There are losses, and then there are rivalry losses. Unfortunately for everyone wearing Jackrabbit green and yellow Friday night, this one wasn’t particularly close. Ephrata came into Jackrabbit Stadium and handed Quincy a 62–7 loss in the annual Battle of the Basin football game, giving Tiger fans plenty to celebrate and those of us in the 98848 a Friday night we’d probably rather leave in the rearview mirror.
We’ll give them this one. They earned it. But don’t get too comfortable over there, Ephrata. The Battle of the Basin is bigger than one football game, and Friday night was only the end of the fall chapter.
TL;DR
🏐 Ephrata got the better of the Lady Jacks volleyball teams during Tuesday’s rivalry matchups.
⚽ Quincy JV girls soccer defeated Ephrata 5–1.
⚽ Quincy varsity girls soccer defeated Ephrata 4–1, extending its undefeated start to the season.
🏈 Ephrata defeated Quincy 62–7 in Friday night’s Battle of the Basin football game.
🐰 Fall rivalry week is over, but the Jackrabbits and Tigers will see each other again when winter sports begin.
If You’re Newer to Jacks Country
There isn’t some complicated origin story behind the Quincy-Ephrata rivalry. No ancient disagreement between the towns needs to be uncovered, and as far as we know, nobody stole anybody else’s mascot a hundred years ago.
They’re simply our neighbors. With only about 15 miles separating Quincy and Ephrata, they’re close enough that generations of athletes from the two communities have grown up competing against one another. Families know families, students know students, and plenty of people in one community work, shop or have friends and relatives in the other.
That’s all perfectly friendly until somebody puts on an orange-and-black jersey. Then things change a little.
For generations of Jackrabbits, Ephrata has been the school just down the road. They’re close enough to bring a crowd when they come to Quincy and close enough for Quincy fans to return the favor. A road game doesn’t require an overnight trip or much planning. You get in the car, head down the highway and, before long, there are those orange jerseys again.
That proximity has made the Tigers a natural rival, and last week gave the two schools plenty of opportunities to renew the argument.
Rivalry Week Was Bigger Than Friday Night
The rivalry started Tuesday, and if we’re keeping score, we’ll admit right up front that it wasn’t the greatest week the 98848 has ever had.
Ephrata got the better of the Lady Jacks volleyball teams, giving the Tigers the early advantage. Things looked considerably better outside, where the Lady Jacks JV soccer team defeated Ephrata 5–1 before the varsity squad followed with a 4–1 victory.
We were there for the varsity match and have already told that story. Quincy entered the night undefeated and walked off the field the same way, extending its winning streak with perhaps its most satisfying victory of the young season. Beating another opponent is good. Beating Ephrata by three goals is just a little more fun.
Then came Friday.
We were at Jackrabbit Stadium for that one, too, and we’re not going to spend several hundred words dissecting it. Anyone who watched the game knows what happened. Turnovers hurt Quincy repeatedly, Ephrata took advantage of its opportunities, and the Tigers controlled the game on their way to a 62–7 victory.
Sometimes your rival gets you.
This time they really got us.
Enjoy Those Bragging Rights, Ephrata
There have naturally been a few metaphorical shots fired from the other side of the Basin since Friday night. After winning 62–7, that’s to be expected.
We can’t even complain about it too much. If Quincy had hung 62 points on Ephrata at Kiwanis Field, does anyone seriously believe the 98848 would have politely congratulated the Tigers on a game well played and then never mentioned it again? Of course not. We’d still be talking about it.
That’s one of the reasons rivalry games are fun. The final score counts exactly the same in the standings as a game against anybody else, but nobody experiences it quite that way. Beating your rival feels better. Losing to your rival hurts worse. A big win buys bragging rights, and a big loss means occasionally having to grit your teeth while the people 15 miles down the road exercise theirs.
So enjoy it, Tigers. Friday night was yours.
Just remember that Friday night wasn’t the last Quincy-Ephrata game on the calendar.
Winter Is Coming
Rivalry week may be behind us, but the fall sports season certainly isn’t. There are still plenty of matches and games ahead, and we’ll keep showing up for our Jacks in the gym for volleyball, along the sidelines for soccer and under the Friday night lights for football.
A few weeks ago, after a difficult football season opener against Prosser, we challenged Quincy to think about becoming a kind of 12th Man for the Jacks. The idea was simple: the players and coaches are responsible for what happens between the lines, but the rest of the 98848 gets to decide what kind of community surrounds them while they do it.
Maybe that idea shouldn’t stop at the gates of Jackrabbit Stadium.
Our volleyball players deserve to look into the stands and see their hometown behind them. Our soccer players should hear Quincy celebrating a big goal and encouraging them when the goal goes the other direction. The same goes for every athlete who puts Quincy across the front of a uniform and represents this community.
Winning certainly makes that easier. Last week’s 4–1 varsity soccer victory over Ephrata was a lot more fun to watch than Friday night’s 62–7 football loss. Nobody needs us to pretend otherwise.
But hometown support can’t only show up when the scoreboard gives us something to celebrate.
There is still plenty of fall sports ahead. We’ll keep following the Lady Jacks volleyball teams as they take the court. We’ll keep watching a soccer program that has given the 98848 plenty to cheer about already this season. And we’ll be back under the lights with Jackrabbit football as those young men continue working through a difficult season.
Then, eventually, the final volleyball match will end, the last soccer whistle will blow and the football helmets will be put away.
When that happens, our support shouldn’t disappear. It should simply follow the Jacks indoors.
Basketball will put Quincy and Ephrata across the court from one another again. Wrestling will bring Jackrabbits and Tigers together on the mats. New athletes will get their turn to represent Quincy, and the bleachers will give the rest of us another opportunity to represent and support them.
The venues will change. The sports will change. The athletes will change.
The hometown shouldn’t.
Same Rivalry, Next Round
Friday’s football game wasn’t the ending anyone in the 98848 wanted for fall rivalry week. A 62–7 loss hurts, and putting “Ephrata” on the other side of that score certainly doesn’t make it hurt any less.
That’s the deal when you have a rival. You take the losses along with the wins, endure a little trash talk when things go badly and make sure you’re ready to return the favor when the opportunity comes around again.
More importantly, we keep showing up. That’s something bigger than Ephrata week. Whether it’s volleyball, soccer, football, basketball, wrestling or whatever Jackrabbit team is competing that day, these are young people from our community putting themselves out there. They’re practicing after school, traveling for away games, competing in front of their classmates and neighbors and learning all the things high school athletics can teach when things go right and when they don’t.
The athletes have to play the games. The coaches have to coach them. The rest of us have a much easier assignment: fill the stands, make some noise and make sure our kids know the 98848 is behind them.
And yes, Ephrata has the football bragging rights this year. They’ve earned them, and we’ll begrudgingly allow them to enjoy them.
For now.
Because there is still plenty of fall sports left to play, and we’ll be there supporting our Jacks through it.
Then winter will arrive.
The gyms will fill. The wrestlers will hit the mats. Quincy and Ephrata will find themselves staring across another court or another mat at one another, and another chapter of a rivalry separated by just 15 miles will begin.
Different sport. Different athletes. Same two towns.
And when the next Battle of the Basin begins, let’s make sure our Jacks look into the stands and see the same thing they should see every time they compete:
Their hometown showed up.