It is a scene repeated over and over and over again after certain high school baseball games. After the third out is recorded and one team begins celebrating, only to remember that there is the ritual of the handshake line. Once that is completed, they continue the celebration.
And the other team doesn’t.
That team will slowly make its way down the foul line nearest its dugout and stop somewhere in the shallow part of the outfield grass. Significantly, in a place where privacy is needed.
This is the last moment that this team will be this team.
The Benton Tigers made that long, slow walk from the first base dugout at Field 41 at McMurry Park in Sulphur Thursday night after a 4-1 loss to Barbe.
The further you advance in the playoffs, the tougher that walk gets. And this was the Division I (Non-Select) semifinals, so that didn’t help.
Benton’s Dane Peavy had to make the speech that no coach wants to make but all do, except for the one that wins it all. But the last thing Peavy wanted to do was reflect on the actual game. There was too much to say about the journey to get there, but not enough words to say them.
“It’s a tough conversation to have,” Peavy said later.
The toughest thing for a coach in that situation is letting go. You know that when they walk away, it’s over. Not the game, but a little chunk of your athletic life goes away.
There are tears and hugs and “just one more picture!” before the realization sets in: The ride is over.
Or is it?
“I told our seniors that they really transcended this program,” Peavy said. “I told them to hold their heads high because what they did was set pace for history. There will come a time when we celebrate being a state champion and we’ll look back and remember these guys were the pillars of success of that path for future Benton players.”
Peavy had said earlier in the week when the season started, he thought the Tigers were probably a year away. And then they lost their top two pitchers.
From just about any angle you want to look it, this game was a mismatch. Benton was seeking its first state championship in Class 5A (the Tigers won it 2018 as a 4A school) while Barbe has run out of collective fingers for its 12 championship rings.
Barbe was the defending champion; Benton didn’t even get a home playoff series last year.
Barbe was the No. 1 seed; Benton was a double-digit seed (13), and those rarely make it to the state semifinals.
Barbe has more than a half dozen players who are committed to colleges that currently ranked in the Top 20, including a freshman who is committed to LSU. Benton has freshmen who do a great job getting the batting cage in place for BP and making sure there is water in the visiting dugout.
The Tigers might look back and point to being one strike away from being out of the pivotal fifth inning, when Barbe broke open a 0-0 game with three runs. Or the Tigers might think about having the bases loaded a couple of times and leaving runners stranded.
Or they might not.
The Tigers didn’t go through a tough regular season – and three even-tougher playoff series — just to be happy with a bus ride to Sulphur and miss a couple of days of school.
The Benton Tigers went toe-to-toe with a nationally-recognized program and didn’t blink. No one should be surprised.
DAY AT THE BLEACH: Benton’s Hudson Brignac (left) and Bryson Pierce display their postseason hair styles. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
This was it.
This was the moment Hudson Brignac and Bryson Pierce and the rest of the Benton baseball team had been waiting for. After all of those close games they had played – especially in the playoffs – it seemed only fitting that this was what it all came down to.
One more inning. Three more outs. Zero margin of error.
The Tigers led St. Amant 1-0, but it was the bottom of the seventh inning and Benton had to take the field to keep the dream of a semifinal berth alive.
Nerves? Yeah, a little. “I was about to throw up,” Pierce said.
“But we knew all the preparation was going to pay off,” Brignac said. “Our team was ready.”
But both Brignac and Pierce say they wanted the ball hit to them. “We knew we were going to have to make a play,” Pierce said. “And we were ready to make a play.”
That’s exactly what happened. Ground ball to Pierce, the Benton first baseman.
One out.
Ground ball to Brignac, the shortstop. Two out.
Ground ball to sophomore third baseman Case Jorden. Ball game.
The gloves went into the air, everyone raced to the middle of the infield for the dogpile and the next thing that came to mind was simple.
“Sulphur,” Brignac said. “The next step.”
That next step will be 12-time (and defending) state champion Barbe in the Division I (non-select) semifinals Thursday at 5:30 p.m. at McMurry Park in Sulphur. Barbe is the top seed; Benton is a No. 13 seed.
It’ll be a challenge, to be sure, but that’s what this whole season has been for Benton. The Tigers have only five seniors, a low number for a Class 5A school. Pitching has always been a strength for Benton, but that depth has been challenged by the loss of two of their top pitchers to injury.
“If you had to write the story of Benton baseball in 2024, it would probably be perseverance,” said head coach Dane Peavy. “Early on, we really didn’t anticipate we would be as talented as we have been in the past. We really didn’t know what this was going to look like.”
If you’d asked Peavy three months ago if he expected to be in this position in early May, “I would have told you we were a year away,” he said. “You don’t come in (Class) 5A with a young team and just think you are going to bully teams around.”
Benton was last in the state semifinals in 2019 as a Class 4A school. This is the Tigers’ first trip as a Class 5A school.
But one thing has remained the same – the postseason hair-bleaching.
“I’m not going to lie to you, it was kind of a team decision,” Brignac said. “We had a few guys highlight and not bleach. We had a team dinner and nobody had bleached, so we got together and got it done.”
With a little help from some team moms and a few bleaching kits, follicle team unity has been achieved. With much better results that previous years.
“I bleached my hair when we were freshmen,” Pierce said, “but it turned out orange.”
Don’t expect Brignac to be at the salon as soon as the season is over. “I’m going to ride it out,” he said.
The Tigers have ridden out the gauntlet of Baton Rouge-area schools in the first three rounds, winning best-of-three-series against Denham Springs, Dutchtown and St. Amant. In those seven games, only once has Benton scored more than four runs. The Tigers have played 17 games that were decided by two runs or less.
As proven in the final inning against St. Amant, don’t expect the moment to be too big for the Benton Tigers.
“It’s like Coach Peavy tells us; if we leave it all out there on the field, we are going to be satisfied,” Pierce said.
Everybody who follows college baseball knows about the team in our state that is still battling to make it into the postseason. There have been some tough losses, even a few non-conference losses, but at this point in the season there is plenty that can still go right.
Their coach will tell you that everything his team wants is still right in front in them.
If you believe those who prognosticate such things, they are right in the middle of the NCAA Tournament discussion. Every game from here on in is important if they want to keep playing after the conference tournament is done.
Of course, that team is … Louisiana Tech?
While you weren’t looking, the Bulldogs are now being penciled in – perhaps lightly with a #1 Faber-Castell – as a potential at-large team.
That is, of course, if the Bulldogs don’t win the Conference USA tournament, which is another path in. If you need to find the ‘Dogs, look at the top of the league standings, where Tech leads with a 11-4 record.
Looming out there is a huge series against second-place Western Kentucky next week. To stay alone in first, Tech will need to win all three at New Mexico State this weekend. If the Bulldogs win two out of three, they’ll share the lead with WKU, which is playing out of conference this week.
But the biggest question is whether Conference USA will be a multiple-bid league. Three years ago, the league got four into the postseason, with Tech hosting a regional. But as is the case about every 20 minutes, conference re-alignment has altered the landscape.
In 2021, C-USA was the sixth-ranked conference; this year, it currently sits at No. 7, which is not that big of a difference.
Let’s do a deeper dive into this and if this gets too deep into the analytical weeds, feel free to abort the mission. Tech’s RPI is currently No. 42 but its Projected RPI is No. 25 (ahead of schools such as Florida, TCU and, yes, two other schools that have “Louisiana” in their names).
That’s one of the biggest projected jumps by any school in the country, so somebody’s computer believes in the Bulldogs.
All well and good for those who love to crunch numbers. Tech coach Lane Burroughs is most definitely not one of those people.
“I’m being honest with you; I never look at that,” Burroughs says. “All you can do is the play the games in front of you. If the season ended today, I think there would be no doubt we deserve to being the tournament. But there’s a lot of baseball to be played.”
Tech got off to a great start (winning its first 12 games) but recently as six weeks ago, Tech’s RPI was in triple digits. You want to know what showed up to turn it around?
Food.
Two weeks ago, the Bulldogs were playing at Dallas Baptist, a Top 25 team that is sure to be a postseason participant, and won the first game by getting to DBU pitcher Ryan Johnson, a Top 50 MLB Draft prospect. But the Saturday game was washed out, forcing a doubleheader on Sunday. Tech lost the first game of the double dip and Burroughs said the team looked a little lethargic in the second game.
“The people who were supposed to bring our food (for between games) got lost,” Burroughs says. “We were already playing the (second) game when they arrived and our guys were literally shoving sandwiches and potato chips down their throats when they came to the dugout. Maybe that worked, because we got a burst of energy.”
Tech scored three in the third inning and three in the fifth and went on to win 6-1. Beating Dallas Baptist two out of three certainly got some folks’ attention.
“We’ve done it all with this group,” Burroughs says. “We chewed them out, we’ve gotten out of their way, but we are an older, more mature group.”
The Bulldogs were an NCAA Tournament team in ’21 and ’22, but things went wrong all season long a year ago, both on and off the field.
The difference? Easy. “The key to all of it is that our starting pitching has gotten better each week,” Burroughs said. “And with the guys we’ve got at the back end of the ball game (relievers Ethan Bates and Sam Broderson), you just don’t get that too often in college baseball.”
At 34-13, Burroughs is content to simply let the season play out and see what happens.
“You can get the pulse of your team and you can feel that they are having fun and they know they’ve got this,” he says. “I say this all the time – I just make out the lineup and get out of the way.”
And make sure the delivery driver doesn’t get lost.
GUARDING THE WALL: Northwood centerfielder Tucker McCabe gives the Falcons a lively leadoff bat and a far-reaching glove as the Falcons host Acadiana in a state quarterfinal series beginning Friday evening. (Submitted photo)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
Even if he wanted to, Northwood center fielder Tucker McCabe knows there wouldn’t be much point in him going home and complaining about the umpires if he felt like he’d gotten a bad call.
He’s got an umpire living at that same home.
