As I’ve stood and watched a couple of 7-onn-7 competitions the past couple of weeks, a few things have dawned on me. THING NUMBER ONE: It’s hot. You’ve probably noticed this and if you haven’t, you may have heard weatherman Stormy McHailStone on Channel 15 make mention of it. That passes as breaking news on slow days…that it’s real hot in South Carolina in the summertime. Stormy probably has some really lame graphic he uses…like a sweaty cartoon sunshine with a little word bubble coming out of his mouth that says “Old folks and puppy dogs should stay inside today.” And Channel 15 will beat that “lawdy law it’s hot” drum until somebody gets bitten by a shark or loses an eye on a Slip-n-Slide, then they’ll go buck wild on that crap for a while. No clue where I’m going with this. THING NUMBER TWO: Since I’m watching football-like activities, actual, real football can’t be too far away. It’s hard to believe, but the prep football season will be commencing in two short months. With that in mind, now seems like a good time to catch up on a few news nuggets and coaching changes from the past few weeks.
The most recent piece of news, courtesy of the Index Journal, is that Calhoun Falls Charter has a new coach in Sherwan Bunch, who, if nothing else has an awesome name. Former coach Ferric Fuller left to become the club football coach at Lander, which is not a thing I previously knew existed, but good for him. Bunch played at a tiny school, which should help prepare him for the challenges that lie ahead. Calhoun Falls Charter is, I think, the smallest school in the state to field a SCHSL football program. They now have less than 100 students and not quite 20 kids out for football. I cover Great Falls as part of my pay-the-bills job and got to see how tough having a roster in the teens is last year. Having 17 players doesn’t mean you have 17 athletes, necessarily. It also means that almost no one ever leaves the field. One injury often means you have three spots to fill…since your running back is also probably your safety and your kick returner. It can be crippling. The cruel snowball effect is that as kids stay on the field longer, the chance of injury increases and pretty soon there’s a lot more leaks in the dike than a coach has fingers to plug them with, unless some school hires Antonio Alfonseca. Great Falls started the year with 20 players, suffered the normal attrition any team has and there were injuries, which left them, at one point, with about 12 players and no choice but to forfeit one contest. Still, with not many more kids than they currently have, the Flashes did win two games last year. With it being a charter school, it’s also possible they can pick up a few more players too, so here’s hoping the Flashes have a BUNCH of success this year. HAHAHAHAPunsAreHilarious. The other recent bit of news from down around the Lakelands area is that McCormick filled its football vacancy with the hiring of Paul Pratt. The Pratt hiring feels sort of like the Scotty Steen hiring at Great Falls. Steen was a graduate of Great Falls who had served an assistant at the school basically from the moment he got his diploma. A lifer who lives in the community and is well-liked. From what I’ve read, Pratt is a McCormick native who has coached at the school for a long time. Judging by the comments on the article I’ve linked to, the move is a popular one with McCormick fans. It’s been a few months on this next note, but C.E. Murray hired Chad Wilkes to replace Brian Smith, who moved on to Blythewood High School. Wilkes is very young at 25 but comes from a winning pedigree, having played on state title teams at Cheraw in 2006 and 2007. He played college football and has been an assistant at Cheraw and Sumter the past few years. He’s inheriting a program that struggled for decades, but found great success under Smith the last two seasons, playing for state in 2015 and making it to the third round last year before losing in a close game to eventual champ Lake View. Having new coaches at McCormick and C.E. Murray means new coaches for two of the top players in the state…Mataeo Durant for the Chiefs and Darius Rush for the War Eagles. Durant, who goes 6-foot-1 and about 188 pounds, announced a list of his top five schools today. I’m not sure where colleges see him playing at the next level, but having seen him person, I feel comfortable saying he can do anything that doesn’t involve lining up in-line and blocking a fat person. He ran for 1,200 or so yards last year which is good on its face, but even better when you consider that he missed about half the season and the team didn’t win a game without him. I saw him against Lewisville and their stout defense held him in check as well as anyone did…which is to say they limited him to 141 yards, two touchdowns and two long kick returns. I don’t know if he’s a tackle-breaking runner because, you know, people actually have to catch you for you to have to break tackles and that doesn’t happen much with him. He’s like the Roadrunner if the Roadrunner had big scary man arms instead of flimsy little wings…and possibly a razor blade beak. He seemed pretty tough, is a fantastic athlete and given that