McCormick-37
Calhoun Falls Charter-18 Fox Creek-48 Dixie-28 St. Joe's-20 Ridge Spring-Monetta-12 Christ Church-56 Ware Shoals-0 Southside Christian-41 Whitmire-0 Lamar-39 C.A. Johnson-0 McBee-80-flippin'-4 Great Falls-0 Williston-Elko-35 Blackville-Hilda-7 Calhoun County-63 Wagener-Salley-22 Hunter-Kinard-Tyler-30 North-0 Allendale-Fairfax-38 Branchville-0 Bamberg-Ehrhardt-37 Estill-6 Denmark-Olar-48 Bethune-Bowman-20 Baptist Hill-56 Lincoln-16 St. John's-38 Burke-0 Cross-70-dadgum-4 Military Magnet-0 Hannah-Pamplico-35 East Clarendon-25 Scott's Branch-8 Timmonsville-6 Lake View-20 Carvers Bay-16 Latta-51 Creek Bridge-0 Hemingway-40 Green Sea-Floyds-12 Breakdown-If you are a fan of non-competitive, one-sided butt draggings, Class A football on Friday night was for you. Seriously, most every game was like a 100-meter sprint race between Usain Bolt and an obese, chain-smoking, half-turtle, half-sloth with asthma wearing lead boots. There were nine shutouts Friday, with the closest of those being a 30-0 drumming of North by HKT and only four games were as close as 10 points. You'd think with all the "playing up" games being out of the way and everyone into their region slates, the contests would be closer. There were some teams that lost practice time and had games postponed because of the flooding, which may account for some squads being more ready to play than others. That would only have an impact on a handful of teams, though. There were some contest where you figured, frankly, one team would need to be given something to bite down on, because they were such mismatches. Again, though, you are only talking about one or two games that fell into that category. My best guess for explaining the curb-stompings of last week is that Class A has the clearest differential between the haves and have nots. It's not uncommon for schools to be in a region where they face opponents that are two or three times their size in terms of enrollment. A struggling AAAA team at least, usually, has numbers. In Class A teams can reach the point where they are just out of warm bodies. Take Great Falls as an example. The school now has just over 200 students and only about 27 or so kids on the football team. They were missing at least five starters last week and had to play Gray Collegiate on Monday, then top-ranked McBee on Friday. In a situation like that you are having to put young players who may not really be ready for varsity action into games at positions they've never played. The elimination of the eight-quarter rule means those younger players aren't getting any experience on Thursday nights. So an already young, thin team that's struggling has starters hurt, green freshmen playing in important starting slots and because of the weather is hitting the field twice in five days. When that's the scenario, you sometimes get 84-0 and 74-0. That's what I think anyway...it's either that or voodoo. If someone can provide us with a live chicken, maybe we can level the playing field a little. Given recent results, it appears that Southside Christian has emerged as the cream of the upperstate private school crop. They won over a gutty Whitmire team 41-0 last week after having given Christ Church its first regular-season Class A loss in eight years the week before. The Christ Church-Southside Christian game was close (it went to overtime) and I was told the Cavs were oft-penalized in that game, but you can kind of start now to look at common opponents and see a trend of the Sabres winning in more impressive fashion than the Cavs. Now, I don't think Southside Christian can beat McBee, but I am starting to really believe they will get a shot at them fairly deep in the playoffs. That's good for Southside Christian, who is getting shipped up to AA next year where the phrase "fairly deep in the playoffs" will probably only be used in tandem with the phrase "remember that time when we went..." I don't think I've ever had the pleasure of meeting Green Sea-Floyds Coach Tony Sullivan...I can't say I was familiar with him at all until this morning, but anyone willing to call out the SCHSL for their crap-hattery is A-OK in my book. I'll put a link to the full story in the "suggested reading" section below, but his team played twice in four days last week because of games pushed back by the flooding our state has endured. Since coaches have to be drilled on concussion protocols, heat management and since such a high premium is placed on player safety and ample recovery time, he considers not postponing all games for an extra week to be a duplicitous bag of dookie. Well, he stated it a bit more artfully than than but you get my point. The season was extended by a week to prevent having teams in the hardest-hit flood areas playing four games in 10 days at the end of the year, but that came after the league first said it didn't have the power to unilaterally extend the season, then said individual classes had to handle that themselves, then said they might could move it but probably couldn't because of iron-clad contracts with venues hosting state title games (though they moved one state title game back last year) then unilaterally extended the season. They also weren't terribly helpful or understanding toward coaches expressing their want to extend the season, I've been told. The extension passed last Tuesday was the right thing to do (though it took too long to do it) but even the one-week extension had cracks that some teams fell into, Green Sea-Floyds included, obviously. Sullivan is speaking out and standing up for his kids and their well-being, which I applaud. If all coaches had sat quietly by, we wouldn't have gotten the one-week extension at all. It's too late to do anything about it now, but if guys like he and Brian Smith keep raising a ruckus, maybe a "worst-case scenario" clause can be put in the league constitution to deal with these kinds of issues in the future. Quick hits- At the midway point of the season, I wrote that Calhoun County was the least impressive undefeated team in Class A because they hadn't beaten anyone with a winning record and had played some not terribly impressive teams fairly close. Well, in the last three weeks they've doled out horrific rogerings, outscoring the opposition 158-34. My haphazard musings were perhaps incorrect...I'm having a tough time figuring out Ridge Spring-Monetta, who lost to what had been a sorta struggling St. Joe's team last week after losing to McCormick the week before that. You can look at the past few seasons and see that they often lose a few, but typically get it together late in the year and make some nice playoffs runs. So, it may be more of the same. It could also be that St. Joe's, after struggling to a 2-3 record, has found its way a bit. They have won three straight games now...McBee apparently bumped their whirling, drill of dismemberment from the "penetrate bedrock" setting to "burrow through whole mountain ranges" Friday night. It was the second time this year they've scored 84 points...McCormick won again Friday with another huge game from Mataeo Durant (227 yards). They will lock up a region title and all the sweet, delicious playoff points that come with that on Friday with a win against Fox Creek. Suggested Reading... Green Sea-Floyds played twice in four days and their coach was totally not down with that. Another coach expresses his displeasure with the league...so that's two. Two is a trend, right? No silly intro here...the football team at Lincoln High honored the Mother Emanuel AME shooting victims last week. A wonderful, touching gesture. Competitive, non-whoopings were in short supply Friday, but Carvers Bay and Lake View played a good one. You can read the the excruciating details of Cross spanking Military Magnet 74-0 here if'n you want to...but if you do you're either a Cross fan or a horrible person that likes seeing children cry. Mataeo Durant's name is extra vowel-y...and also he is a stud hoss running back that went for 227 Friday. Fox Creek won and I don't have anything funny to say about that. Also, my apologies for not getting part two of the weekly preview up last week...believe me when I say I'd much rather extol the virtues of Bethune-Bowman's defense than be car-less for eight hours and have to buy new tires. Wasn't really given the option of picking between the two though...
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TravisI am Travis, the king 0f SC 1A Football Archives
November 2021
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