By Jon Moffett

sports@vindy.com

LEAVITTSBURG

John Armeni knew the biggest obstacle for his LaBrae High football team wasn’t its opponent. But rather it was the looming presence of their own locker room.

The Vikings came up on the short end of a 40-28 contest against visiting Jefferson High. And even though LaBrae fielded the obligatory 11 for all its offensive snaps, it felt like they Vikings were playing a man down.

Senior quarterback Justin Jenkins was excused from the team earlier this week for an alleged conduct violation and could miss the season. Armeni said he tried to rally the team, which went into the week four matchup undefeated.

“I worried about distractions and I worried about where their heads would be, but they came to play tonight and I’m very proud of them,” he said. “Justin means a lot to us, he’s our heart and soul and it hurt them early in the week. But I tried to give them the message that good programs aren’t one-man teams. And we have a lot of very good football players.”

The game at LaBrae High might as well have been played in the La Brea tar pits.

Neither team was able to gain their footing enough to get their ground games started. That put the contest into the hands of the young quarterbacks, which Armeni knew was a disadvantage to his squad.

The Falcons (4-0) were led by senior gunslinger Lucas Hitchcock. The 6-foot-2 dual threat found openings all over the Viking defense. Hitchcock went 9 of 18 for 187 yards and two scoring hookups with classmate Derek Parker. Parker finished with five catches for 115 yards.

And when Hitchcock wasn’t burning the secondary, he managed to find the slim pickings the Vikings’ front seven was willing to give up, rushing for 70 yards on 14 carries, including two more scores.

But his most critical play came on a fourth-and-five from the Viking 38 with three minutes left in the game. With his squad up 33-28, a punt would all but assure the Vikings a comeback opportunity. Hitchcock instead followed his blockers, broke a tackle and scampered for the clinching score.

Jefferson coach Jim Henson said the Vikings put up a tough fight given their circumstances.

“I was hoping we’d be able to run the ball a little bit better than we did, but they’ve got a nice defense,” he said. “Their linebackers were bringing a lot of pressure. We talked about it all week. We knew they were going to bring pressure and we knew we were going to have to throw the ball.

“We finally started hitting some passes, and that got our offense going a little bit.”

Brandon Boone stepped in as LaBrae’s quarterback and was 11 of 21 for 128 yards, but threw two interceptions. But Boone threw three TD passes — one to Keevon Harris, one to Tariq Drake and one to Carlton Brown.

Harris returned a kickoff 81 yards for a touchdown.

Jefferson’s Jon Jackson returned a fumble 52 yards for a score.

The Vikings fell to 3-1 with the loss to All-American Conference, Nation Division rival Jefferson.