Thomas Jefferson tight end/defensive end Brock DeCicco is being courted by several big-time, Division-I programs.

Seeing the name Thomas Jefferson pop up on the schedule is enough to make your knees buckle, your hands want to cover your eyes, and your legs want to take off the other way. It happened to 16 teams last season — the most sent the other way by one team in Pennsylvania Class AAA history. This isn’t a program that’s on the rise; it’s one that is sitting squarely on the top. But that wasn’t always the case. ‘‘The funny thing for us,’’ Thomas Jefferson coach Bill Cherpak said, ‘‘is for so many years, we got to the (WPIAL) semifinals and couldn’t get over that hump. Four years in a row (2000-03). That gets old pretty quick.’’ The learning process was nearing its completion, as they finally won the WPIAL in 2004. ‘‘That takes you to another level,’’ said Cherpak, who is 137-26 in 12 seasons at the school. ‘‘We learned the little things that make a difference.’’ As a team, and as a coaching staff. ‘‘We push them hard but sometimes you have to pull back a little bit,’’ Cherpak said. ‘‘We watched how mentally and physically exhausted they were.’’ That season (2004) turned out to be the same one they won the first of two state championships during the last four years. Since 2003, the Jaguars are 42-3 in the regular season, where they’ve outscored their opponents 1,630-317 (an average score of 36-7) and they’ve not lost back-to-back games since 2001. So how do they do it? Buy buying into the program, its philosophies, rules, and ideals.