SPORTS
STORM CENTER: Mascot mania ensues
We’ve dealt with some serious issues in columns the past couple of weeks, so it’s time to change that.
One of my personal favorite topics is high school mascots.
The mascots around here are safe picks, and certainly aren’t going to make the politically-correct crowd boil like water on a stove.
At one point, Bowie wasn’t the Jackrabbits – rather the school mascot was the Mustang.
As stated in previous special sections found in the Bowie News, the first school mascot was the Mustang. This was documented in yearbooks from 1909 and 1912.
More annuals were uncovered during the 1920s, and these publications have Jackrabbits listed as Bowie’s mascot.
Tales of the change are unclear.
One account states the Jackrabbit mascot was born thanks to a member of the media. Bowie ran so fast at the University Interscholastic League state meet, a reporter compared them to Jackrabbits.
The other story relates one of the track team members had a Jackrabbit sewn on his shirt, and the crowd cheered him on, yelling, “Go Jackrabbit.”
The new mascot stuck, and the Mustangs were transformed into Jackrabbits.
Nocona is an Indian town through and through. So therefore, Indians makes perfect sense to be the mascot.
Peta Nocona, chief of the Comanche Quahadi band, led his tribe through the Indian Wars from the 1840s to the 1860s. He’s the father of Chief Quanah Parker.
Peta was the son of Pohebits-quasho, also known as “Iron Jacket,” which serves the name for the largest youth baseball tournament every year in Nocona. Read more from this column in the July 23 Bowie News.
Do you know some interesting mascots? Let the sports editor know by email: sports@bowienewsonline.com.
Editor’s Note: The Storm Center column is the expressed written views of sports editor Eric Viccaro and not The Bowie News.
Hutto High School, according to the sports editor of the Bowie News, has the best mascot in the state of Texas. The legend has it a hippo escaped from a traveling circus and visited this community, which is near Austin. (Submitted photo)
Bellevue’s girl’s basketball team led at halftime but a quick 9-0 Jacksboro run in the opening moments of the second half would prove the difference in a 28-25 Lady Eagle loss June 15 in a Nocona Summer League game.
Leading 12-9 at the half, Bellevue continued to shut down the inside game of the Tigerettes. Jacksboro switched tactics and began firing from outside. Three 3-pointers in the span of just under two minutes gave Jacksboro an 18-12 lead.
Bellevue kept things close, however, getting on the second half scoreboard with Mattie Broussard’s basket and free throws cutting the deficit to two, 18-16. A Haven Jones 3-pointer put the Lady Eagles up 19-18 midway through the second half.
The Tigerettes had just one 3 -pointer the rest of the way but got inside for a pair of buckets to take a 25-21 lead with 4:50 to go. Both offenses shut down late.
For further details, pick up a copy of Thursday’s Bowie News.
Most school-age athletes start off playing everything. By the time they graduate, they whittle it down to just one or two.
New Bowie girl’s track and overall cross country coach Shawnda Childers is no exception. While at Iowa Park she competed in volleyball, cross country and track before cutting out volleyball and focusing on track and cross country to close out high school.
Childers did not stay with athletics while moving on to Midwestern State University, where she received her bachelor’s and master’s Degrees. After graduation, shestarted coaching in Electra. She came to Bowie for one year, then went back to her old stomping grounds in Iowa Park where she spent the next four years.
The return home also put her in contact with now-Bowie Coach Griffin Fields, who was a coach there at the time. From Iowa Park, she spent the next three years at City View.
For further details, pick up a copy of Thursday’s Bowie News.
New Saint Jo Girl’s Basketball Coach Grant Gooch isn’t completely unfamiliar with the area.
“We went to Muenster quite a bit when I was a kid,” Gooch, who will be going into his 20th year as a coach, said. “We’d load up the cooler from the meat markets. It’s good to be back.”
Gooch worked with Saint Jo Athletic Director CJ Hantz when the pair were in Throckmorton. Gooch comes to town from Menard where he spent three years at the West Texas school.
Gooch says coaching and education kind of come naturally to him.
For further details, pick up a copy of Thursday’s Bowie News.
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