay gold medals in both the Olympic Games and World Championships.
Saunders, who was selected the Daily Press Track and Field Athlete of the Year in 2018, is flattered by the comparison but is looking to make her own mark.
“Hampton has a good school, a good team and good coaches,” she said. “They also have my major: Kinesiology.
“I’ve always wanted to get a four-year scholarship and I want to grow into a powerful multievent athlete. I feel like Coach Pierce can make me the best athlete I can be.”
Pierce said, “I’ve known about her since she was a kid. The Technique Track Club practiced at Hampton.
“I’ve watched her get better and better each year, and I’ve said to myself, ‘I’d love to get her here at Hampton.’ I couldn’t wait for her to became a senior so I could recruit her.
“She’s best in the jumps right now and is an exceptional hurdler, too. She can become a great multi-event athlete.”
The Peninsula District has canceled wrestling for the 202021 season after schools’ offices in
Hampton and Newport News opted out. The sport has been a regular part of the PD since the league debuted for the 1965-66 season.
“COVID obviously was big in doing that,” Heritage athletic director Michael Gardner said of the decision. “I support our administration.
“We all want to participate, but safety first. If they’d have said ‘We wrestle,’ we’d have wrestled.”
Gloucester, the district’s most consistently successful wrestling program the past two decades, will go it alone with the other nine schools on the sidelines. Dukes athletic director Kristy Hunter said the school will piece together a schedule against other area schools still competing.
“My feeling is it’s all (sports playing) or nothing,” Hunter said. “We feel we have the protocols in place to do this safely.”
All other Peninsula District winter sports are a go at this time. Williamsburg-James City County Schools recently canceled all sports for the winter season because of COVID concerns.
Stadium Talk, an online sports site, ranked Hampton High’s Mike Smith No. 3 on its “Greatest High School Football Coaches of All Time” list published in late November. Smith was cited for his 494 victories in 49 seasons, along with 12 state titles and two national championships.
Only one active coach, John T. Curtis Jr. of John T. Curtis Christian in Louisiana, with 595 wins and 26 state titles, was picked ahead of Smith. The late John McKissick, who won 621 games and 10 state titles for Summerville High in South Carolina, was the site’s No. 1 pick.