Justin McCabe was an assistant coach at Northwood when Tucker was a freshman and sophomore and has now completed his second season as an umpire in the Shreveport Association.
So he’s got quite a few perspectives to offer his son.
“He used to talk to me from a coach’s perspective,” he says. “Now, he talks to me from an umpire’s perspective. The game’s the game; it doesn’t really change much, but I think he knows more about the game now since he’s been an umpire.”
Umpires are the last thing that Tucker McCabe and the Falcons are worried about as they head into this weekend’s quarterfinal playoff series against Acadiana.
Last week, the Falcons defeated Byrd in two games, earning a home berth in the quarterfinals.
If it seems as though the words “home berth in the quarterfinals” are familiar for Northwood, it’s because they are.
Perhaps just a little bit too familiar.
If the Falcons need any extra motivation, there is this: In 2022, they made it to the quarterfinals and lost. At home.
In 2023, they made it to the quarterfinals and lost. At home.
No one needs to remind the Falcons, most of whom have been on the roster the previous two years, of their recent history.
“It’s been two years in a row to get stuck here at this spot in the playoffs,” McCabe says. “It’s my last year here and we are going to play hard and get it done.”
It all starts with McCabe – literally.
Head coach Austin Alexander might as well have had printed lineup cards with the name “Tucker McCabe” already printed on them in the leadoff spot. He’s been there for three years and for good reason.
“He’s a plus runner and can change the game defensively with his baserunning,” Alexander says. “He can turn a single into a triple in three pitches. And he’s the best outfielder in our area.”
McCabe relishes his role as the leadoff hitter, mainly for what it can do for his teammates.
“I love the pressure of starting it off right,” he says. “I feel like everybody follows after that. If I get a hit, the dugout goes crazy and it sets the tone for the rest of our lineup. It just goes from there.”
There is a school of thought that the leadoff hitter should show patience in seeing as many pitches as possible in order to allow himself and his teammates to get a feel for the opposing pitcher.
Not McCabe.
“I come to attack,” he says. “If I get a first pitch fastball, I’m driving it. I don’t care (to see) what he has. I’m attacking.”
“He’s a team leader,” Alexander says. “He’s fiery and passionate about being successful, but not just for himself but for his teammates too. He’s a really good teammate.”
After winning District 1-4A with a 7-0 record, the Falcons had a week off to start the playoffs before defeating crosstown Byrd. Northwood, the No. 4 seed in the Division I Select bracket is 28-6 overall. The Falcons have won 10 in a row and 15 of the last 16.
“Our pitching has been lights out and our hitting has been on,” McCabe says. “We really don’t think about our opponent. We are here to play the game and do the best we can and hopefully what we want comes out happening.”
Game 1 of the best-of-three-series is Friday at 6 p.m. at Northwood. A series win would take Northwood to the state semifinals next week in Sulphur and would put an end to the quarterfinal road block that Falcons have faced.
“I have a good feeling about this weekend,” McCabe says.
I didn’t watch much of the NFL Draft Thursday night because I didn’t have to. I knew exactly what was going to happen.
No, not that USC quarterback Caleb Williams was going to be take first overall by the Chicago Bears. That figured.
Here’s what else I figured –
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell was going to be booed every time he stepped to the microphone.
NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell wasn’t going to care that he was being booed every time he stepped to the microphone.
Young men with bad suits were going to bro-hug Goodell on stage after their selection and it was going to look awkward for both.
ESPN announcers would do a poor job of hiding the fact that they knew who the pick was before it was actually announced, just like your older brother would let you know that he knew what your Christmas present was but was “sworn to secrecy” by your parents … and would keep dropping hints anyway.
There would be Green Room drama.
Those in the audience would be showing fake excitement when the camera was pointed at them, as if they really were pumped about the pick of that Colorado State player they had never heard of.
There would be more Green Room drama.
Every pick would he overanalyzed so that we would be convinced that the latest selection might as well make reservations for an upcoming Hall of Fame ceremony.
Long ago and in a world we really don’t recognize any more, here’s how much significance the NFL Draft had in the public consciousness: In 1982, the draft started at 8:30.
In the morning.
I remember it well because it was one of the few occasions that those of us who worked at afternoon papers (kids, ask your grandparents) could actually have something that resembled breaking news. We’d hang on as long as we could and try to get the complete first round in the afternoon editions.
You think they might go for an 8:30 a.m. start next year when the draft is held in Green Bay? Breakfast bratwurst for everyone!
It lasted only two days (it’s three days now) and they had 12 rounds of picks, so they didn’t have any time to jack around and wonder what Mel Kiper or Louis Riddick had to say about it.
Kenneth Sims went first that year and Johnie Cooks went next. Heard of them?
Exactly the point.
Much Ado About Nothing was a nice comedy that William Shakespeare cranked out in the late 1500s, but Billy was ahead of the game by about 400-something years because that’s exactly what the NFL Draft has become.
NOTHING is forced on the American sports consciousness quite like the NFL Draft. There’s not even a close second. It’s become a way for non-experts to act like experts and somehow think they are NFL insiders. As if Jerry Jones is going to tell one of his minions “Hey, somebody call Joe and see who he has pegged at No. 24.”
Here are some more things you can pretty much count on.
As great as they have made all of these quarterbacks to be – “I see a lot of Tom Brady in him” – typically only one of them will turn out to actually be the real deal. In the 2021 draft, Trevor Lawrence went No. 1 and he seems to be on his way. But after him?
Quarterbacks were chosen No. 2, No. 3, No. 11 and No. 15 and none of them are still on their same team three years later.
There’s going to come a time pretty early on that a pick is going to be made and you will have never heard of the guy. Last year, they didn’t even make it into double digits before the first “Who he?” was uttered.
And, of course, there will be the inevitable draft grades, the most pointless post-event exercise in all of sports.
They could hold this event in a Goodell’s basement and the results would be the same. And he’d probably still get booed.
PITCH-AND-PUTT: Kade Bryant has been starring for Benton in two sports — at the same time. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
Every once in a while, things just seem to go your way over the course of a few days. Maybe it’s just good luck or maybe you simply make it happen, but sometimes the stars just seem to line up in your favor.
Good for you, but did you pitch 7 2/3 innings in your first-ever playoff start on the mound and single-handedly keep your team in the game until it was won in extra innings?
Kade Bryant did.
Did you then turn around three days later and shoot a career-low 68 at the regional golf meet?
Kade Bryant did.
Whether or not his playoff hair dye job makes things better or worse is a matter of personal preference, but there is no doubt that Bryant had a pretty special week competing for Benton High School.
One of those accomplishments would be good enough to double your Instagram followers. But both?
Wait a minute … what happened to the whole specialize-in-one-sport thing? Bryant is specializing in two sports at the same time.
“I put a lot of time into both,” he says. “I come to baseball after school, go home for a little while and then go to the golf course. It is tiring, especially keeping up with school, too.”
And to make things even better, he’s not even specializing with the same hand. In baseball, he’s a left-handed pitcher; in golf, he’s a righty.
“I’ve always been left-handed, but when I started playing golf, I just started using right-handed clubs,” Bryant says. “So I stuck with it.”
Athletes playing two sports during a school year is not that unusual. Athletes playing two sports at the same time does happen, but usually only in special circumstances.
But athletes playing two sports at the same time at this level and having top-shelf performances on the big stage just doesn’t happen very often.
“I understand he’s a baseball player first,” says Benton golf coach Tim Cram. “But if he played golf all the time, he’d be really, really good.”
Cram should know; he’s been coaching golf for 30 years.
“First of all, he’s one of the hardest workers I’ve ever had,” Cram says. “But he retains information in a way that is unbelievable. You tell him something one time and he puts it into use. In all my years of coaching, you have a handful that just get it; those who are good athletically, great kids, mature and work hard. He’s one of those.”
Bryant started playing baseball when he was three but didn’t take up golf until he was 10. “I found out I was kinda good at it,” Bryant says.
It’s pretty obvious what the next question is. “I think I like baseball a little bit more because of the team aspect of it,” he says. “Just being around the guys all year long and seeing the improvement makes it a lot more fun.”
But that is not to say that golf is a distant second for Bryant. “I love how golf is the course versus yourself,” he says. “You have to mentally stay locked in and do what you do best.”
The funny thing is, Bryant doesn’t appear dominant in either sport – until you look at the results. As a pitcher, he throws in the mid-80s but has very good control. “I’m not going to throw anything by you,” he says, “but I do locate my pitches pretty well.”
On the golf course, “I’m not much of a long hitter. I just need to hit fairways, hit greens and run some putts in,” he says.
The biggest issue about Bryant playing so well in both sports isn’t really an issue at all. Cram and Benton baseball coach Dan Peavy got together before the season and worked out a schedule that didn’t have too many conflicts.
Now that the postseason has arrived, the schedule gotten even better. Baseball playoffs are on weekends and postseason golf tournaments are scheduled for early in the week.
The Benton baseball team will be in Dutchtown this weekend in the second round of the Division I Non-Select playoffs.
Kade Bryant will be there.
The Benton golf team will be in Lafayette Monday and Tuesday for the Division I state championship tournament.
I remember exactly where I was three years ago when my financial world changed. No, I didn’t win the lottery or get a visit from the IRS.
Instead, I was at the concession stand at Disch-Falk Field on the campus of the University of Texas for a baseball game and all I wanted was a soft pretzel (easy on the salt).
I whipped out my wallet from my back right pocket, pulled out the cash before seeing the look on the concessionaire’s face, which basically said “We’ve got another rube!”
Instead, I was actually told “Sir, we don’t accept cash.”
WHAT?!?!? Literally, my money was no good at Disch-Falk Field, so I was left with no choice. Out came the debit card.
I’d rather cut my toenails with a hacksaw than pay for singular items with a debit card. To me, it’s like writing a check to the Handee Mart on Tech Drive in Ruston for $0.76. (Yes, I did that in 1981 and I am still not proud of it.)
