SPORTS
Football practice starting next week with an emphasis on safety
Monday is the beginning of a four-month journey for high school football teams around the state.
While temperatures are not expected to be as soul destroying as they were two weeks ago, no one can deny temperatures in the mid-to-upper 90 degrees is not hot, especially when you are sprinting around a football field in a helmet.
Two-a-days in Texas high school football are for the most part a thing of the past as University Interscholastic League passed more and more stringent rules since the mid 2000s to limit pre-season practices. This followed the trend at all levels of limiting football practices, from pro and college as well, in the names of player safety.
The main concern during this time is protecting players from heat stroke which can be fatal. Gone are the days where coaches held water from their players to “toughen them up.” Science shows this is a dangerous game to play and no player performs better when they are dehydrated.
Coaches and organizations know now athletes almost cannot drink enough water. Every 15 minutes is a required water break by UIL. Some schools have trainers with water bottles at every drill constantly filled with water.
At Saint Jo, they are monitoring how much water each player is drinking throughout practice to make sure they are drinking enough.
“We take a page out of the Louisiana State University manual,” Saint Jo Coach Derek Schlieve said. “They have each player bring a gallon jug of water and mark it off with different lines throughout the day so we can gauge where our athletes are at in the hydration process.”
Other schools hope educating their athletes on the importance of staying hydrated while also always having it on hand will let players take care of it themselves.
Still, every year there are reports around the country of players dying due to heat stroke. Players not conditioning themselves physically and getting used to working in the heat are more susceptible. Also, getting plenty of hydration in the days leading up to the first day and not just on the day is important.
A lot of teams do their best to avoid the summer heat as much as possible by scheduling their practices earlier or later in the day.
“I like to get the guys used to practicing early and with athletics being the first period of the day, it just works out for us,” Forestburg Coach Kyler Roach said.
“As much as we can, we are going to try to practice early,” Bowie Coach Dylan Stark said. “We have a trainer and we make sure we always have plenty of water available.”
Along with changes over the years, amount of days players practice in full pads has cut down to help players bodies stand up to the months of hitting. Teams this year cannot have their first full contact practice until after Friday, making Bowie move its Midnight Madness practice from Thursday to Friday.
This has been the trend at all levels to try to help cull injuries as much as possible. Opponents of this trend have argued this has led to what is perceived to be a decrease in tackling fundamentals due to less full contact practices, but coaches know they have no choice but to adjust their practicing habits as new rules are put into place.
“I think the good coaches take it in stride and they can adjust,” Schlieve said. “There is a lot of things you can do without hitting. It forces a coach to focus on things like the fundamentals instead of just lining up and scrimmaging. It can be a challenge, but we like to look at it as glass half full and gives us an opportunity to work on other things with our athletes.”
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.
The Red River High School Bass Club competed this past weekend, May 31 – June 1, at the State Tournament on Lake Conroe for the two-day tournament.
Two of the teams from Montague County traveled south to try their best at the culmination of the year for the state title. Teams were able to pre-fish on Friday before the Saturday and Sunday competition. On Friday, there was a flipping contest for the youth and Cooper Johnson won third overall and won a $500 scholarship and an Academy gift card.
The club’s two teams who competed were Lane Smith/Colt Henry with boat captain Jimmy Smith. The team placed 63rd with a total of 16.22 pounds. The second team of Cooper Johnson/Corbyn Patton and boat captain Jayson Toerck placed 169th with a total weight of 2.29 pounds.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekly edition of the Bowie News.
The Maskat Shrine Oil Bowl is this week on June 6-7 and graduating athletes from Bowie, Nocona and Saint Jo are confirmed to be playing.
In total, seven athletes from Bowie, five from Nocona and three from Saint Jo are planning to play in the all-star games this week. Nocona also will have a pair of coaches participating as well.
The girl’s basketball game kicks off events on June 6, scheduled for 6 p.m. at Wichita Falls Memorial High School. In the game, the east team will have Nocona players Avery Crutsinger, Meg Meekins and Reagan Phipps playing while Kyler Spitzer and Clayton Brown coach them one last time.
On the west team, Saint Jo’s Payzlie Cervantes is confirmed to be playing.
The boy’s basketball game is scheduled to follow at 7:30 p.m. On the east team, Bowie’s Boston Farris and Nocona’s Jose Gomez Jr. will be playing.
On June 7, the volleyball games are scheduled to start at 4 p.m. with the small school game. On the west team, Nocona’s Kaygan Stone and Saint Jo’s Taylor Patrick are confirmed to play. On the east team, Saint Jo’s Aubrey Morman will get to play her teammate.
There are no local athletes confirmed to be playing in the big school volleyball game.
The final event is the football game, scheduled for 7:30 p.m. at Memorial Stadium. It is an all Bowie affair with six players confirmed to be playing for the east team: Justin Clark, Jorge De Leon, Hunter Fluitt and Braden Rhyne, Preacher Chambers and Moh Azouak.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekly edition of the Bowie News.
Nocona Independent School District officials looked inward for a new athletic director/head football coach, selecting Jeff Hill for the position.
Hill, who served last year as Nocona football’s offensive coordinator and also led the softball program to the playoffs for the first time in a while as its head coach, was upgraded to the role.
This came on the heels of former Athletic Director Blake Crutsinger, who served in the role the last four years, resigned in May.
For Hill, the choice to apply for the position was a no brainer. His one year in Nocona had impressed upon him and his wife that it was the place they would like to be long term.
“I’m looking for a town to raise my kids in and Nocona has treated my family really well,” Hill said. “There are some really good people. The kids work hard. Everything I am looking for in a hometown is right here in Nocona and I want to try and make it as best as it can be, especially through athletics.”
Before Nocona, Hill served as the athletic director at S&S Consolidated while also spending time at Hebron and Whitewright in his coaching career.
Hill expresses great respect for the departing Crutsinger and besides changing a few small things in how he personally wants to do things, he is not trying to come in with a sweeping restructuring of the whole athletic department.
The program had five of its six team sports make the playoffs, with volleyball playing in the regional final and the girl’s basketball team winning the state championship.
That along with two athletes competing at the state championship in cross country and track with one earning a gold medal, it was one of the more successful school years in athletic program history.
“Coach Crutsinger was awesome and did a great job so honestly just little tweaks, a little bit of structure and cohesion amongst the coaching staff between boys and girls,” Hill said. “I hope to keep the winning tradition going overall in the athletic department.”
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekly edition of the Bowie News.
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