As my newspaper career winds down, I have been thinking about the events I have witnessed over the years. With it being football season, I have been thinking about that sport the most.
I wish I had kept track of all the things I have seen over the years. I know I have forgotten much that I would like to remember, but here are a few things from high school football in no particular order:
A national rushing record - Back in the late 1990s and early 2000s, I was working in West Memphis, Ark. West Memphis High School was playing a playoff game on the road in the second round in Russellville (where, coincidentally, I would later work).
West Memphis had a fullback in their wing-T offense by the name of De’Arrius Howard, who would go on to play at the University of Arkansas. Howard and his fellow running backs amassed 853 yards rushing against Russellville, which was then a national record.
Russellville played in a conference where all the teams ran the spread offense with a lot of passing. They had not played a smash-mouth running team like West Memphis all season. It showed on the field. The Blue Devils were unstoppable on the ground. They threw one pass the whole game - a 10-yard completion. It was one big running play after another.
Another memorable thing about the game was the weather. It was brutally cold. I’m talking literal teeth-chattering, body-shivering, finger-numbing cold. It was both one of the most miserable and most exciting games I have ever watched in person.
A successful 32-yard two-point conversion - This one happened when I worked for a newspaper in Alabama in the early 1990s. The team I was covering scored a touchdown and got back-to-back unsportsmanlike penalties for their touchdown celebrations, which left them with a two-point try from the 32-yard line. But to everyone’s surprise, they converted it on a long pass to the end zone.
I was a bad luck charm - Not one particular game, but half of a season. I started working for a newspaper in Florida midway through football season. Before I had arrived, the local high school team was 5-0 and ranked in the top 10 in the state in their class, which in Florida is quite an accomplishment.
Once I started covering them, they lost their last five regular-season games to finish 5-5 and barely qualified for the state playoffs. They lost in the first round. To summarize - before my arrival, 5-0; after my arrival, 0-6.
Perfect timing - This happened when I was working for the newspaper in Marlow. The Outlaws were playing a road game at Washington. I was standing on the sideline near the field of play about 20 yards from the line of scrimmage. It’s not a place I would normally stand, but I figured I would be out of the way and maybe could get a good picture.
An assistant coach spots me and asks me to back up because the play is coming right where I’m standing. I back up a couple of steps and sure enough, the wide receiver catches the ball in front of me about six inches from where I had been standing and runs in for the touchdown. The assistant coach and I looked at each other and laughed.
The “Comanche Special” - Bryson Evans and Kooper Doucet combined on one of the more memorable plays I’ve seen in my career. In 2021, Lone Grove had rallied from a 20-6 halftime deficit to go ahead 23-20 with a little more than three minutes left in the game.
The Indians drove from their own 35-yard line down to the Longhorns’ 14, where they faced a fourth-and-7.
Head coach Casy Rowell was thinking about kicking a field goal to tie it, but Doucet wanted to run a play and talked him out of it. Doucet and Evans got together and drew up a play where Evans lined up to the right on the same side he knew Doucet, the quarterback, would be rolling out.
Evans initially was going to run an out route, but cut upfield after he saw the out route was covered. The defender covering Evans kept his eyes on Doucet and never saw Evans cut up the field until it was too late. Doucet had already thrown the ball and Evans caught it at the seven and ran it in the rest of the way with 17 seconds left to win the game.
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