Until the Great Pretzel Incident in Austin, I had managed to avoid this financial blasphemy. And I have pretty much steered clear of it since. But I know it’s out there, mainly because I see it all the time at high school athletic events — and I go to about 100 of those a year.
The combination of working at a school and being a sports writer allows me the ability to walk right through the admission gate instead of having to scan a QR code or download an app. For that, I am one thankful dude.
All of this comes up because there is a bill in the Louisiana Legislature – House Bill 5 – that would require colleges to accept cash at sporting events. If needed, I am availabe for hire to be the chief lobbyist for this bill.
It’s being sponsored by Rep. Charles Owen of Rosepine and if my man Charlie wanted to have a real impact, he would expand that to include high schools. For all I care, just keep going from there.
Look, I get it. There are all kinds of reasons/excuses that they will give you for being “cashless.” Seems like it started with Covid, when apparently if two people touched the same dollar bill, instant death was sure to ensue.
There is also the ol’ nefarious Booster Club member, who gets sticky fingers behind the popcorn machine and walks out with pockets stuffed when it’s all said and done. LSU sent a note to the House saying that the bill could lead to a $75,000 annual loss of revenue for concession companies. So we need to be inconvenienced because you can’t make proper change for a $20?
And when all else fails, they’ll tell you that being cashless is “for convenience of our patrons.” LSU also argued that it will slow down concession lines. Sure, if everybody is at the ready with the chip card and taps the machine at the right time, that would speed things up.
Now come back to the real world.
It’s particularly troubling at high school games, where internet access for running credit cards can be sketchy. And wait until you see how the line gets backed up because MeeMaw has no idea what she has to do just to get inside the gate so see can watch little Trey.
The University of New Orleans suggested some concession stands should require reverse ATMs, which allow somebody to deposit cash and receive a temporary debit card. That’s taking inconvenience to a new level. Think MeeMaw will go for that?
There is only one solution – have both. There’s nothing wrong with have the ability to pay online for game admittance or for two hot dogs and a bag of popcorn. Tap away with that chip card and the guy behind you will appreciate getting to the front of the line a little quicker.
But as long as someone is not counting out pennies to pay for a pizza slice, let the people who prefer cash still have the same opportunities as all of you chip-card-toting Millennials.
DOMINANT: Gavin Brint gave Loyola an outstanding outing Thursday in the opener of a best-of-three playoff series. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
The Loyola Flyers hit into a double play and a triple play in consecutive innings Thursday against Northlake Christian, but just when it seemed like it might not be their night, their luck changed.
The Flyers scored on a fifth-inning throwing error with two outs to post the only run in a 1-0 win over the Wolverines in the opening game of the best-of-three Select Division III playoffs at Cicero Field.
Loyola’s Gavin Brint and Northlake Christian’s Eli Shewmake battled it out and were dominating the strike zone. Brint threw 67 strikes and only 16 balls to pick up the win. Shewmake was just as impressive with 43 strikes and only 13 balls.
The Flyers’ junior had only three two-ball counts and never had a three-ball count. Shewmake faced only one batter that even had more than a one-ball count.
Brint scattered six hits, struck out five and the only walk he issued was intentional. Shewmake threw a four-hitter, walked nobody and rode his defense, not recording a strikeout.
The game only took 1:16.
A brilliant outing in a playoff game wasn’t a unique experience for Brint. In his last two postseason starts, Brint has allowed only one earned run in 15 innings.
It was the first playoff win for Loyola first-year coach Morgan Brian.
“That was one of the best pitched high school games I’ve ever seen,” Brian said. “We won that game because of Gavin Brint. It’s nice to get the first one, but we still have more work to do.”
After missing out on golden opportunities in the third and fourth innings, the Flyers got the run they needed when a ground ball by Bryce Carpenter behind the third base bag that was thrown away at first, scoring Will Pickett from third.
Northlake Christian had the tying run in scoring position in both the sixth and seventh innings but Brint got the third out. He also wiggled out of a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the fourth.
Game 2 will be played at 5 p.m. today with Game 3 (if necessary) to follow.
FORE-MIDABLE: Golfers gather at the No. 1 tee box at Querbes Park, a course which is part of the growth of municipal golf. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
There’s been something of a revolution in golf that has nothing to do with equipment, technology or even LIV.
And you may not have even noticed it — unless you are finding it more difficult to get a tee time at your local municipal course.
Public golf – they like the term “municipal” a little more – is on the rise across the nation and certainly in the Shreveport-Bossier area.
“We are probably up 30 percent in the last few years,” says Querbes Park pro Nathan Barrow.
“At least,” says Huntington Park pro Reg Adams, when asked about Barrow’s projection. “It’s just been up, up and up the last four or five years.”
It’s being called “Munaissance” and what is truly bringing about this revival is that cities are re-investing in their public courses.
That has certainly happened here. In the last 10 years, both Huntington and Querbes have undergone major renovations, thanks to bond issues. Greens have been re-done. Drainage has been improved. New clubhouses at both facilities.
In addition, the Querbes Park Foundation has played a major role in improvements at course when it was struck by major damage from a storm last June. Querbes is celebrating its 100th year in 2024. Huntington opened in 1969 as a private course before the city purchased it in the early 1970s.
“The city realizes that we need to keep investing in this journey to try to attract more golfers, more kids, more families,” Adams says.
There has always been the mental caricature of the “muni monster” golfer — hat on backwards. Shirt untucked. Music playing in the cart.
Which is exactly what is helping to feed this transformation in golf. Private courses have always had their place and it seemed as though municipal courses only got the leftovers. These days, municipal courses thrive from having clientele who enjoy a more casual version of the game.
Now, it seems as though municipal golf, once seen as dying on the vine in some locales, has found its place as well.
“It’s just a little more relaxed,” says Adams. “Not only are there guys who are all about golf, but we are getting blue collar guys and boys and girls and people coming back who may have stopped playing for whatever reason. More women. More families. We are welcoming them all.”
Golf, in general, can be expensive … and then there is the cost of country club golf. Without doing an in-depth analysis, price increases seem to have held steady more at public courses than private, where it seems as though membership is never far away from another dues increase and/or assessment.
For years, there was a net-zero growth in golf. There has always been a new influx of golfers, but there was also those who stopped playing for whatever reason. Now, there is still that influx, but they are also retaining those who they might have previously lost.
“When I first got in the business, you never saw a big increase,” Adams says. “You had a lot of new golfers that came in, but you had the same number who left. If you were a young single guy and played a lot of golf and then you got married, well, priorities change.”
Both Barrow and Adams agree that the social aspect of municipal golf is a huge factor.
“With today’s generation, it’s an inclusive atmosphere now,” Barrow says. “Everybody is included at a muni course. Everybody is eligible, everybody is welcome. We have music playing at the clubhouse when you walk up. It’s a more inviting and welcoming atmosphere and if it’s their intro into golf, this is where they will stay.”
Adams points to a number of programs by the PGA that have also had an effect. For example, PGA Hope has been targeted for veterans and he has seen remarkable results at Huntington.
“It’s just taken off like gangbusters,” he says. “You get veterans to come with other veterans and that way they can socialize together.”
“People are also looking at the health benefits,” Barrow says. “A lot of people want to carry (their bag) walk and that is promoted at municipal golf courses whereas maybe not at a private club.”
Barrow is also the pro at one of the most walkable courses around. “Seems like everybody in town lives 10 minutes away from Querbes,” Adams says. “It’s easy to get there and easy to play nine holes after work.”
Barrow says Querbes has doubled its revenue over the last six years. Both courses are finding more ways to get golfers to the courses, whether that is with Thursday Night Scrambles or simply sending out email blasts on what is being served at lunch in the restaurant.
“You only have so many golfers in the golfing pool,” Adams says. “Some of them are members at country clubs because they see the benefit and they can afford it. But if something happens and they can’t afford that, they can still come play golf at the city courses.”
“It’s authentic golf,” Barrow says. “It’s golf in its purest form.”
As writers, we often spend a lot of time staring at an empty computer screen. In the old days, it was a blank piece of paper curled up around the typewriter roller, just waiting for the hunting and pecking to begin.
“Empty” and “blank” are the operative words there, because that’s what it feels like when the creative juices just aren’t flowing.
It’s a part of the craft that we take for granted. I have no idea what all is involved in writing a novel, but I have to believe Ernest Hemingway had moments in which he had no idea where to start. Ernie was known to knock a few back, so that probably helped get him loosened up and started on The Old Man and the Sea.
Sports writing might be a little easier – you mean to tell me that Farewell To Arms wasn’t about the decline of the Dodgers pitching staff? – because there’s always some game being played or about to be played and therefore something to write about.
I’d have no idea how or what to write about a City Council meeting, but I’m all over a Benton vs. Parkway baseball game.
I don’t know about the rest of the people who practice this craft, but the hardest part for me is simply getting started when you are swimming in a sea of nothingness.
My boy Gustave Flaubert once wrote “The art of writing is the art of discovering what you believe.”
Here’s what I believe in, Gustave — Newspapers.com.
I don’t know if this website is the greatest invention ever – air conditioning and the automatic teller machine are hard to beat – but I find when the verbs and adjectives are hard to come by, a deep-dive into my online account is the cure for what ails me.
And it only costs $74.90 every six months. (There is no discount for 19th century French novelists.)
I’ll spend hours looking for just the right bit of inspiration and often ended up fascinated with how the craft of sports writing has changed over the years. Sometimes it’s re-reading a piece I wrote in my younger days and wondering just what the hell I was thinking when I cranked out a 26-inch story on a prep football game between two teams with losing records.
But I often see stories by some really terrific writers who wrote a really terrific story on a really terrific game. No matter how the industry has changed, that’s still what it’s all about.
Sounds silly to some, but just trying to write a story as good as the next guy is a great way to start pounding the keyboard.
Newspapers.com is like a gigantic scrap book (kids, ask your parents from clarification) that can be used for whatever purpose you’d like.