his college list includes Duke, Wake Forest and Wofford, he’s obviously a very good student too. I saw Rush in person two years ago when, as a sophomore, he was playing quarterback for C.E. Murray. They had a huge offensive line and a 240-or-so-pound fullback that year, so their offense was built mostly around blunt-force trauma. They didn’t throw it all, but Rush provided an outside speed compliment and you could tell then what kind of athlete he was. He had that incredible first step, is very shifty but will mix it up and get physical too. They moved him around some last year to get him the ball in space and that obviously worked out well. He’s already committed to the University of South Carolina where, like Durant, he’ll excel at doing anything that doesn’t entail lining up directly across from very large people on the line of scrimmage. I’m sure Pratt and Wilkes will enjoy having such fun toys to play with in their first head coaching gigs. A few observations: I mentioned Steen earlier. A year after the Red Devils had such awful struggles with numbers, things have picked up considerably. Some guys who didn’t play last year have come out and this year’s ninth-grade class is a big one. Great Falls has about 34 players on the team. If they can hold that number, they’ll be just fine and fairly competitive this year. They’ve also made a couple of alterations to their schedule. Last year they had two games against Battlin’ Bill’s Home School Super Stars, or someone of that ilk, but won’t be playing either this season. I think that’s a pretty good move, actually. I have nothing against those teams, I’m all for kids playing athletics in whatever form they can, but you honestly have no idea of what you’re getting into when you schedule them. The roster can change drastically year-to-year or even game-to-game and maybe you are playing home school children and kids that go to private schools with no teams, or maybe you’re playing kids kicked off their public school team the previous week. There’s not much upside for the public school in that scenario. Anyway, Great Falls will now open against York’s JV team. The Red Devils’ senior won’t be able to play in that one, but they’ll have a mostly young roster anyway. It’s frankly very difficult to fill openings when you’re in the second year of a realignment and everyone else’s schedules are set. They’ll now play Andrew Jackson on October 6. I’ve seen Lewisville in some 7-on-7 action. The Lions made it to the third round of the playoffs last season but lost players like QB Trey Keels and WR Mike Hill, both of whom will be playing in college. Rhett Cox has looked good at quarterback, showing off a very strong arm and picking up the offense quickly. Demetric Hardin might be able to provide some of those “holy crap how did he catch that” plays that Hill was so famous for. They have plenty of other weapons too, like Quentin Sanders (who has an offer from Marshall). The offense will score points in bunches, I’m sure. They suffered some losses on defense too, particularly at the OLB slot, but the Lions have Josh Belk (Clemson commitment) up front, Mikial Fourney at safety (has an offer from Liberty) and a bumper crop of young players coming up. 2016-‘17 was an excellent all-around athletic year for the school (they won the annual Carlisle Cup in Class A) and trust me when I tell you that wasn’t a one-year phenomenon. They football team remains one to keep an eye on. Lastly, a request. I know I have a few coaches who read this silly blog. I’m going to attempt to do full-on previews of every Class A football team in the state this year. I’ll be sending out questionnaires soon, but it is sometimes difficult to find contact info for coaches at smaller schools. So, if you are a Class A coach reading this, please shoot me your contact info at [email protected] or message me on Twitter (@CNR_Sports). Now if you’ll excuse, it’s almost time for the news. I’d hate to miss the weather forecast…
1 Comment
There was a time when, had it not been for a microwave and people in paper hats handing me bags out of windows, I would pretty much have starved to death. It’s probably not uncommon for a young man, out on his own for the first time to subsist on McRibs and Hot Pockets, I don’t guess. After a while, though, I started to take an interest in, you know, eating things other than Hot Pockets. Once I started to cook for myself I found that I actually enjoyed doing it. I liked eating better food, but I also got some satisfaction out of trying something a little more difficult and having it pay off…and even more for cooking and having other people enjoy it. I particularly love cooking things on my grill and in my smoker, partly because (in my opinion) it imparts more flavor but also maybe because it adds an exciting danger factor to the experience that I nice, clean stove doesn’t. Or maybe I just like playing with fire…I should really move on. My interest was boosted even more when “BBQ Pitmasters” hit the airwaves. I’m not given much to watching reality TV…unless it involves people cooking whole hogs in cinderblock smokers and a bearded Georgian judge saying stuff like “We ain’t judging on appearance