White: PIL football has put in the work to change the narrative across all its programs

The streak is over.

For the first time since 2017, the Portland Interscholastic League has produced playoff-winning football with No. 6 Ida B. Wells surviving at home against No. 11 Grants Pass 46-35, and No. 10 Lincoln upsetting No. 7 Jesuit on the road 30-24.

For Wells, it’s the program’s first playoff win since 2003, and for Lincoln it’s been since 2017.

Winning these games is a tremendous honor for the Guardians, Cardinals, head coaches Robby Scharf and Cody Schnaufer and their whole staffs.

There was plenty said this past week by some folks clearly not in the know of the PIL football scene, and these wins help display the work the entire league has put in to improve.

My hope now with these playoff wins is that the narrative begins to change, which is what Schnaufer repeated to me when I bugged him to call me Friday night after he got done talking with his wife and dried off a little bit from his Gatorade bath.

“I think part of the significance is it's kind of changing the narrative,” Schnaufer told me. “We’ve got good football in the city. … We know that we're helping change that narrative about where this league is and kind of what we can do to put our guys in that position and just let them battle.”

I can’t help but reflect on what it took to get here and what it means for the PIL as a whole.

When I first moved to Portland in 2021, I was quick to hear about just how bad the PIL was at football, and the chatter was largely right.

Wells and Lincoln, frankly, were two of the worst as they struggled to keep with the likes of Grant or Roosevelt or Jefferson. But then those three struggled to keep with the likes outside of the PIL.

Now six seasons later, the PIL can say it has two quarterfinalists, and that’s a testament to the league as a whole.

Throughout these six years, there have been some incredible players who don’t get the same kind of shine from some so-called recruiting “reporters” and those of the like.

But without guys like Tre’Marion Crawford at McDaniel testing the speed of defenses, or a guy like Attucks Johnson at Jefferson ruining run plans, or a Cash Landau at Franklin winning every jump ball, or a guy like Felix Amistadi at Cleveland being tough as nails, or a guys like Geovoney Burks and Miles Green doing two-way damage at Roosevelt, or guys like Deckard Hale and Conor Segel pushing opponents to the limits at Grant, none of this is possible for Wells and Lincoln.

And we can’t forget about past players at Wells and Lincoln like Spencer Reid, Wyatt Andler, Cam Shea, Liam Eldridge, AJ Reverman, Finn Davies, Zan Galton and Blake Timothy, just to name a few off the top of my head.

That small list of players who went underlooked this year or in years past are just the tip of the iceberg of the talent I’ve witnessed in this league that continues to be disrespected.

And at the end of the day, it’s the kids who get hurt when dismissed by the masses. If no one is there believing in them and telling them they can succeed, it won’t happen.

Which is I commended the work of all the PIL coaches: Adam Grimes at Franklin, John Beck at Grant, Anthony Stoudamire at Jefferson, Russ Millage at McDaniel, Alan Hopper at Cleveland, Alex Melson at Roosevelt and especially Kendall Lewis trying to revive a program from the dead at Benson.

These guys and their staffs deserve the credit as well for stepping up the levels of their programs to not only give Wells and Lincoln something to improve on each Friday, but to start making strides in their programs as well toward the postseason.

Cleveland was a game away from making the postseason this year. Franklin posted another winning record. Grant got an at-large bid into the state bracket. Roosevelt took out a Metro League team that has haunted the PIL. Benson played varsity football for the first time since 2018. Jefferson gave some of the top teams a real scare and McDaniel has some of the best young talent in the city.

All of that means something to a league that has had to hear it for the past 10 or more years about how bad things are. And instead of sitting around complaining, these kids and these coaches have put in the work to make things better.

This quote that Wells QB Jude Nolan had to Elias Esquivel covering the Guardians game for me stuck out:

"It feels like it's a brand new day, basically, because all I've ever heard growing up is just that the PIL sucks, you know what I mean? Like they're the bottom of the bottom,” Nolan said. “Nobody wants to play them because they're all going to be the bottom teams in the state. It's a paper trophy, the PIL championship. But I mean, look at us now. It's a whole different story."

There was the argument this past week that the PIL was purposely benefitting off a heavy league schedule, making it easier for teams to get ranked higher in the system. However, it’s a two-way street.

When the narrative is how terrible the PIL is, how are these teams supposed to get games scheduled against the programs that are supposed to be elite? And if the PIL can’t schedule those games, how are they supposed to generate these difficult schedules that seem to be the only way some folks give respect?

The only way for them to get some attention is to take a spot in the postseason, like they did four of this year.

And now, they better have everyone’s full attention.

There are serious players on these Wells and Lincoln teams. Jude Nolan, Lucius Coon, SeAun Davis, Yassin Birya, Wyatt Hanifin, Tanner Naslund, Ethan Hoover, Kannon Walter – just to name a few for Wells.

Leonardo Correani, Antayus Wilkins, Alex Lydgate, Auden Rose, Greyson Murff, Devin Prendergast, Ben Azerrad, Emmanuel Wisbrock, Reed Eldridge – just to name a few for Lincoln.

But almost all those guys get no air time outside of PIL circles because the narrative has been that Lincoln and Wells just beat up on their little brothers.

The PIL is ready to do battle with anyone, even if the odds may be stacked against them.

And that’s what high school sports are supposed to be out. It’s not about which individuals are the highest ranked or who’s going to what college or which program is collecting talent like an All-Star team.

Sports are supposed to help provide structure for the student-athletes to not only grow on the field, but off of it. And by the way, Wells was No. 1 in 6A in team GPA this year at 3.50. Grant was fourth at 3.38, Cleveland seventh at 3.32 and Franklin eighth at 3.29.

High school football is about teaching kids how to deal with adversity and how to work together as a team to accomplish a common goal through those hurdles.

These kids in the PIL have proven that to me over the past six years, and I can’t wait to see what barriers they break through in the years to come on the football field and in life.