But nothing is better than to look back a few decades and read the prose in which the stories, particularly sports, were written. I stumbled into a May, 1964 story about Jesuit (now Loyola) was headed to Hahnville to try to win the state baseball championship.
In the unbylined story, it was written “Restovich will take over the gateway post while Attaway is laboring on the hill. Mike Restovich will hold down second while Tony Papa will be at the other keystone post. The hot corner will be in the reliable hands of Marvin Jordan, the man with the supersonic arm. Tommy Mazur will handle the backstopping chores. Danny Gayer, hard-hitting James Bustillo and Tony Rinaudo will handle the gardening chores for the Flyers.”
If that’s not gold, I don’t know what is. Gateway post, keystone post, laboring on the hill … all of those are great, but “gardening chores” to describe the outfielders had me doubled over.
You think Hemingway could have cranked out a paragraph like that? Think again, my friend.
STARTING OVER: Josh Jones started almost from scratch to bring back the BTW baseball program. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
The season is coming to a close for the baseball team that will finish in last place in District 1-4A. If you look strictly at results, you might think it has not been a success.
Not only have wins been hard to come by – there have been none – but so has scoring runs.
This is a team that basically started from scratch. There were very few games last year, some of which were forfeited for lack of players, and even those that were played would generously be described as disorganized.
But success isn’t always measured on a scoreboard. And when you look at it from that perspective, there have may not have been a bigger success story in local high school baseball this year than the Booker T. Washington Lions.
* * *
A backstop.
That’s it. That’s what BTW has for baseball facilities. Down the hill behind the school and next to the football stadium, the most action the baseball field gets is for parking places at the annual Soul Bowl football game.
When the baseball season started, they didn’t even have bases. There still is no pitcher’s mound.
But the school did have one thing going for it – opportunity.
BTW Principal Crystal Barnes called assistant football coach Josh Jones into her office one day and asked if he would be interested in reviving the baseball program. Not because she thought he was the second coming of former LSU coach Skip Bertman, but because of the way the students gravitated to him.
“Just trying to expose the kids to the game of baseball,” Jones says.
Barnes believed that Jones was perfect choice to get students interested. It didn’t take long to find out that Barnes was right.
On the first day, about 50 students – mostly freshmen and sophomores – came out to practice. That’s the good news. The bad news came when Jones found out he would have to trim the roster.
“We just couldn’t handle all of them with the budget for the program,” Jones says. “But for a person like me, it’s hard to do something like that because these are kids who want to do something.”
Jones got the numbers down to about 30. More bad news – that meant they needed gloves for 30 players and enough bats that could be shared. And catcher’s equipment. Plus helmets.
And, quite significantly, uniforms.
But it didn’t take long for those problems to be solved. Equipment donations came flowing in and, most importantly, the uniforms were ordered.
Two sets.
“That was a big thing for me this year, so that they could feel like they were a part of something,” Jones says. “Just small things like that matter to a kid. The old ones were mildewed. You would have thought I brought in top of the line, major league uniforms. They want to wear them at school.”
Little by little, things began to fall into place. “We’ve got bases now, but we really don’t have a mound,” Jones says. “One thing I love about these kids is that they don’t use that as an excuse or a crutch.”
Baseball is a tough game to learn and Jones knew the Lions weren’t going to compete for the District 1-4A title. One of the biggest obstacles to overcome were players who were literally afraid of being hit by the ball.
“I just show them and help them learn the game,” Jones says. “Their development has been the best part to me.”
Earlier this year, BTW traveled to Northwood for a district game. The Falcons are one of the top-ranked teams in the state, so the results that night were predictable. But the scene that played out after the game has been common whenever BTW plays against a strong opponent.
“We stayed probably 10 or 15 minutes after the game with their starting pitcher and working on some things,” Northwood coach Austin Alexander says. “We were going over different things like the windup and stretch and pickoff moves. It was impressive because the kid was like a sponge. He just wanted to learn everything.”
“The coaches in the district have been great in helping us,” says Jones, who came to BTW from Northwood. “Everybody is happy for us to get this going. We don’t have everything like the other schools have. Like a batting cage. Or a pitcher’s mound. But I commend the kids; on the days we can’t practice, they are sad because they want to be out there.”
Earlier this year, a scheduling conflict canceled a game for the Lions. “When they got on the bus, they asked me, can we at least have a scrimmage?” Jones says. “That’s when I knew they were starting to love it. They are just happy for the opportunity to play another sport and learn the game. They don’t necessarily care about the score. They are just excited to be playing. It’s been a good experience for all of us.”
* * *
When you look at BTW’s schedule this year, one thing become very obvious very quickly – there are no home games. Some might think that would be a problem. But never getting the opportunity to bat last is a non-factor when you consider the other side of that equation.
When Jones brings the 20-25 players to a game on the road, it is often to a place – even inside the boundaries of Shreveport-Bossier – that many of his kids have never seen. They get to see facilities such as the ones at Northwood and North DeSoto and Minden and Evangel and they realize what else is out there.
“Just taking them to other parks and seeing their reaction has been amazing,” Jones says. “Some of them have never gone anywhere other than home and school.”
To them, they might as well be at Yankee Stadium.
It’s hard to ask a coach about the highlight of his season when the team hasn’t won a game. But Jones knew that was likely going in. He says there has been definite progress and he’s looking forward to seeing how the team can build on this foundation next season.
On Feb. 28, the second game of the season, the Lions were (of course) on the road at Southwood when that defining moment of the season came. It wasn’t a tape-measure home run or turning a triple play. It wasn’t throwing out the winning run at the plate or striking out the side.
On that night, the Lions were down 16-0 and came to bat for the final time. One thing led to another and before you knew it, the Booker T. Washington Lions scored a run.
“They weren’t even mad about the loss,” Jones says. “Just to see them celebrate and cheer on each other and hearing the fans clapping, that was great.”
That’s when Jones knew it was all worth it.
“Our players feel so great with all the love they have received with people understanding that they are out there trying for the first time,” he says. “The support has been great all around. It’s taken off and I can’t even believe it. It’s been amazing.”
There was one big problem Samantha Guile faced when she took over the Caddo Magnet softball program three seasons ago.
You might think it was because the Mustangs’ softball facilities were in poor shape, which certainly didn’t help.
Or having no real tradition to fall back on, which wasn’t exactly great news either.
But before any of that – or any other issue – could be fixed, one thing had to happen.
Guile had to get her team to believe it was possible to be a success.
Fun is always a part of any softball team. But it seemed like the balance was tilted more towards fun than it was competition. The key was to find the right combination that fit would best serve the Caddo Magnet program.
Guile, who played at Parkway and finished her career as a pitcher at Northwestern State, knew that nationally ranked programs such as Calvary Baptist and North DeSoto are on another level. But that didn’t mean Caddo Magnet couldn’t find its own level.
And that’s what the Mustangs have done.
Caddo Magnet has no real history of softball success. In the decade before Guile arrived, Magnet never had a single season with a winning record. In two of those years, the team was a combined 2-44.
“Caddo Magnet has always been a challenging place academically,” she said. “The school always pushes students to achieve whatever their interests are. However, I didn’t feel like there was that same level of dedication to be a competitive softball program and parallel the success we have academically.”
The year before Guile took over, the Mustangs were 6-18, but five of those wins were against schools that were barely even able to field a team.
Samantha Guile had a long way to go.
But she knew how to get there.
“We just needed to teach them how to win and to hate losing,” she said. “That’s something I really didn’t know how to do because I had always played and coached at a competitive level. It’s great to have a team that’s happy to be out there, but you have to reinforce that winning atmosphere. That was a major thing.”
A year ago, Caddo Magnet played host to a playoff game for the first time in school history. This year, they are on the way to doing it again with a goal this time of winning the first playoff game in school history.
Three years ago, that wasn’t on anybody’s radar.
Guile says the Mustangs pride themselves on the “small milestones” and being able to hit daily and weekly goals, but the main focus has always been to be in position to win a playoff game, preferably at home. There is no record of Caddo Magnet ever winning a softball playoff game.
A year ago, Caddo Magnet was a No. 16 seed in the Select Division I playoffs, but lost 7-6 at home to No. 17 seed Ben Franklin.
This year, the Mustangs are 10-9 with two games remaining against 20-win teams in the hopes of moving up in the power rankings and keeping those home playoff goals alive.
Even with this year’s success, there have been challenges. The main one is the lineup. No, not the batting order. This lineup:
Broken foot.
Broken hand. (“She just got back last week!” Guile says.)
Broken thumb.
Potential broken elbow. (“We are still not sure. They still can’t get a clear X-ray.”)
Broken finger.
“I doubt anybody has a team with five broken bones,” Guile says. “You expect injuries like pulled muscles, but these have all been freak accidents. It’s just crazy. Things just keep happening.”
With only 13 varsity eligible players, “We only have three girls who are playing in the positions we practiced in during the off-season,” she said. “We’ve had to build our program with more utility players than a team with a small roster would expect to. Even with all of those challenges, the girls aren’t happy if they are not playing at a level they expect to.”
There has been a lot for Guile and the Caddo Magnet softball program to overcome. But they’d rather not think of it in those terms.
“It’s not what we are fighting against.” Guile says. “It’s what we are fighting for.”
While you weren’t looking, things changed pretty dramatically in the world of high school golf. The days of the three- or four-team match are gone. These days, it’s mostly just the members of a single team playing nine holes after school, known as a “qualifier.”
Which seems to work out all right, since the players are competing against their teammates for placement when the time comes for the upcoming district, regional and state tournaments.
But Byrd coach Meredith Duncan and Loyola’s Don Cassano got together and came up with something different. Not only are the Yellow Jackets and the Flyers having a match against each other, it’s spread over two weeks and two courses.
The two schools – located 1.5 miles away from each other – are competing in the “Drivin’ Down Line” tournament, which will culminate in an 18-hole event today at Southern Trace. (Byrd is located on Line Avenue and Loyola’s address is two blocks off Line.)
