The Jericho High School football team beat the Roslyn Bulldogs in the 2024 homecoming game and season opener, a first win since 2015.
The High School Game Day panel kicked off the evening with trivia games, captain interviews, score predictions and player highlights to excite the fans for the game ahead.
Game day panelist and Jericho High School senior Ryan S. said, “I thought it was really fun to have the fans come, and they were engaged with the game and the show.”
Senior Joe C. said, “The pre-game show was great. Ben was electric with the helmet. It was fun to watch.”
The Bulldogs took control of the game early. At 6:44 in the first quarter, Roslyn’s quarterback threw for a 14-yard touchdown pass.
After taking a beating in the end zone, Jericho suffered a major blow when Roslyn scooped up a fumble and ran it 27 yards to the house. The Bulldogs secured the conversion making the score 14-0.
As the second quarter was underway, the Jayhawks were looking to find the end zone.
Welcome, James Patrick (J.P.) Wang, Jericho’s own clutch-man. Wang exploded with a 21-yard touchdown run to put the Hawks on the board, The Nest was satisfied with the play, but Wang was just getting started.
Despite Roslyn answering back with 7:58 left in the second, striking an 18-yard touchdown pass to secure the 15-point lead, Wang broke through Roslyn’s secondary, putting another 6 points up for the Hawks with seconds left in the half.
After another unsuccessful 2-point conversion attempt, Jericho went into the locker room trailing by only 9.
While the Jayhawks regrouped, the Jayettes took mid-field and showed up at half-time with a spectacular dance.
The Jayhawks tightened their defense in the third quarter as well as their offense. At 1:18, Jericho’s quarterback and captain, Max Spector found Donnivin Jones for a clutch 16-yard touchdown pass, and this time Spector nailed the extra point. Jericho was back in the race, trailing by only 4.
With 3:28 left in the fourth, J.P. finished his incredible night with his third touchdown of the game, an 8-yard outside run, giving Jericho their first lead, 25-21. The 2-point conversion came up short, but Jericho had the advantage.
With under 3 minutes left in the game, strong safety Andrew Han made a crucial interception to seal the deal for the Jayhawks and hand the team its first home victory since 2015.
Wang had an outstanding performance, with 134 rushing yards and 3 touchdowns. He said, “It feels great, but I have to give it out to all the blockers that I had, the linemen, Robert, they’re the ones that really did it for me.”
QB and captain Spector threw for 100 yards and one TD, completing 10 of 19 passes.
Andrew Han earned 60 yards on 4 catches, and Donnivin Jones added 23 yards and a touchdown, contributing to the team’s victory
Coach Brenden Lahti expects that the team’s victory will motivate them to strive for more strong games this season. He said, “They now know what it tastes like to get a victory, and in the future more will come if we practice with the purpose.”
Contributing “JerEcho” students include Jessy Siegman, Charley Scharf, Logan Fuller, Austin Weiss, Christine Yu, Emily Libertoff, Ethan Rubin, Marcus Kranz, Matthew Weissman, Melanie Jernigan, Miley Yakuel, Naya Reddy, Rehana Dhirani, Skylar Derector, Sonia Ngai and Sophie Green. The “JerEcho” is the Jericho High School student newspaper
