Thrasher’s Willie T. Jackson Stadium will remain dark this fall.

The school is hitting the pause button on its football program due to low participation. Blake Levine first reported on the decision.

Fielding a team, never mind a competitive one, has been a struggle for the Rebels in recent years. The 2025 squad had only 19 players, according to its MaxPreps roster. Thrasher went 0-11 – its eighth straight losing season. It was the first year for head coach Thomas Jamieson, who said he will remain at the school and try to build the program back up.

“I’m going to work with the ones I have and the junior high along with younger kids to get them more interested,” Jamieson said.

He said the varsity program will be on a “one-year pause, and see what next year holds.”

Jackson, the stadium’s namesake, started Thrasher’s football program in 1983. The Rebels had some early success, including an 8-3 record in 1985 and four total playoff appearances under Jackson, who was 61-99-1 during his 16-year tenure.

Thrasher holds the ignominious distinction of having the longest losing streak in state history, at 71 games (a forfeit win officially reduced that streak to 55). That skid ended in 2002.

The team became competitive again less than a decade later. Between 2011 and 2017, the Rebels were 32-39, although they failed to make the playoffs during that stretch. In fact, Thrasher’s last playoff appearance had been in 1992, a drought that ended in 2023 – due to being in a region with just four teams.

Over the last eight seasons, Thrasher is 10-71. The Rebels’ last winning campaign was in 2011, when they went 5-4 and narrowly missed the playoffs.