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Prepped And Ready: Miserable Morning at McCallum
I would not want to be a McCallum or Akins football player right now.
Due to a weather delay that lasted nearly two hours, the Knights and Eagles weren’t able to finish their game on Thursday until after midnight. You’ve got to figure that with postgame activities and the bus ride home from House Park, some of those kids probably didn’t get to bed until around 2 a.m. on Friday.
Let’s just hope that none of the McCallum or Akins teachers were going to hand out pop quizzes today.
After covering the Bastrop/Seguin game last night, I stopped by House Park to see the end of the McCallum game. I stayed until around 11:45 p.m… which marked the end of the third quarter.
So, like the players, I’m a bit tired this morning. But I’m a trooper so let’s blog.
NEWS FROM AROUND THE STATE
- Former McNeil coach to honor late Kingsville High football player (via the Corpus Christi Caller).
- Sidelined by an injury and an illness, two elite runners are ready to run (via the Dallas Morning News).
- Volleyball coach nearing milestone win (via the Fort Worth Star-Telegram).
- Storied stadium stirs up controversy in San Antonio (via the San Antonio Express-News).
THURSDAY NIGHT RECAP
- Bastrop 51 Seguin 21: Josiah Monroe’s touchdown-a-thon gets Bastrop back to its winning ways.
- McCallum 60 Akins 43: Knights overcome weather and D’Auuhndre Raindle en route to the team’s first victory of the season.
BASTROP’S BACK
A few more words on the Bastrop win.
Last night’s win shouldn’t have been a surprise. Bastrop, after all, is District 25-5A’s defending champion and the Bears were ranked ninth in our preseason power poll.
But after last week’s loss to McNeil, it was possible to think that the Bears, who returned only two all-district players, might not have been as good as we thought they were. A loss to Seguin would have all but slapped an “overrated” label across the jersey of every Bastrop player.
But Bastrop played great on Thursday, using its speed to blow by a rebuilding Seguin team that had won its season opener. Josiah Monroe accounted for six touchdowns but the Bears did a a good job of spreading the wealth – Monroe’s five touchdown passes were hauled in by four different receivers and Monroe, Marcus Reed and Mark Jackson combined for 174 rushing yards on 26 carries.
“It’s not a one-man show,” Bastrop coach Gerald Perry said after the game.
Bastrop still has issues – five of the six touchdowns allowed by Bastrop this season have been rushing scores – but Thursday’s win made it clear that the Bears will be contending for a district title this season.
FRIDAY NIGHT BREAKDOWN
Dripping Springs v. Wimberley
Friday, Sept. 3 at 7:30 p.m.
- Last week, Jeff Tuck celebrated his third year on the Tigers’ varsity team with a four-touchdown performance against Crockett. Not to be outdone, Aledo transfer Brady Lambert accounted for four touchdowns in his first game in a Wimberley uniform.
- Crockett had a tough time tackling Omar Pereyra last week as the junior running back averaged 6.8 yards a carry. Wimberley has numerous weapons on offense, none more scary than Texas A&M-bound running back Dennis Smith.
- Dripping Springs opened the season with its first shutout since last year’s 24-0 win over Wimberley. Wimberley returned seven defensive starters this year but the Texans still gave up 42 points in its season-opening win over Cuero.
- Dripping Springs got two 30-yard field goals from Paden Williams last week. Wimberley will be led on special teams by Brennen Blakemore, who had a punt return touchdown last year against Ingram Moore.
- Dripping Springs has won three straight games over the Texans and a fourth straight victory would help the Tigers match their win total from last year. Wimberley’s season couldn’t have gotten off to a better start: Wimberley ended Cuero’s 33-game home winning streak last week and was named the Army Strong Team of the Week for the 3A classification.
CHAT RECAP
Every Thursday at 1 p.m., we host a high school football chat on the Varsity News blog. Here are some of the highlights from this week’s chat:
- Since Lake Travis struggled in its season-opening victory over Westlake, we asked the chatters who they thought would beat Lake Travis this season. Fifty-three percent of the voters thought that Lake Travis wouldn’t lose this fall while Kerrville Tivy (18%), Aledo (12%), Cedar Park (12%) and the somebody else option (6%) all got votes. We asked the same question two weeks ago and only 33 percent of the voters thought that Lake Travis wouldn’t lose a game this season (20 percent of the voters in that poll thought that Westlake would knock off the Cavs).