“All of the kids are buddies and they play together anyway, so we thought it would be something different and fun,” Duncan said. “But we had to figure out what to call it. There’s a heck of a lot of good golfers down Line Avenue, so we just decided call it that.”
The tournament opened with a nine-hole match on March 18 at Querbes Park. Combined with the 18 holes today, the team with the lowest four-player scores over 27 holes will be the winner.
And the bragging rights will begin shortly afterward.
Loyola has a three-stroke lead going into today’s final round. In the opening nine holes the Flyers were led by Charlie Bell’s two-under 33, followed by an even-par 35 by Connor Cassano and Jack Gilmer’s 36.
Keep in mind that this isn’t just a bunch of buddies getting together and hacking it around. Talent wise, this is about as good as it gets.
Bell has signed with Middle Tennessee State; Cassano is headed to LSU next year.
The Yellow Jackets are led by senior Grant Reagan and juniors James Holtzclaw and Shep Smith. Last week Holtzclaw won the AJGA event in Lake Charles; Reagan became the youngest to ever win the City Match Play Golf Championship in the summer after his sophomore year.
And it’s not a stretch to say that these are two of the best teams in the state. In the last four years in which the LHSAA has held a state tournament, Byrd has won the Division I title three times.
Loyola might have been able to top that, except for the fact that the Flyers have been in Division III with Ascension Episcopal, so the Flyers have had to settle for being the state runner-up in all four years.
In February, Loyola won the prestigious Kelly Gibson Foundation Invitational at Beaver Creek in Baton Rouge. Care to guess who came in second? The team from just down Line Avenue. (Flyer fans will note that Ascension Episcopal finished third.)
Holtzclaw was the medalist in that event; Bell was the runner-up.
“There’s a lot of friendly banter and some trash talk too, which is great,” Duncan said. “They like to compete and actually play for something against your buddies.”
The two coaches got together to come up with the format, and having Daylight Saving Time has allowed for 18 holes to be played in the final round.
“We really use this to put ourselves in the competitive edge,” Duncan said. “We want to be in position where you have to make the pressure putts and you have to hit it down the middle (of the fairway). You can’t replicate that in practice.”
“It’s good to play against players from another team so that we can stay sharp and see what we need to clean up on,” Connor Cassano said. “We’ve got a lot to play for with bragging rights between the schools.”
Both teams hope this is just a step along the way to the state tournament later this month in the Lafayette area.
“We’d like to keep doing it for a few more years,” Duncan said. “Maybe add an event in the fall. Just something fun and something different.”
“It’s great to be competitive and to change up the format,” Connor Cassano said. “It’s cool to play another team in Shreveport with some really good players. They are our friends on the road. But this week, I guess they are our enemies.”
Though he was doing exactly what he is supposed to do as commissioner of the Southeastern Conference, the appearance by Greg Sankey on the set of ESPN’s College GameDay on the morning of the SEC Championship game in December didn’t sit well with very many of the non it-just-means-more crowd.
It was tacky, self-serving and egotistical all rolled into one. Basically, Sankey was lobbying for two teams to get into the College Football Playoff if Georgia were to lose to Alabama later that night. (Which the Bulldogs did.)
It was about 20 minutes of yukking it up with Rece Davis, Kirk Herbstreit, et. al. before punctuating it with this line: “Let’s go back to like Sesame Street … one of these things is not like the other, and that’s the Southeastern Conference” when talking about the teams competing with Georgia and Alabama for spots in the semifinals.
The point is not that Sankey said those words.
It’s that ESPN gave him the forum to say it.
College football, as we all well know, is in a state of upheaval right now. You may be mad about NIL or the transfer portal or about conference realignment. For goodness sakes, there’s talk about blowing up the 12-team CFP — before they even have one – in favor of 14 teams.
And of course, Sankey and the SEC are trying to drive that bus also.
But the biggest issue in all of this is not Greg Sankey or the Big Ten or whether a Group of Five conference winner should automatically be one of the playoff teams.
It’s that ESPN owns all of it.
Let’s see now … playoff teams (however many there are) will be chosen by a committee. You know who doesn’t do that and has run a pretty a pretty successful operation for quite a few years? The NFL, where the teams automatically qualify.
No committee needed. Outside influences, perceived or otherwise, carry no weight.
You know what else the NFL does differently that college football doesn’t? One network doesn’t control the entire playoff structure. It may be hard to keep up with, but there are games telecast over a variety of networks throughout the playoffs, leading up to the Super Bowl, which rotates between networks on a yearly basis.
That’s about as fair as it can be.
ESPN has broadcast every game in the 10 years of the previous playoff structure. You think they are just going to step away and wait for a phone call as to who has been chosen by the committee? There are 1.5 billion reasons why that’s not going to happen.
Look at it this way: If CBS got to choose who played in the Masters, do you really think the U.S. Mid-Amateur champion would be in the field?
ESPN has never been shy about pushing agendas (many would argue non-sports agendas as well) and you need to look no further than the Heisman Trophy, which ESPN almost prides itself on who should be the week-to-week frontrunner. Three guesses – and the first two don’t count — as to which network has the rights to the Heisman Trophy presentation.
“ESPN has worked very closely with the College Football Playoff over the past decade to build one of the most prominent events in American sports. We look forward to enhancing our valued relationship over the next two years, and then continuing it for six more as we embark on this new, expanded playoff era,” ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro said in a statement. “This agreement further solidifies ESPN as the home of college football, as well as the destination for the vast majority of major college championships for the next eight years.”
If college football were truly interested in the best interests of college football, it would start having its signature event being shown on as many as networks as possible. That would minimize the influence, to whatever degree that might be, a network has.
Unless you have a pre-determined number of teams from each conference (another self-serving Sankey agenda being pushed), the College Football Playoff is always going to have a certain number of teams that have to be chosen as at-large.
But this is also a TV show.
TV shows have ratings.
Ratings mean money.
The line “follow the money” was made famous by Hal Holbrook in the movie All The President’s Men. We just might not like where that leads.
TAG, YOU’RE OUT: Captain Shreve’s Andrew Sharp applies the tag to a base runner. (Journal photo by KEVIN PICKENS)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
Here’s some advice if you are trying to figure out the District 1-5A baseball race.
Don’t.
It’s not like things get turned upside down every week. It’s more like they get turned upside down every other day.
Byrd started off the season with a 1-9 record. But after the first two weeks of the district season, the Yellow Jackets were at the top of the standings at 4-0.
But that was last week.
Now, it’s Natchitoches Central at the top. And Parkway. And Captain Shreve. Oh, and look – there’s Byrd, too, even though the Jackets have lost their last two games.
How about this: Haughton (13-7, 2-4) is currently in seventh place in the district and could be in first place by the time the Easter Bunny shows up Sunday morning. The Bucs have lost three straight games by a total of four runs, but things can change a lot in 48 hours.
“We can all beat each other on any given day,” Captain Shreve coach Todd Sharp said. “There really hasn’t been many surprises because we are all competitive. On any given day, we can all win and we can all lose.”
“It’s a combination of a lot of good baseball teams that are pretty equally matched,” Airline coach Toby Todd said. “One or two pitches can be the difference in sweeping, splitting or getting swept.”
Parkway (14-6, 4-2) got 10-runned by Shreve and then two days later shut the Gators out 5-0. Benton 10-runned Natchitoches Central and then lost to the Chiefs 1-0 two days later. Haughton lost three straight district games by one run and then stranded the tying run at first base Tuesday night in a 5-2 loss.
Airline (9-10, 3-3) scored only four runs in its first four district games – and then scored 41 in the next two.
“If there is anything that has surprised me it’s that I thought that the district would be more offensive,” said Haughton coach Glenn Maynor. “To me, it seems like all the teams have pitched pretty well.”
“Any time you have good pitching, it keeps you in games,” Sharp said. “We lost some offense from last year, but we maintained most of our pitching and that’s what has kept us in games.”
“I was really impressed with Byrd’s pitching,” Todd said. “Not awed, but impressed because they could pitch. They don’t just throw. I’m not slighting them by any means, but I don’t think they had a guy who threw more than 82 (miles an hour). But they threw a lot of strikes and made good pitches when they needed to.”
Most felt that Natchitoches Central (15-3, 4-2) and Benton (16-6, 3-3) were the favorites coming into the season. The Chiefs because of their returning talent and the Tigers because of the depth of their pitching staff. At the end of play on Tuesday, Natchitoches Central is No. 1 in the non-select power rankings in the state and Benton is No. 10. So no surprise there.
However, Todd pointed to Shreve (14-7, 4-2) as being a bit of a surprise.
“I thought they had some holes to fill because of who they lost last year,” Todd said. “I knew their pitching would be good but I didn’t know about their offense. They’ve won some big games so far.”
The basic format of the District 1-5A schedule is set up for games on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Teams played a district opponent in back-to-back games (in effect, a series) and then move on to the next opponent.
Therefore, coaches can’t really stagger their pitching rotation for a particular opponent. “It’s not a pitcher per team,” Sharp said. “It’s a pitcher per day of the week.”
“We are about to go play Captain Shreve (today and Saturday) and we really don’t have our top two pitchers available,” Byrd coach Greg Williams said. “We were in both games with Benton (8-4 and 5-2 losses in the last week), which is a good thing and a bad thing. You don’t want to chase after a win you may not get, but at the same time, you don’t want to give up on a game to save somebody.”
“There are a lot of years when you go into a series and you feel like you are going to win those games or you feel like there’s a really good chance you are going to lose those games,” Maynor said. “But not this year. Every game we’ve played so far has gone down to the wire.”
Today brings about another Thursday/Saturday series and another potential shift in the standings. It’s also rivalry time; in addition to Byrd-Shreve, Haughton plays Parkway, Airline meets Benton in battles of schools that share district boundaries. Natchitoches Central meets Southwood in the other 1-5A series.
