When your varsity quarterback is a smallish, 14-year-old freshman and there are only three seniors on the team roster, two things are predictable:

Hard times for now, but high hopes for the future.

That’s the reality for the John Marshall High School Justices, now 1-6 following a humbling 55-6 loss last Friday to previously winless Glen Allen High School in Henrico County.

“We’re young and inconsistent, but once we get on the same page, we have a chance to be very good,” said John Marshall High’s third-year Coach Damon “Redd” Thompson.

John Marshall’s lone win was over winless Armstrong High School.

In the quest for an elusive second victory — and the first against a non-Richmond opponent — Coach Thompson’s Division 3A Justices will play Henrico’s J.R. Tucker High School, a Division 5A school, 1 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 22.

Imagine being in Coach Thompson’s position. He planned to open 2016 with a 6-foot-7, 230-pound returning quarterback Isaiah Anderson.

When Anderson transferred to Benedictine, 5-foot-8, 145-pound ninth-grader Damien Harris from the Battery Park Vikings of the Richmond Parks and Rec Youth Football Program emerged.

What Harris lacks in stature, he makes up for with a swagger unexpected from someone so young and small by varsity standards.

“Damien said he came to John Marshall to be the varsity quarterback, not the JV quarterback,” said Coach Thompson. “He’s a tough guy, but we’ve had to throw a lot at him.”

Wearing jersey No. 1, Harris has impressed with his arm, quick feet and ability to withstand some bone-rattling hits.

No stranger to being sacked, Harris leads the team in grass stains.

“Damien’s got a heart of steal,” said John Marshall’s Activities Director Lamont Davis.

John Marshall’s team roster is remarkably young, with three seniors and seven juniors. But its coaching staff oozes with experience, especially in the passing game.

Coach Thompson, a former Virginia State University sensation, is the CIAA’s all-time receiver. His assistants include Danielle Derricott, quarterback extraordinaire of Patrick Henry High School’s 1994 state 5A champions.

“I’m not going anywhere,” said Derricott. “I’m going to groom him (Harris).”

Yet another assistant is James Roe, a former Henrico High School and Norfolk State University receiver, who played three seasons with the NFL Baltimore Ravens.

Also on a pass-friendly staff is Leonard Hopkins, who led Norfolk State University in receptions in 1984 and 1985.

Harris is among 15 ninth-graders on John Marshall’s varsity football team. Among the team’s 14 sophomores is linebacker Romelo Burris, who attacks like a wrecking ball in the middle of the gridiron.

Coach Thompson is convinced he can produce a winner on the North Side, but he cautions it will take time.

“When city schools play the larger county schools, it’s like a football team going against a football program,” he said. “I’ve coached at Varina and Benedictine and know the difference. City schools are always behind, always catching up.”

One area in which the city schools have almost no way of catching up is in enrollment, which is how the athletic divisions are determined.

John Marshall’s schedule includes seven Division 5A opponents and just three Division 3A opponents — Armstrong and Thomas Jefferson high schools and Booker T. Washington High School of Norfolk.