Maybe it was the addition of a fifth panelist, or maybe it was just the confluence of a bunch of really dang good performances. Whatever the reason, this week’s RBC Heritage Player of the Week voting was about as exciting as I can remember.
If you look at the fan voting, the area private school fans once again turned out in force. Hilton Head Prep quarterback Stone McDonald (36.73%) took home the fan vote, followed by Beaufort Academy Swiss Army knife Kai’Shawn Jenkins (18.08%) Hilton Head Christian Academy quarterback Hayden Shinn (16.13%).
That might lead you to believe the area’s public school teams had a rough week, but au contraire, mi amigo. We had plenty of strong candidates from the area’s biggest high schools, but their voters appear to be disenchanted.
Sometimes our voting panel bails out disengaged voters, but not this time.
Shinn got the support of the TV bloc, picking up votes from Frank Sulkowski and Greg Talbott, while the print dinosaurs split our votes among Northern Beaufort County running backs, as McCombs threw his vote to Battery Creek’s Jacove Anderson and I opted for Beaufort High’s James Dagin.
The new guy, LowcoSports Lowdown podcast co-host Wes Kerr, also threw his support behind Anderson, whose 89-yard touchdown run in the final 90 seconds was the lone score in the Dolphins’ 6-0 win at Ridgeland-Hardeeville.
If you’re scoring at home, that’s two votes each for Shinn and Anderson, meaning the fan vote serves as the tiebreaker, and Shinn finished third with 16.13% while Anderson gained merely 2.06% of the vote.
That means Shinn, who played only one series in the second half of a lopsided game but finished 13-of-17 for 226 yards and 4 TDs, along with 45 yards on five carries in a 37-14 win over Colleton Prep, is the RBC Heritage Player of the Week, an honor he has narrowly missed claiming several times this season.
Congrats to HHCA’s senior quarterback and all the nominees, and thanks for voting!