Former Oscar Smith star QB Phillip Sims has Princess Anne’s Cavaliers focused on winning this season

VIRGINIA BEACH — When Princess Anne junior Ajani Martin heard that the Cavaliers were getting a new football coach last January, he did his research to find out all he could about Phillip Sims.

“I looked him up and I saw what he did,” Martin said with a wide smile. “I was highly impressed that he made it all the way to the NFL.”

Sims was a quarterback at Oscar Smith High who led the Tigers to their first state title in 2008. A five-star recruit, he threw 119 career touchdown passes, which still ranks first in Virginia High School League history. He also threw for 10,725 yards, which is second. He was the 2009 Abe Goldblatt All-Tidewater Player of the Year, the Associated Press Group AAA Player of the Year and Gatorade Virginia Player of the Year.

He played collegiately for Alabama, Virginia and Winston-Salem State. After college, he signed with the Arizona Cardinals and attended training camp. He also signed with the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and the Saskatchewan Roughriders of the Canadian Football League.

But you won’t hear Sims talk about his playing days. No, he’s more focused about the present and leading the Cavaliers to big things.

“That’s not something we talk about. We don’t want to make this about me or about any of the coaches,” said Sims, who began his first official day of football practice Monday. “This is about Princess Anne High School as a program. Like I tell them all the time, none of the coaches are going to be out on the field on Friday night. For the most part, it’s kind of irrelevant as far as the history behind myself. It’s all about what we’re going to do as a team this year.”

Sims has turned around other struggling programs. In 2017, he helped John Marshall High of Richmond go from 1-9 to 4-7 and 6-5 — the Justices’ highest win total since 2012. They also made the playoffs twice.

In 2020, he was named the head coach at J.R. Tucker High, also in the Richmond area, and helped the Tigers win their first three games in 2021 and finish 4-5. They also made the playoffs (in Class 5 Region C) for the first time since 1992.

Now he comes to Princess Anne, which has won just 58 games since 2000, including just three winning seasons. The Cavaliers have been to the playoffs just three times during that span, the last time in 2019.

Martin, a running back and defensive back, already has seen a huge difference under Sims.

“He improved us all a lot, especially in conditioning. He’s on top of that. He’s going to make sure we’re the best-conditioned team in the Beach,” Martin said. “It feels good playing with someone that has high experience at a high level. So I know he knows what he’s doing. I think it’s going to be a great outcome this year because we’re coming in with a different urgency and we’re trying to win.”

Quarterbacks Brayden Hunter and Barrett Shewbridge have also seen a change. Both are looking forward to the season and being tutored by a legend.

“My middle school told me about him, so I looked him up,” said Hunter, a freshman. “He’s already helping me throw the ball better and conditioning.”

Shewbridge, a junior, said Sims has had an immediate impact on the Cavaliers.

“He brings a lot of energy to the team,” he said. “We really didn’t have that last year. I think he will be a big help. I’m really excited.”

One of the first people Sims called when he thought he might get the Princess Anne job was former Oscar Smith teammate Evan Hailes.

Like Sims, Hailes had an impressive playing career. A three-time first-team All-Tidewater selection, he was was rated the nation’s No. 88 recruit by ESPN and played in the 2010 Under Armour All-American Game. He played for Penn State before medical issues cut his career short.

He returned to coach at Oscar Smith, but balancing work and coaching was too difficult.

Then he got that call from Sims, which came right on time.

“He gave me a call to see what I was doing, and he wanted to know if I still had it. And I said, ‘Let’s see,'” Hailes said. “I told plenty of guys I work with that if I ever had the chance to get back out there, I guarantee I could make a difference. And it’s happening.”

Junior wide receiver and defensive back Malachi Small has high hopes.

“If we put the hard work in,” he said, “I feel like we could be a pretty good team.”

Added Hailes, “I’m excited for (the season),” he said. “Anybody counting Princess Anne out, just see us on Friday.”

Larry Rubama, 757-575-6449, larry.rubama@pilotonline.com Follow @LHRubama on Twitter