Lenoir City rallies past short-handed Jefferson
The 2026 football season started on a losing note for Jefferson Middle School late last week as the Eagles came up on the short end of a 22-7 decision against Lenoir City.
The Eagles held a 7-6 halftime lead of their opener Thursday night at Blankenship Field.
But Lenoir City (1-0 overall, 1-0 in the Tennessee Valley Athletic Conference) scored 16 unanswered points after halftime against Jefferson (0-1, 0-1).
“We just didn’t play very well,” Eagles Coach Sean Jessie said. “We were banged up. We didn’t have three starters. We didn’t have our starting running back. We didn’t have a starting tight end and we didn’t have a starting wide receiver.
“We were ahead, 7-6, at halftime and we just didn’t play cleanly on either side of the ball. It was just a rough night all the way around.”
Despite a frustrating night, Jessie said he saw some positives.
The Eagles scored their only touchdown on defense when Brycen Stott intercepted a Panthers pass and went 89 yards to score.
Quarterback Braylon Knipp went 10-for-13 for 95 yards. He threw one interception.
“Braylon did a good job,” Jessie said. “I think he did a good job managing our offense.
“Isaac Hernandez did a good job. He had 65 yards and he carried the ball 17 times, and he’s not used to carrying the ball that much.”
Defensively, Hernandez totaled six tackles to lead the Eagles.
Jessie said the injured players would likely be out two weeks.
“We’re just going to get through the stretch here,” he said.
The Eagles return to the gridiron Thursday night when they hit the road for the first time in 2026. Jefferson will head to West Knoxville to tangle with Christian Academy of Knoxville.
Kickoff between the Eagles and Warriors is slated for 7 p.m. at Warrior Stadium.
Jessie is looking for improvements this week against CAK.
“We’ll have to play cleaner and we’ll see how much we improve from Week 1 to Week 2,” he said.
“Offensively, I want to say that we moved the ball well (against Lenoir City), but we took two steps forward and then we would shoot ourselves in the foot and we were back behind the eight ball again.”