“I don’t think our kids were too concerned when we started off like we did or got too excited when we started off the district like we did,” Williams said. “Our goal is just to try to get a little bit better every day.”
Thomas Boswell, the great retired baseball writer from the Washington Post, wrote a book titled “Why Time Begins on Opening Day.”
That was 1984. Well, Tommy ol’ buddy, it’s now 2024 and Opening Day doesn’t even begin on Opening Day anymore.
Did you realize that the first game on the ’24 Major League Baseball season came basically on the same day as the NCAA Tournament began?
Of course you didn’t, unless you happened to be chillin’ in Gocheok-dong, Seoul, South Korea this week.
That’s where “time” began this year. After winning the first game, Los Angeles sadly gave up a 15-spot to San Diego so those who thought the Dodgers were going to go 162-0 this season are out of luck. But the pennant race is on!
And with that, these two teams will take a week off to recover from the rigors of the day-to-day grind of what they have already endured this MLB season.
They’ll tell you that the idea of playing in a foreign country is to “grow the game.” How about this novel concept – let’s spend a little more time growing the game in this country first before we worry about whether there is unmined talent to be found in Mongolia.
By the way, they poured in 15,000 for each fever-pitched game in South Korea, which will probably be less than any other Opening Day in this country will draw. (Yes, the Marlins and Rays both had bigger opening game attendance numbers than that last year.)
Opening Day, both as an entity and a concept, is supposed to mean something. In 1983, the first game of the year was played on April 4. It was the same day as the finals of the NCAA Tournament. Masters Week was beginning. Now, we’ve got the Valspar Championship to look forward to.
Of course, all of this is not new. The NFL has been playing games in Europe and Mexico for quite a while. New Year’s Day games in college football aren’t even played on New Year’s Day. And baseball has done this cross-the-Pacific thing before.
But it’s one thing to do something different every now and then. Playing in the Field of Dreams “cornfield” (not actually, but the idea is the same) is actually pretty cool. And if you want to play a series during the summer in the Dominican Republic, no harm, no foul (ball).
Opening Day is supposed to be mean something more than hanging bunting around the stadium and some politician throwing out the first pitch. It supposed to mean that it’s time to strap in for the long haul of the baseball season. Winter is now showing up the rearview mirror.
Sacred may be a little strong of a term to describe Opening Day, but no other sport uses capital letters to describe its first game of the year.
Baseball has long since let many of its traditions go by the boards. Some thought the demise of civilization was going to be tied to the instillation of the designated hitter. The Chicago White Sox wore shorts in 1976 and democracy didn’t crumble.
But we’ve got to hang on to something, especially when it signifies more than just the start of baseball season. Whether you are a baseball fan or not, you’ve got to admit that when the season starts, your mood gets a little bit better. A little hop in your step.
Memo to Major League Baseball: We need that, and all Opening Day signifies. If you want to grow the game, grow it some other time.
Sports are made to follow some kind of sequence. The universe has a natural order that suggests there is an inherent balance and harmony.
The sports universe needs that too. But there is no inherent balance or harmony when Opening Day is played during the same week as the Valspar Championship.
BROTHERS: LSUS senior Trey Johnson has a special bond with Gentry Blankenship, son of Pilots’ head coach Kyle Blankenship. (Photo courtesy of Kyle Blankenship)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
When you listen to enough coaches talk about their players, it’s easy come away with the same feeling. They are advocates for their players and never have any trouble coming up with good things to say about one of their own. The quotes are typically of the cookie-cutter variety and though they may insightful, they tend to fall into the same category.
But when you listen to LSUS basketball coach Kyle Blankenship talk about senior Trey Johnson, it doesn’t take long to figure out that this something is different in the way he talks about him. This is not your ordinary coach/player relationship.
Sure, Blankenship is proud of every one of his Pilots as they prepare for the NAIA National Tournament this weekend in Kansas City. As for Johnson, who is not even a starter, Blankenship doesn’t try to mask the pride he has for his player.
“We talk about family,” Blankenship says. “Well, he is the true definition of that. Not just the basketball part of it, but outside of that, too.”
Johnson has been at LSUS for four years, long enough to have seen Blankenship’s son Gentry grow up. But not just watching from the side; he’s been a part of that process.
“The relationship he has with my son in particular is just pretty special,” Blankenship says. “He knew him when he was born. He was holding him before he could walk. The other night in the stands, he was holding him while he was sleeping.”
“Gentry is like a little brother to me,” Johnson says. “I always want to see him smiling. I try to teach him a few things. I’m just trying to be a good influence with him.”
When LSUS plays Langston Friday at 1 p.m. in the NAIA’s Sweet 16 in Kansas City, Johnson won’t be a starter. He will, however, likely be there when the game is on the line. “I’m pretty much of a closer,” he says. “When it’s winning time, I like to be on the court. If there is a big shot to be take, I want to the ball in my hands.”
It hasn’t been the easiest path for Johnson since he graduated from Jehovah Jireh, a Class C school in Baton Rouge. He went to McNeese State for two years, then came to LSUS.
“He’s our best defender, he’s our energy and hustle guy, he’s our emotional leader,” Blankenship says. “And he’s been all of that since he got here. “He’s just been ‘that guy’ for us his whole career.”
But in the last two years, he’s been ‘that guy’ who just can’t seem to stay healthy. He missed all of the 2022-23 season with a shoulder injury. This year, he’s gone through a series of injuries that include a hand, an ankle and a concussion.
And yet when you ask him about his career at LSUS, he answers with one simple word: “Blessed.”
“I just know that with my faith and my walk, I just always pray to stay strong and that something good is going to happen,” Johnson says. “Just being a teammate and a leader and doing what it takes off the court. I try to keep my teammates motivated and bring positive energy.”
He brings a little more than that.
After the December hand injury continued to be a problem – “two weeks kept turning into two more weeks,” Blankenship says – Johnson was forced to the sideline while the team began to struggle down the stretch.
“It’s been rough personally and mentally,” Johnson says of his injury problems. “But I know that if I have a good attitude as a leader, my teammates will come through.”
“You could see the turning point in our season was when he lost him,” Blankenship says. “We knew when we got him back, our team was going to take a step in the right direction for sure.”
And they have. Johnson was able to get on the court for one minute on Senior Night and then was cleared to play for the conference tournament. The Pilots qualified for the NAIA Tournament as an at-large team and Johnson made his return in style, scoring 11 points in each of the two playoff wins last weekend and making a pair of big shots in the overtime victory over high-seeded Kansas Wesleyan on the Coyotes’ homecourt in the opening round.
“His numbers aren’t going to go crazy and jump out at you, but he’s going to be in the game come winning time,” Blankenship says. “He’s been like that his whole career.”
“A lot of people don’t get the opportunity to play collegiate basketball, whether it is Division I or NAIA,” Johnson says. “I can just say it’s been a blessing and has been fun.”
When it comes to the “split” in athletics in the Louisiana high school sports, I’m about as anti-split as you can be. I was against it when it first happened and I’ve only become more against it as time has gone by.
The reasons are endless and I won’t get into them here (borderline segregation, stupid, unnecessary, discriminatory, orange-slices-for-everyone mentality … oops, did I say those out loud?) but there’s something else out there that nobody is talking about and could create far more of an “unfair advantage” than anything else the Splitheads ever imagined.
It can be summed up in your favorite three letters:
N.
I.
L.
You probably didn’t notice when the Louisiana High School Athletic Association, in an effort to stay one step ahead of the posse, adopted an NIL policy for high school athletes in 2022. (Yes, you too can give the Pleasant Hill JV point guard $5,000 to come to your sign autographs at your car dealership!)
The posse the LHSAA attempted to stay in front of is both the state legislative bodies as well as other athletic governing bodies in other states. So the LHSAA partnered with something called Eccker Sports “to provide educational services and resources to help high school leadership and students navigate the challenges that NIL contracts are bringing to high school sports.”
Educate the player. Educate the schools. Educate the parents. OK, fine. Good luck with that. That’s a nice, tidy bow to put around it.
And to be honest, this really hasn’t seemed like much of an issue in the two years since it was adopted. Not sure if anybody has been educated, but OK, we will play along.
What’s going to happen when it starts becoming a real issue?
If the Splitheads thought it was an unfair advantage for “select” schools to have students from outside their attendance zones – which is laughable in the first place because any school, public or private, can get around that in a myriad of ways – then how are they going to react when some proud alum who still has his letter jacket starts financing an entire football team?
It will make the Select/Non-Select division set-up look like a playground version of Red Rover.
Where is the self-righteous indignation over this? What happens when School A flat-out buys a four-star linebacker, School B finances a 6-foot-9 center and School C purchases a left-hander who throws 98? Even worse, what if School D buys all three?
Yes, you are correct; technically the “school” won’t be buying them. Just like the universities aren’t doing that at the collegiate level right now, right? (Wink, wink.)
Get ready for a Select/Didn’t Buy A Wide Receiver state championship game to be played right before the Non-Select/Has Been Known to Give A Truck to A Quarterback game.
Thirty state athletic organizations allow NIL – many because political legislation was imminent – and it’s about to be 31. Mike Bianchi, the fine columnist for the Orlando Sentinel, recently blew a gasket in a column over the fact Florida’s state athletic governing body has drawn up an NIL proposal.
“Sadly, NIL is about to ruin high school football in Florida” was the headline of his March 2 column.
“Is nothing sacred anymore? Is nothing immune from the corruption of money? Can we not have one safe haven from the greedy, cut-throat, win-at-all-cost mentality that has already polluted college and professional sports?”
Appreciate you bringing up those questions, Mike, but we already know those answers.
And if it starts happening in Florida, one of the most high-school-football-mad states in the country, don’t be naïve to think it won’t start spreading to other parts of the country.
Kids have been leaving their original high schools to go somewhere else in the name of a better opportunity for quite a while now. But places such as IMG Academy (coincidentally, located in Florida) have prospered on the concept that they were preparing kids for the next level.
Not anymore.
