A Saturday Full of 6-man Game 2...

The second game of my Saturday full of six-man football was supposed to be a really good game between defending state champion Throckmorton and Water Valley, who was actually the favorite in this game. It was kind of cool since the game had a 6pm start time, which put it right around sunset. which allowed me to capture a really nice shot of the opening kickoff and coin toss.

The game was supposed to be a lot closer than the one I had shot a few miles down the road in Zephyr, but Throckmorton didn't seem to feel the same way. The Greyhounds came out looking like the defending state champs, taking the first play from scrimmage to the end zone for a touchdown. Now this isn't all that unusual in six-man football it is known for its high scores. But then Throckmorton was playing some really stiff defense. Water Valley did keep it close on the first couple of drives, but by the second quarter things really started to get out of hand quickly.

By the start of the second quarter it was just a matter of time before the game ended via the 45-point mercy rule. Water Valley came out and scored a touchdown and stalled one of Throckmorton's drives to prolong the game a little bit longer, but there was never any doubt who was going to come out on top in the game. Throckmorton ended up winning the game 62-16 late in the third quarter.

State Softball

Thursday was the first day of a really busy weekend. In fact, Thursday was the easy day, all I had to do was drive to Austin, shoot Early High's school's softball game in the state tournament and put together a slide show for the web and I'm done. It sounded easy enough. I'd seen this team play before and they were very good. However, when a team gets no-hit in its game, getting all those photos becomes A LOT harder!

I know from covering last year's state tournament that pitching usually dominates in the state tourney. So, I wasn't expecting a whole lot of hits, but for the team to get no-hit wasn't expected either. One thing about Early is they don't make a lot of errors, which they didn't make in their game either, which would have been great for them had they gotten some hits, and maybe scored some runs. Instead, it was just another zero on the board.

The one thing about these big games I can always count on is the end of the game and the reactions that it brings. It's pretty much a given that when you lose this late in the year there will be some emotions. There was. And it's a damn good thing too, because other than a mediocre at best second base shot I got pretty much nothing from the game. I guess it's a good thing this game was played at 4pm so I knew there wouldn't be deadline issues and I could hang around and watch the players get their medals. The top photo of the girls hugging happened quickly, I saw the two girls holding hands and kept my eye on them, then the other two hugged. I let out a big sigh of relief after that... I knew I would at least have something to send in. The good thing about this is I wouldn't have a scheduling conflict on Saturday having to shoot a softball game and the state track meet at the same time.

Three games, three days...

Football season is in full swing here. This weekend was the "slow" week of the year in the high school season. Most teams are taking their off weeks before the start of the district play. Of the 40-something 11-man teams that we cover only 11 were playing last weekend, and two of those games were on Thursday. I've already talked about Thursday's game. Friday was a rare chance for me to go out of town and cover one of our area teams. But, since none of the local teams were playing in town though it gave me the chance to go shoot a game out of town, about a month early (during the playoffs I'm going all over the place covering games, it's kina fun... but more on that in a few weeks).

Something else rare happened, something I never really thought about until I got there and noticed this peculiar green stuff coming out of the ground. You see, I think it has been about five years or so since I've shot a game that was played on actual grass! I chalk this up to an "only in Texas" thing, but most of the bigger teams that we cover and then later on in the playoffs almost exclusively on field turf (since all the grass fields are usually dead by then). Saturday's game was ACU, in another game that was gonna be a blowout, which wasn't a bad thing since I was going to have to leave at halftime because of deadline issues (and I had been working since 7am). The photo below is of Bernard Scott who should probably win the Div. II version of the Heisman Trophy, I think he had about 300 total yards rushing and receiving.