you silly sumbeech.” Again, I digress… Once I became a bit more skilled and adept, I started to experiment. Once I’d mastered smoking baby back ribs using store-bought rub and sauce, the next step was to concoct my own spice rub and make my own barbecue sauce. Then I tried my hand at beef ribs. Once I’d gotten to where I could consistently produce good barbecue, I started smoking whole turkeys and brisket. There’s some trial and error involved and occasionally some inedible meat, but every time I’ve tackled something new, I’ve eventually gotten to the point where I can cook it and people will eat it without vomiting or making sour faces. In most all cases, what comes out of my smoker or off my grill has actually been good. One of the foods I’ve been particularly experimental with is steak. I started off grilling ribeyes, using a fairly standard mix of salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder on them. After a while, I wanted to change things up a bit, so I’d experiment with different seasonings, then I got especially daring and started buying cheap, off-brand cuts of meat (blade steaks, bottom round, shoulder roasts etc.) just to see if I could make them tender and tasty. I once saw steaks on sale at a Dollar Store and almost pulled the trigger…then I really started thinking about “steaks” that cost a dollar. Seriously, that has to be hooves and no-no parts doesn’t it? I’m adventurous, but I don’t know if Bobby Flippin’ Flay could make one dollar steaks edible. Anyway, I figured out that, unlike strips and ribeyes, marination was a key. I soaked those things in everything imaginable, including whiskey (that usually cost more than the meat), broth and salad dressing. I actually hit gold once, marinating some really cheap bottom round in a mix of whiskey, hot sauce, garlic and brown sugar. I also learned that just because it looks like a steak, doesn’t mean you can cook it like one. A little lower and a little slower goes a long way in some cases. I’ve mostly gotten away from buying really cheap steak cuts and doctoring them up for a couple of reasons. For one, it requires a lot more effort than just buying a little better steak and now I’ve kind of proven to myself I can make good food from discount cuts. Mostly though, when I want a steak, I want to taste steak with a little seasoning, not Jack Daniels with a little beef taste…much as I like the flavor of Jack Daniels. That changed a few weeks ago, though, when I made a Friday morning run to the grocery store and found sirloin on sale. Now, sirloin is not hooves and no-nos, Dollar Store tough, but it isn’t as tender or well-marbled as ribeyes or filets. To me, though, it actually may have more natural flavor than some better cuts. So I bought what was billed as a “steak,” though I would more aptly describe it as “a ginormous slab of cow.” It weighed over 1.5 pounds and only cost me about $10. I decided with a piece of meat this big and with this little bit of marbling, I needed to go the low, slow route. However, I didn’t really feel like getting out my smoker to cook one steak. So I turned to my kettle, charcoal grill. I do have a gas grill, but I rarely use it, both because it’s old and doesn’t work great and because I just much prefer the flavor or meat grilled over charcoal. I decided I’d just offset the charcoal to one side to grill on indirect heat. I also decided the charcoal I’d be using would be hickory briquettes that give off a lot of smoke. I’ve found that putting wood in my grill just makes the meat a bit sooty, I guess because even when you open all the vents, there isn’t enough airflow for a clean burn. You could wet some wood chips, wrap them in foil and punch some holes to put a little smoke in your grill, but I have found that doesn’t give me enough smoke, so I went with the hickory briquettes. I decided not to over-season the meat, since I wanted to taste mainly meat and smoke. I just gave it a good coating of salt and pepper and threw on it on the grill. The only challenge with a piece of meat that is not very well marbled is that even cooking lower and slower, it can dry out. So, I whipped up some melted garlic butter and brushed it on often. You could also use squeeze butter, which I sometimes do, but I thought a little garlic would set it off nicely. It took a while to get the steak to medium, since I was using not a lot of charcoal and it was offset, but man the wait was worth it. After I let it rest, I cut into it. I was so impressed with the results that I took a picture and sent it to a fellow grilling enthusiast. “How the (naughty word) did you get a smoke ring on a steak?” he texted back.
Cooking like I did, it was as tender a steak as most any steak I’ve ever cooked. It was juicy and the smoke, butter and light seasoning all just enhanced the steak flavor. It mas made into INCREDIBLY DELICIOUS sandwiches. If you’re willing to put in a little extra effort, cheap steak doesn’t taste like cheap steak at all…and it’s much better than a Hot Pocket. Have any magical steak grilling techniques to share? Leave them in the comment section. |
TravisI am Travis, the king 0f SC 1A Football Archives
November 2021
Categories |