DeMatha Catholic High School is known nationally for its sports programs. The DeMatha athletic program was ranked top 3 in the country in 2005 and 2007 by Sports Illustrated. Over its 77-year history, DeMatha’s sports programs have won over 170 league champions, the most in the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference (WCAC).
One of the biggest reasons for DeMatha having such a dominant sports program is that they’ve had many Hall of Fame coaches, including Morgan Wootten and Mike Jones ’91 for basketball, Bill McGregor and Elijah Brooks ’02 for football, Dick Messier for wrestling, Anthony Bryant and Buddy Crutchfield for track and field, and Dick Long for lacrosse. But deciding which has been the best decade for DeMatha sports comes down to a couple factors.
One of the factors is championships, and another is how many alumni from that decade went pro. Out of all the decades, there are really two contestants here: the 1990s and the 2000s.
DeMatha faculty member and former basketball coach Patrick Smith ’82, who has worked at DeMatha for about 30 years, said, “I might be biased but I might lean to the 90s, only because of the number of championships they had.” In the 90s, DeMatha brought home 47 trophies to Madison Street, and six alumni who graduated in the 90s went pro, most notably Brian Westbrook (football) and Derek Mills (track & field). The 2000s Stags had 46 championships, 1 shy of the school’s 90s mark.
But the 2000s had 12 alumni who went pro, including Paul Rabil (lacrosse), Rodney McLeod (football), Josh Wilson (football), Jordan Graye (soccer), and Brett Cecil (baseball). Faculty member and head cross country coach Cory Puffett ’10 feels confident this was DeMatha’s best decade athletically. “You had one of the longest winning streaks in high school soccer history, with DeMatha winning multiple WCAC and national titles.”
Which decade do you believe was greater for DeMatha sports? Either way, it’s clear DeMatha has one of the best track records when it comes to winning championships and producing professional players in the country.