Combine open enrollment and NIL at the high school level and you’ve got the perfect recipe for an athletic free-for-all that would create a disparity that would make the current split setup look like child’s play.
We are two years into NIL being legitimized by the LHSAA and that explosion hasn’t happened.
DISTANCE ACE: Minden native Derrica Gilberts leads the LSUS women in 3-pointers. (Journal photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
If the NAIA really wanted to stick it to LSUS – and men’s and women’s basketball head coach Kyle Blankenship in particular – it could have scheduled the Pilots to play the men’s regional in Miami Gardens, Fla., and the women’s in Ashland, Ore.
But rather than make him try that 3,245-mile commute, the NAIA did Blankenship a solid and put both LSUS teams in the same place — Salina, Kan.
“I’m thrilled be get the opportunity to coach both teams,” Blankenship said. “No matter where the location is.”
That’s the good news.
The rest of the news isn’t necessarily bad, just unknown. How will the men react to playing on the homecourt of the host team, fifth-seeded Kansas Wesleyan, which is expecting a sellout?
And how will the LSU women react to this cold reality of history? Eleven previous national tournament appearances; zero wins in those appearances.
No need to send reminder cards to the Pilots.
“We know what’s at stake,” Blankenship said. “The girls are hungry to etch their name as the best women’s team ever at LSUS.”
The Pilots certainly have done a good job of it so far this season, going 29-2 and 22-0 in the Red River Athletic Conference. Seeded No. 5, they will play 12th-seeded Tabor at 2 p.m. Friday in the opening round.
“We are grateful to the NAIA for helping us out,” Blankenship said. “We all loaded up on one charter bus and are going to treat it like a normal road trip in conference play and mirror what we did during the conference season.”
The men’s team will play at 8 p.m., also on Friday. The second round for both brackets will be played Saturday.
“We’ve played well for two or three months now,” Blankenship said of the women’s team. “We’ve remained focused and concentrated in practice. As we progressed through the end of the season and in the conference tournament, I think we are playing some of our best basketball.”
That certainly looked to be the case last week in the RRAC tournament in Alexandria as the Pilots beat Xavier, another national tournament team, 66-55 in the finals. LSUS used a 23-8 second quarter advantage to turn the game into a blowout.
“Xavier is the best team we have played all year,” Blankenship said. “In the first half against them was our best 20 minutes of basketball. We played physical, we played fast and we did everything need to do. We are hoping we can replicate that at the national tournament.”
But it wasn’t as if Blankenship didn’t see this coming. On Jan. 17, also against Xavier, LSUS was down six with less than two minutes to play and rallied for the victory. The Pilots defense allowed only three points in the final 3:46.
“That really changed the entire momentum of our season,” Blankenship said. “From that point on, I don’t think we looked back.”
The only thing to look back on are lopsided wins. LSUS didn’t lose in January, February or March.
“I knew they had talent when I first took over,” Blankenship said. “I was familiar with some of the returners and with the recruiting class that was brought in, they had all the pieces in place to be really good.”
Too bad few others noticed. In the national coaches weekly poll, LSUS didn’t even crack the Top 25 until the final week of the regular season. And even that was at No. 24.
“Our girls have played with a sense of urgency to prove people wrong,” Blankenship said. “Despite our record, we’ve been doubted all year in the national polls and even within our own league. They’ve played with that chip on their shoulder. Every single time out, they feel like they have something to prove.”
(Speaking of slights by coaches, the RRAC coaches somehow managed to not choose Blankenship as Coach of the Year, even though he didn’t even take the job until a few weeks before the season started after the sudden departure of the previous coach.)
“After three or four weeks of putting our fingerprints on how we wanted them to play, we realized we had a chance to win a lot of games and be a championship team that could make the national tournament,” he said.
They will be up against a Tabor team that is 27-4 and has a home state advantage (Hillsboro, Kan.) and has been to 12 national tournaments.
The LSUS men’s team is in the national tournament for the 19th consecutive year and 12th under Blankenship. But that doesn’t make it any easier.
“Any time you get into national tournament level play, there’s always nerves on both sides, whether you are No. 1 in the country or you are the underdog,” he said. “You’ve just got to battle through those first couple of minutes and let everything settle down. That goes for both of our teams; if we can get through the high of those first few minutes and settle down, I think we will be OK.”
I understand that you can’t name more than five players total in college basketball, much less some team’s starting five.
I realize the fabric that has held together the sport has been ripped apart by a number of factors. Namely, the one-and-done concept, but Wild West nature of all college sports these days doesn’t help either.
I get it; Patrick Ewing played four years, Tim Duncan played four years and Michael Jordan played three years and they all turned out pretty well.
And yes, there is an AAU mentality at the sub-NBA level that is wholly unappealing to the average college basketball fan.
Those things may all be true and valid points. But there is still one thing that trumps them all.
The NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship. March Madness. The Big Dance.
We are a week away from a sporting event that is still as major as it has always been. Sure it’s different, but that doesn’t mean it’s any worse.
You can call it whatever you like, but it still captivates. You may not know Hunter Dickenson from Angie Dickenson (he plays for Kansas; Angie played Police Woman and, even without a decent jump shot, is still going strong at 92).
Other sports, especially professional ones, may relentlessly promote their stars to try to get eyeballs. But when it comes to the NCAA Tournament, they truly have to just roll the ball out there (like some say Houston’s Guy Lewis did) and let it fend for itself.
Something always seems to happen in this tournament that brings you back. You say a 16 seed has never won a game? Hello there, Maryland-Baltimore Country. Oh, and then it happened again last year when Fairleigh Dickenson (no relation to Angie) knocked off Purdue.
The big-name schools always dominate? Don’t try to tell that to three of the four teams in last year semifinals, none of whom had ever been to a Final Four. Heck, Florida Atlantic, who you had never heard of, hadn’t even won a tournament game before last year.
As all of our parents (never) told us when we broke a lamp, “These things happen.”
And they will happen again.
The NCAA Tournament has gotten rich, so to speak, by two things – a cute name (“March Madness”) and a gimmick (filling out brackets).
Do you remember when Bill Walton and David Thompson were running down the court on a surface that had a bracket as part of decoration? Neither do I.
But people are buying it and the what’s left of the NCAA is selling it. All well, all good. No matter how many times you hear “Howz ya brackitt?” this tournament still delivers.
You know why? One simple reason – competition. There’s something about the matchups this event provides. Big Guy vs. Little Guy. Heavyweight vs. Heavyweight. It really doesn’t matter. The networks will try to tell us that every game is one for the ages, but the reality is much different.
Doesn’t matter. There is always enough “Did you say that?” moments to go around.
See, you really don’t watch for any reason other than that. Let’s see what (fill in the blank school) has got. Throw it up at midcourt and let’s get it on for 40 minutes. Either win or carry it back home.
That game back in December doesn’t matter anymore. How you think you got shafted in the seeding is irrelevant.
So don’t worry if you can’t name a single player for either team. Or that you won’t remember them two hours after the game is over.
All you need to know is that you are not going to be disappointed.
SCRAPPING, CLAWING: Southwood’s team had high expectations and plenty of talent, but it took hustle from players like Jeremiah Evans (left) and Tyler Williams (eyes on loose ball) to fuel the Cowboys’ charge to Lake Charles. (Journal photo by KEVIN PICKENS)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
If you had asked Southwood basketball coach Brandon Gultery back in October what he thought the odds would be of his team making it to the Top 28 semifinals, he says his answer would have been rather definitive.
“I would have said to bet the house,” he says now.
Belief then, belief now. Belief on Friday night even when the Cowboys were losing in the final seconds. But all Jeremiah Evans needed was the ball and a chance. His 3-point buzzer beater is why the sixth-seeded Cowboys are in Lake Charles to take on No. 2 seed Liberty in today’s Division I Select semifinal at 2:45 p.m.
They’ve got a star player in Evans, as well as plenty of others who can step up when needed. But what they have most of all, Gultery says, is that one word – belief.
“We have this motto of ‘I believe’,“ he says. “The kids have done a great job since last year of believing we are capable of getting to the Top 28 and winning the state championship. They believe in the coaches, they believe in each other. I think it all starts with the man up above leading us down this path.”
The stunning game-winner Friday night came after the Cowboys had already lost twice to Shreve – their only two losses in the last 12 games – and had to go on the road to avoid having it happen for a third time and ending their season.
Now that is belief.
Down by two points, the 6-foot-8 Evans made a 3-pointer that went through the net with 0.7 seconds to play.
“The kids make plays when it matters, both offensively and defensively,” he says. “There have been times when Jeremiah has been the leading player for us and times when he hasn’t played up to par and the other kids have had to step up,” Gultery says. “It’s been more of a win by committee.”
If so, then one of the committee chairmen would be Kamauri Fleming. “There was a lot of pressure on him in that Captain Shreve (quarterfinal) game,” Gultery says. “They had somewhat exposed us in the previous games with pressure and he came into that game with a motor. Although Jeremiah gets the praise for hitting the game-winning shot, Kamauri Fleming is the MVP of Friday night’s game.”
This will be Southwood’s first semifinal appearance since 2002 – none of the Cowboys were even born when that happened – but Gultery knows all about it.
“This is my first rodeo of experiencing it as a head coach,” he says. “But I’ve been there as an assistant (at Carroll) and a couple of times as a player at McCall. This is a great thing for our kids and our program. I’m going to be honest; this is the vision we have always had.”
This may seem a little crazy, but is there a chance that the Cowboys might have to guard against a letdown, even though they have achieved something that hasn’t been done at the school in 22 years?
Think about it – it was the ultimate game-winning shot, on the road, against a district rival they had already lost to twice before. How easy is that to put in the rear view mirror?
“In these moments in the playoffs, the focus is on moving on rather than how the results were,” Gultery says. “Regardless of if you win by 30 or by one, a win is a win. And at the end of the night, we were able to prevail and that’s the most important part.”
