Black Friday Doubleheader & Why I Hate the Option...

The best thing about football season in Texas is since schools are out there are usually afternoon football games on Friday, which means I get to miss shooting Black Friday shopping in exchange for shooting an afternoon football game. That deal works just fine for me. So, on Friday while the masses were fighting crowds for doorbuster deals I went to Colorado City to shoot Munday's game against Crosbyton and in the nightcap it was Cisco playing Idalou.

The first game was barely even a game. Munday came out guns blazing scoring early and often. By halftime the score was 49-0 and even then it looked like Munday had called off the dogs late in the second quarter. Most of the starters never even saw the field in the second half and even a few of the JV players made in the game late and still Munday ended up scoring two more touchdowns. The final score was 63-14, and I'm pretty sure they could've put up 100 easily if they wanted to.

The second game, Cisco vs. Idalou was the big reason I went out there. Cisco, a perennial power was playing Idalou, the defending state champion. Just looking at Idalou's stats they play great defense, they hadn't given up more than one touchdown to a 2A team all season including not giving up a point the whole month of October. Cisco, on the other hand, could score at will and averaging more than 40 points a game. Something had to give...

Cisco in the past has been a running team, basing out of the I-formation. That made them rather easy to shoot. This year, however, they've started running the zone read option. Well, the problem with running the option was where I shoot from behind the line was I really had no idea who was getting the ball. When the option is run well it's meant to confuse the defense as to who has the ball. Well, the problem was, it also confused the photographer too! I hadn't shot many option teams lately and had almost forgotten how much I hated shooting option teams. Well, luckily Cisco was playing great defense as well, because Cisco, like their counterparts were playing great defense and causing lots of turnovers. On paper, the game was an upset, but Cisco played great and dominated the defending state champs and pulled out a well-deserved win.

Playoffs Week 2...

Much like last year my only chance of shooting a playoff football game in the second week of the playoffs was on Thursday night, since I was going to have to go to San Marcos for the state volleyball tournament. Luckily we had a Thursday night game with Eastland playing last year's 2A state finalist, Littlefield. Eastland was 10-0 going into the game and Littlefield was 8-3 going into the game.

This was really a classic example of a trap game. Eastland on paper was the better team, however they had not played in three weeks. With their bye week coming in the last game of the season, and then getting a first round bye for the playoffs, add to playing a team that made a long run in the playoffs the previous year and a lot of those players coming back, well it was just a formula for a tough game for Eastland.

And, on the first first play of the game it was looking like it might be. Littlefield took a long run for a touchdown to open things up. Eastland, though, came back with a touchdown drive of their own. The game stayed pretty tight through the whole first half, with Eastland going into halftime up 14-10. Then in the second half the Mavericks took control in a big way. Opening up with a long touchdown run on the first drive then the defense picked things up with a big stop. Eastland showed just how expolsive the offense was in the second half winning the game 51-22. It looked like they got rid of most of that rust during halftime.

One Down 16 to go...

The final game of the weekend was another area match up between Colorado City and Merkel. Both were expected to have big seasons and whoever won this one was off to a good start. The game started off looking pretty good Merkel scored first, but Colorado City moved the ball well. The biggest problem is Colorado City kept shooting themselves in the foot in the red zone.

In the second quarter Colorado City started to put things together, but Merkel was still playing really well on both sides of the ball, it was just looking like one of those games that looked like it would go back and forth all night. It was a lot of fun to watch but made things a little stressful to cover given earlier deadlines on Saturday, than the normal later Friday night deadlines.

I shot until the middle of the third quarter and after I got photos that would work for both teams I ran to the pressbox to edit. Things stayed close all through my editing. I was kind of hoping one team or another would pull away, but that just wasn't going to happen. So, I sent two photos, one that would work if CCity won and another that would work should Merkel win. Finally, towards the end of the fourth quarter Merkel pulled away with the lead and with less than two minutes left they scored a TD to put things away. This was easily the best game I got to see of the weekend, I just wish I wasn't so squeezed for time. Nonetheless I was happy with what I got. Hopefully things will only get better from here.

Searching for Hailey, My Last Day...

Monday was my last day in Colorado City, and it wasn't a moment too soon. And on this day there wasn't a whole lot going on. I had forgotten it was Martin Luther King Day, so the "official" search had kind of taken the weekend off, publicly at least. Monday had also marked the three week mark since she had last been seen. I drove around the city for a while and talked to the reporter to see if she was working on anything in particular. But, at least I didn't have to write the story. After coming up with nothing in Colorado City I decided to drive up to Dunn, the small town about 15 miles north where much of the searching was going on.

