Fans will pick the 757’s best VHSL championship game
Hampton Roads has a rich history of high school athletic excellence.
From the Princess Anne girls basketball team to the Hampton football team, the region is filled with VHSL state champions.
But which championship game was the most memorable?
The sports staff at 757Teamz.com has looked back in the VHSL record books and found 32 of the best state championship games involving teams from the 757. We’ve divided them into four groups — baseball/softball, football, basketball and other sports — and seeded the events.
We need your help picking the best championship game in 757 history. Starting Monday, we will post matchups on our 757Teamz Twitter account. Games with the most votes advance until we have a champion of champions.
Once we have a winner, we’ll run the game story as part of our Greatest Hits series.
So let us know: What was the most memorable championship game? Here are the nominees:
Baseball/softball
1. Princess Anne11, Osbourn10, 2005 baseball
Princess Anne trailed 8-0 after three innings and fell behind by a run in the 11th and 12th, but battled back to win the Group AAA championship. Current Washington Nationals pitcher Daniel Hudson was on that Cavaliers team.
2. Warhill 1, Brookville 0 (18 innings), 2017 softball
An epic pitchers’ duel in the broiling midday sun between
1973 Crown winner bests fellow legends
Secretariat won a virtual Kentucky Derby against 12 fellow Triple Crown winners, 47 years after the chestnut colt won the real race at Churchill Downs.
The 11⁄ 4- mile race featuring computer-generated imagery was held Saturday, the same day the 146th Derby had been scheduled until it was postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Derby has been reset for Sept. 5.
Secretariat was the 7-2 favorite. Fans selecting the winning horse online were entered to win a VIP experience at the Derby this fall. Churchill Downs pledged to match $1 million in fan donations to COVID-19 relief.
The virtual Derby was part of NBC’s three-hour telecast, which re-showed portions of the 2015 coverage in which American Pharoah won on his way to becoming racing’s first Triple Crown champion in 37 years.
The show opened with Churchill Downs bugler Steve Buttleman playing “Call to the Post” from the front steps of his Louisville home. It moved to the track, with shots of empty stands, betting windows and the jockeys’ room.
The track’s stable area is set to reopen May 11, with live racing expected to resume May 16.
“It’s weird not being there,” Bob Baffert, who trained American Pharoah, said in an interview from his California home.
Larry Collmus, who calls the Triple Crown races for NBC, provided a live call for the virtual Derby, seeing it unfold for the first time just as he would have been doing on the first Saturday in May.
“That was fun ‘calling’ Secretariat and the other Triple Crown winners,” he tweeted.
A virtual Seattle Slew, who won the 1977 Triple Crown, led much of the way until being overtaken in the stretch.
Secretariat surged to the lead in the deep stretch in the middle of the track. He won by about half a length.
Secretariat, born at the Meadow Farm in Virginia’s Caroline County, was a two-time Horse of the Year and swept the Derby, Preakness and Belmont, winning the last race by a record 31 lengths, in 1973.
Citation, the 1948 Triple Crown champion, finished second. Seattle Slew was third. Affirmed, the 1978 champion, was fourth, followed by American Pharoah.
Also in the race were 1946 champion Assault, 1919 champion Sir Barton, 1930 champion Gallant Fox, 1937 champion War Admiral, 1941 champion Whirlaway, 1943 champion Count Fleet, 2018 champion Justify and 1935 champion Omaha.