The 3-point game-winner by Evans, the tallest player on the court, was no surprise to Gultery. “His favorite player is Kevin Durant and he plays like him,” Gultery says. “I told him during the timeout that I trusted him and he trusted himself in that moment.”
There was about 48 hours to enjoy the stunning win, but there’s more business to attend to for the Cowboys.
“We’ve had our eyes set on getting there (to the Top 28),” Gultery says, “but now that we have gotten there, we are looking to finish the deal.”
TOP STOPPERS: Byrd defenders Lauryn Fleming (left) and Sarah Katherine Murrell plan to be stingy when it comes to protecting the goal in Saturday’s state championship game in Hammond. (Photo by JOHN JAMES MARSHALL)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
For Byrd girls soccer coach Lisa Levermann, this is just like Game 1 against St. Michael.
Just like Game 11 against St. Louis. Or Game 21 against South Grand Prairie, Texas.
At least, that’s the plan.
And as much as she will try to make it that way, she knows as well as anybody that it really isn’t just like those games.
This is for the state championship. This is why her team played Game 1 and Game 11 and Game 21. And all of the rest of them.
All of that for this: Byrd vs. St. Scholastica for the Division I state championship on Saturday at Strawberry Stadium in Hammond.
“I want them to enjoy the ride,” Leverman said. “There’s a fine line there because you want them to go into it like we have every match. They are very superstitious so we are trying to do everything like we have done from the beginning.
“But I told them,” she added, “things are about to get a little crazy.”
St. Scholastica won back-to-back titles in 2018 and 2019. Though Byrd was in the finals in 2016, it was 20 years before that since the Lady Jackets brought home the biggest trophy.
That’s a lot to think about, so they’d rather not.
“I’ll try to just focus on the exact moment,” said Natalie Dvorakova of what she’ll be thinking when the opening whistle blows. “At the end of the day, it’s still just a game we have to win. I’m just going to play my game and focus on having fun and enjoying my time on the field.”
Fun is kind of the operative word around the Byrd girls soccer program these days.
“I want them to focus,” Levermann said, “but I want them to enjoy it, too. I want them to know there’s no pressure. They (St. Scholastica) are the No. 4 seed. We have nothing to lose, so I want them to have fun and to play their hardest, no matter what.”
“It is just another game when you are playing it. But in the bigger picture, you know it’s not,” Dvorakova said. “But you have to think that way or the stress will get to you.”
The defense for 11th-seeded Byrd figures to be a big key in the game. The two teams have already played this year with St. Scholastica winning 3-0 on Dec. 28 at a tournament in Mandeville.
“I’m going to be super excited, but I know I need to keep my composure so we can have fun,” said defender Lauryn Fleming. “I’m proud of our team for getting here.”
“Honestly, I’m going to treat it like a regular game,” said freshman defender Sarah Katherine Murrell. “I don’t want to get my nerves too spiked, so I just need to keep my composure too. It means a lot to be starting on the back line as a freshman. It’s been a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Just to get a chance to play for my school and this team at a state championship is a great experience.”
Levermann has been down this road plenty of times – she was the coach in 1996 when Byrd won the title – and she understands that her role as coach means more than just strategy and substitutions.
“I’m just trying to keep calm with them,” she said. “That approach has been working pretty well. so, we are going to have fun, be focused and just enjoy the moment.”
Apparently, there was a problem going on in high school baseball that nobody knew was a problem.
Monday night – opening night of the 2024 season – something happened at Cicero Field in the Northwood-Loyola game that caught more than a few people off guard.
In the middle of a plate appearance by a Loyola player, the first base umpire stopped play just before a pitch was thrown.
“Clock violation” was the call.
“That caught me off-guard for sure,” said Northwood coach Austin Alexander.
He wasn’t the only one.
Major League Baseball has a time limit between pitches and innings. So does college baseball.
And now, so does high school baseball.
But in pro and college stadiums, there are countdown clocks strategically placed throughout the facility, so everyone knows when it’s about be an issue. It might be awhile before those start popping up at local baseball facilities.
So how do the umpires keep track? The old-fashioned way – with a stopwatch. Welcome to the modern world of time-limit baseball … with a relic from the past.
We are almost a week into the season and mostly coaches have not found it to be an issue. Even in the case of the Northwood-Loyola game, it was only a warning. (On the next violation, a ball would have been called).
“I don’t think it’s much of a factor,” Alexander said. “We try to get out guys to play fast and set the tone that way. But it’s really going to be to each umpire’s discretion. Some are going to enforce it and some aren’t.
The biggest issue is how it will all be implemented. “I’ve had three games this week,” said Captain Shreve coach Todd Sharp, “and I have to ask the umpires before the game how are these rules going to be implemented. And I get different answers every day. Rules have always been around; I don’t have any problem with rules. It’s more about how they are implemented.”
Most coaches agree that the pitch clock (20 seconds between pitches, even with a runner on base) is not as big of a potential issue as the between-innings clock, which is a 1:20.
“Say I’ve got a catcher trying to leg out a ground ball in the hole and he runs halfway down the line on the third out and we are in the third base dugout,” said Airline’s Toby Todd. “That’s going to be tough to get back and get the equipment on in time.”
Pitchers only get five warmup pitches when they come back to the mound during a game. That’s also a change from before. But what if the catcher hasn’t finished putting his equipment on? Does the pitcher just stand there? Can he lob a few to the third baseman?
There’s another little-known clock rule. When a pitching change is made, the new pitcher only gets eight warmup pitches or 1:20. “I’ve had an umpire tell me by the letter of the law, if he’s only thrown four pitchers in 1:20, that’s it,” Sharp said. “So my question is, if my pitcher goes really fast, can he throw 10 (warmup) pitches? They told me no.”
“This was a non-factor that they tried to make into a factor,” Todd said. “They only thing I see it’s good for is that now it makes the lazy umpires hurry up and get his mask back on.”
Though most coaches say it doesn’t change their approach, there has been an occasional problem in the past with an over-abundance of sign giving. Either coaches are trying to disguise their signs as if a bevy of Russian spies are in the stands or the players stare back and have no idea what belt-hat-belt is supposed to mean.
“A lot of these kids play travel ball during the summer,” Todd said, “so they aren’t used to seeing a take sign anyway.”
“For this area, I don’t think it was necessary, but I’m sure it was in other areas so we are all going to have to deal with it,” Sharp said. “Mostly, the umpires tell me they aren’t looking to do this (calling violations). They are just making you aware of it.”
MY OH MY: Byrd’s MyJoi Anderson (with the ball) is a tough weapon for opponents to defend. (Submitted photo)
By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
There are a lot of things that stand out about Byrd’s MyJoi Anderson, but you have probably guessed what is at the top of the list.
“I get asked about my name a lot,” Anderson said. “I’m my mother’s only child, so I guess it really meant a lot to her.”
She also means a lot to the Byrd girls soccer team as Anderson leads the Jackets into the Division I semifinals.
The 11th-seeded Jackets will get a shot at their first trip to the state finals since 2016 when they play host to 18th-seeded Barbe Saturday at 2:30 at the Byrd soccer field.
Anderson is one of the team’s top scorers, but it hasn’t been an easy road. She was ineligible as a freshman and then broke her ankle during her sophomore year in a game against Loyola.
She and Loyola defender Mary Helen Burford tangled near the net and as both made a play on the ball, the two crashed into each other. “A really common play you see near the goal,” Loyola coach Mark Matlock said. “Just an unfortunate thing.”
Surgery was required for Anderson and she spent three months in a cast, but her recovery did not come as a surprise to Byrd head coach Lisa Leverman.
“She’s that worker you can’t get off the field,” the coach said. “When you see someone get an injury like that, sometimes their head is not in a good space and they can really crumble. She never did. She just went straight to work. Everything she had to do to make herself stronger, she did and always had a positive attitude.”
But the road to soccer success started for Anderson back when she wasn’t even able to play on the varsity.
“I feel like only being able to play JV my freshman year showed me I was good enough to play on varsity as if I was eligible,” Anderson said. “It was a hard time but I still pushed through.”
Playing JV may have been an enlightening experience for Anderson, but it was a miserable one for Byrd’s opponents.
“I had JV coaches so mad at me for playing her,” Leverman said. “They’d say ‘why do you have her on this team?’ But I said ‘Give her a break. She has nowhere else to play.’ If she had been on varsity, I never would have had her play JV. But why should I penalize her? Then she would have nowhere to play at all.”
These days, opposing coaches are still finding out what a force she can be.
“She’s a really strong and runs really well and that makes her tough to knock off the ball,” Matlock said. “She attacks with the ball and is a really good finisher.”
“Once she powers through, there’s no catching her,” said Leverman, who coached Anderson as an academy player at the youth level. “She just has that explosive speed. And she works hard on her craft to try to be the best she can be.”
But if you ask Anderson, she’ll tell you the strength of her game is less obvious. “Just being confident and knowing when to do certain things and being confident in my teammates as well,” she said.
“She’s just as sweet as she can be,” Leverman said. “She has that sweet, soft voice and there is not a mean bone in her body. But when she gets out there to play, she gets this mindset and goes to another level.”
It’s been a rare under-the-radar season for the Jackets. Anderson was still in pre-kindergarten the last time Byrd was seeded this low (2011).
Getting the win over Captain Shreve earlier this week in the quarterfinals was especially sweet for Anderson and the Jackets since it came against a district rival and also overcame something of a playoff roadblock. Byrd had lost its last four quarterfinal appearances (all as single-digit seeds.)
“It was sweet because earlier in the season we kind of got destroyed (5-1) by them,” Anderson said. “It was nice to get revenge and show who we really are. We were more confident than before and trusted each other.”
This will be the second meeting of the season between Byrd and Barbe. The Jackets took the first one 3-1 in December in Lake Charles.
“I know that we are a different team than when we played them, so J know Barbe has got to be different by now too,” Leverman said. “They’ve got to be doing something right, because they are here too.”
