Post by The Lunch Pail on Oct 30, 2022 12:48:24 GMT -6
We had an excellent season at my school. It's our 3rd year of varsity football in a rural school district that has an deeply-ingrained history of fall baseball. Despite all of that and playing a roster of 30 kids (it's 1A), we somehow managed to finish the regular season 8-1.
I can't lie, we played a schedule of inept teams. To be fair, we had a combined record of 2-15 over two seasons, so we weren't much different. We are an independent team surrounded by a 10-team conference, so we had to traverse the entire state to find games. Getting these "winnable" games was the best thing we could've done. However, we looked like beasts for most of the year. We were beating these teams 49-6, 42-13, 38-0, etc. like great teams are supposed to do.
We were undefeated up until our final regular season game. We were without four of our six seniors. We played a team with a .500 record that we knew was going to be a dogfight. We lost the game by 3 touchdowns, giving up nearly 60 points. They had a RB that ran right through every tackle (and we coached tackling harder than I've ever done this season). We'd literally defeat blocks and he'd just run right through 4 guys in the open field. We knew it might not have looked like that if we had our guys, though. So it was onto the next one.
First round of the playoffs. We're the 2 seed (8-1) playing the 7 seed (5-4). The 7 seed was a tough matchup, though. They had some freaky looking dudes, including an all-state WR and a 6'3/235# bruiser of a RB behind a massive OL. They just shot themselves in the foot game after game. We also knew this would be a dogfight. But we scouted them so thoroughly that our kids could call out the incoming plays all week.
What do they do? Completely break all of their tendencies. They're coaching, too. But our kids were so disheartened and seemed to lose all confidence. We ended up losing the game 46-8. I had never seen such a somber atmosphere in the midst of an 8-0 deficit. I don't have any clue what happened with our players.
I am just sad. These seniors were all such great kids who worked unbelievably hard to get to this point. Our coaches as well. I wish we could have ended on a better note than this
I can't lie, we played a schedule of inept teams. To be fair, we had a combined record of 2-15 over two seasons, so we weren't much different. We are an independent team surrounded by a 10-team conference, so we had to traverse the entire state to find games. Getting these "winnable" games was the best thing we could've done. However, we looked like beasts for most of the year. We were beating these teams 49-6, 42-13, 38-0, etc. like great teams are supposed to do.
We were undefeated up until our final regular season game. We were without four of our six seniors. We played a team with a .500 record that we knew was going to be a dogfight. We lost the game by 3 touchdowns, giving up nearly 60 points. They had a RB that ran right through every tackle (and we coached tackling harder than I've ever done this season). We'd literally defeat blocks and he'd just run right through 4 guys in the open field. We knew it might not have looked like that if we had our guys, though. So it was onto the next one.
First round of the playoffs. We're the 2 seed (8-1) playing the 7 seed (5-4). The 7 seed was a tough matchup, though. They had some freaky looking dudes, including an all-state WR and a 6'3/235# bruiser of a RB behind a massive OL. They just shot themselves in the foot game after game. We also knew this would be a dogfight. But we scouted them so thoroughly that our kids could call out the incoming plays all week.
What do they do? Completely break all of their tendencies. They're coaching, too. But our kids were so disheartened and seemed to lose all confidence. We ended up losing the game 46-8. I had never seen such a somber atmosphere in the midst of an 8-0 deficit. I don't have any clue what happened with our players.
I am just sad. These seniors were all such great kids who worked unbelievably hard to get to this point. Our coaches as well. I wish we could have ended on a better note than this