- We asked the voters which team had the most disappointing season-opening loss. Thirty-seven percent of the vote went to Bastrop, which lost a 22-20 game to McNeil. Bastrop’s dominance on Thursday night showed why people were so shocked by last week’s struggles.
- While the voters were disappointed by Bastrop, not a lot of people seemed overly concerned about McCallum’s loss to Anderson last week. Eighty-three percent of the voters expect the Knights to win the District 26-4A crown. Travis got the remaining 17 percent of the vote while LBJ and Crockett were shutout by the chatters.
We also got into a spirited discussion about the recent 7-on-7 controversy going on in the Dallas area.
Poll-wise, we asked if coaches should be banned from coaching 7-on-7 drills or allowed to coach. An overwhelming 80 percent of the voters thought that the coaches should be allowed to coach while 20 percent thought that the head honchos should be banned.
I really don’t think this topic is worth an investigative report but if the goal was to get ratings then point, WFAA-TV. I’ll keep my opinion on the matter short and if you want a more in-depth opinion piece, I suggest this column by the Dallas Morning News’ Matt Wixon.
If the UIL doesn’t want coaches coaching in the summer, they shouldn’t let them attend the games. Eliminate the grey areas and either ban the coaches completely or let them be fully involved. It’s that simple.
HIGH SCHOOL FANTASY FOOTBALL
This season, we will be playing a high school fantasy football game. We will be using a standard scoring system but instead of Peyton Manning or Brett Favre, we will be debating each week on whether to start Lake Travis’ Michael Brewer or Belton’s David Ash.
Each week, we will draft a quarterback, a running back, a wide receiver and a defense. There is no exclusive ownership of players but each quarterback can only be used twice. Running backs, wide receivers and defenses can only be used once.
We will publish our weekly line-ups in the Friday column and our season scores can be found in the parentheses following each participant’s name and affiliation. Be sure to check back with us throughout the season to see how we’re doing.
Here is what our Week 1 line-ups look like:
- DeVon Odems, LBJ fan (67 points): Westlake QB Lewis Guilbeau, McCallum RB Michael Sorrells, LBJ WR John Kavanaugh, Stony Point defense
- Michael Adams, Bastrop Advertiser (52 points): Elgin QB Dylan Scott, Copperas Cove RB William Randolph, Vista Ridge WR Jaylen Harris, Elgin defense
- Max Thompson, Lake Travis View (39 points): Killeen QB Michael Cummings, McCallum RB Michael Sorrells, Killeen WR Cameron Fleming, Lago Vista defense
- Rick Cantu, Austin American-Statesman (38 points): Austin High QB Jordan Jaquez, Giddings RB Eric Rimes, Lake Travis WR Griffin Gilbert, St. Michael’s defense
- Thomas Jones, Westlake Picayune (34 points): Belton QB David Ash, Regents RB Walker Netherton, Austin High WR Cayleb Jones, St. Michael’s defense
- Danny Davis, Austin American-Statesman (23 points): Lake Travis QB Michael Brewer, Copperas Cove RB William Randolph, Lake Travis WR Griffin Gilbert, Cedar Park defense
And that’s the end of this story. Have a fun Friday and I’ll see you on Monday morning.
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Austinites love to be heard, and we’re giving you a bullhorn. We just ask that you keep things civil. Leave out the personal attacks. Do not use profanity, ethnic or racial slurs, or take shots at anyone’s sexual orientation or religion. If you can’t be nice, we reserve the right to remove your material and ban users who violate our Visitor’s agreement. Click here to report comment abuse.
By Danny Davis
September 4, 2010 3:07 PM | Link to this
Joe, you must not have read the entire blog post. The McCallum score is clearly listed in the “Thursday Night Recap” section.
By Joe Mitchell
September 4, 2010 2:21 PM | Link to this
Why does the Statesman not print the McCallum football team scores?
No score was posted Friday or Saturday for the McCallum game. You did not mention the score on your blog. I understand Austin has many High schools in the area which makes it difficult to cover all the games in depth.
The least the paper can do is print scores for all teams.
By BF
September 3, 2010 2:20 PM | Link to this
No pop quizzes today. Yep, we wouldn’t want learning to get in the way of football.
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Tags: McCallum, Miserable, Morning, new, Prepped, Ready