On the bridge in the town there was a huge memorial set up for Hailey. Over 100 stuffed animals lined the bridge along with letters and posters of support. It was both really cool to see the outpouring of support and sad because of the whole situation. It was also the meeting place for the unofficial search parties. So, I hung out there hoping one of the groups would show up. I spent about an hour sitting in my car, listening to the radio. Then a couple ladies showed up with their kids. There were from Colorado City, they all stood around and prayed together, and then the kids spent a few minutes looking at all the letters and stuffed animals. It made for a really nice moment. After another long wait, the Hailey's Angels group, the few ladies that spent pretty much every day out there looking for them showed up. I spoke with them for a while and followed them to the next place they were looking. It worked out really well, because the light was nice. And even though I only had about 40 minutes to spend with them when we finally got to the place I got a couple nice shots. Thank God! A couple hours earlier I was afraid I wouldn't get anything.

Still Searching for Hailey...

Despite spending two days digging up the Abilene landfill, Hailey Dunn was not found in the Abilene landfill. The two hits that had been picked up on by the cadaver dogs were from a couple of casts that were thrown away and the hots the dog made were from dead skin cells in the casts. So the search continued...

The photog we had staying in Colorado City had been there for 12 straight days, only getting home once to get clean clothes. Living out of a hotel and working on the story nearly non-stop. So, anyone who's ever had to work that much especially on the same story, knows that you need to just get some time off to unwind. So, I got to spend two days covering it. On Sunday, members of the Taylor County Sheriff's Posse were going to join the search on horseback.

Since I was the only person covering the story that day, I was both shooting the photos and writing the story. It wasn't nearly as bad as I was thinking it would be, since the Sheriff Posse was there it was a new story we were able to do rather than the same "searching continues and nothing is new" story that was becoming redundant. I spent all morning following the group to a couple different places and taking off on horseback. It's really amazing how much ground can be searched by 30+ people on horseback. I wasn't able to follow to much but, needless to say, I got plenty of exercise from walking around with all my camera gear. And, like the past nearly three weeks, nothing was found. Here is a link to the story I wrote: here.

Praying for Hailey...

A couple of weeks ago, 13-year-old Hailey Dunn went missing in Colorado City, about 70 miles west of here. When it was originally reported we didn't do a whole lot on the story. The local police in Colorado City were treating her case as a runaway. However, after a week, it was looking a little different and started picking up national headlines. We had a reporter and photographer staying in Colorado City the whole week. By Sunday, we had a photog working things in that area, but there was another prayer service in Sweetwater that I had to go shoot. I was told it was going to be a candle light vigil, however, it was happening at 5pm, when there's still light out. It turned out to be a prayer service. That was fine, but I had to figure out how I was going to shoot it. All of the people participating ended up holding hands in a giant circle in the parking lot of the church. It made it kind of nice the sun was going down and I just followed the light around. At the end, they had a balloon release, by that time the sun had almost set, so I figured I'd work out the silhouettes, since that's about all the light I had left. It worked out pretty nicely considering how somber the situation was.

2 Games, 1 Night...

Normally I absolutely HATE shooting two games in one night. The reason being, when you leave at halftime often you only get half the story, especially is if it a close game. However, when I got to Cisco on Friday night, I noticed it was homecoming. In Texas, homecoming means one thing, a ridiculously LONG halftime. As it is, high school football games have miserably long halftimes (28 minutes). However, homecoming halftimes last even longer! Usually a minimum of 40 minutes, Some have even pushed nearly an hour.

Now, this was bad enough under our old deadlines, but now, it pretty much means there is absolutely no chance at shooting the whole game. On this particular night though, that wasn't a problem. Cisco went up 28-0 going into the half and looked like they would run away with it. Plus I was able to get some nice stuff in the first half of the game. So, coupled with my hatred for homecoming I had no problem leaving at halftime.

The good thing about it, is the second game I was going to had a longer first half and the 15 minute drive to Eastland from Cisco got me there at the start of halftime. The problem I ran into, which is what I often complain about when I need to cover this stuff, Eastland was in complete control of the game. So, basically I had the third quarter to shoot. I guess it turned out ok. Not long into the third quarter I got a nice interception shot that I normally wouldn't have gotten, but I was standing a little further down the field than normal. On this occasion it worked out, and I got a nice shot of Eastland's Jett Johnson pulling in a nice one-handed interception (below).