The Starting Five

I don’t get out to many high school football games these days.
I spend most football Fridays in the office, holding down the fort and putting the sports section together with colleague Dan Kauffman.
The last high school football game I went to was on Sept. 1, 2006, when I witnessed Cumberland Valley’s 45-0 beatdown of my alma mater, Chambersburg, in David Carruthers’ debut as Trojans coach.
Carruthers — a coaching legend in Maryland — must have wondered what he was getting himself into with Chambersburg in the tough-as-nails Mid-Penn Commonwealth Division.

Carruthers racked up 206 wins and six state titles in his 26-year career in Frederick County, coaching Linganore and Urbana.
The Trojans finished the 2006 season with a 1-9 record, having been outscored 108-401. Things didn’t get much better in 2007, as Chambersburg again went 1-9 and was outscored 120-366. Last year, Chambersburg went 1-9 again, getting outscored 109-367. And this year, more of the same was predicted by many.
Apparently Carruthers — who wasn’t winning many popularity contests in C’burg — just needed one more year to work his magic.
Last Friday night, Chambersburg rallied from a 29-7 halftime deficit to stun previously unbeaten Susquehanna Township 36-32 in Harrisburg. Following the live game blog on pennlive.com was as exciting as following a live game blog could possibly be.
The Trojans improved to 4-2 with the win, as Carruthers surpassed his win total from the three previous seasons combined, with Chambersburg seemingly on its way to its first winning season since going 8-3 in 1998.
But Mid-Penn wins rarely come easily.
Chambersburg likely will have its toughest task of the season at home Friday night, when nationally ranked Bishop McDevitt (6-0), the No. 1 team in Pennsylvania, comes to town.
But who knows? Picking the Trojans to beat McDevitt almost doesn’t seem as far-fetched as predicting them to be 4-2 would have seemed a few months ago.