Ran Out Of Time: 3-0

 

 

 

Sharks Before Boarding Team Bus 

 

 

Javonte King (22)  Dion Jones (10) Chris Putnam  Heading to Bus 

 

I am sorry for not writing my blog for the past couple of days.  I have been so busy with breaking down video and preparing for our games, there just has not been a hour or so to spare.  In fact, I fell a sleep at my computer on Friday night while breaking down the video of our game.  I woke up at 3:30 AM with my computer mouse in in one hand and a pencil in the other....sitting straight up.  I am still exhausted.

 

Lets start with Friday.  I arrived at school around 1:30 pm or so.  Coach Tony Brown was already there and working on our football trailer for out trip to Melbourne.  Mr. Stutzke obtained a 6' x 10' trailer from the school district. We decided to skip our team meal and work on getting the trailer ready for hold-downs and storing our gear.  It was so nice having the extra room.  When the kids returned from Mulligans, we loaded up the buses and headed to Melbourne for out 7 PM game. 

 

 

 Loading Our Trailer 

 

A local restaurant, MULLIGANS, feeds our entire football team every game day.  Generally, the team eats a chicken breast, and wild rice for the meal.  This type of meal burns nicely, and gives the kids some energy for the game.  I would encourage all the people reading this blog to visit Mulligans (in Sebastian) during the week and support this business. 

 

We arrived in Melbourne and immediately got dressed for specials.  This is Coach Millers and my area here.  We take out the QB's, centers, receivers, running backs, and kickers for some early work to get loose.  Our time schedule is very strict...down to the minute.  When we are done, the specialist go and meet the rest of the team to come out for regular stretch.  We go through the stretch period, then to Indy, and finish up with a TEAM period before going to the locker room for any last minute details.  Then, we come out to the field and line up for the national anthem. 

 

Can I talk about the National Anthem for a second?  My son is in the US Army stationed in Germany.  He already has one combat deployment under his belt, and he is preparing for another.  Before my son joined the Army, the National Anthem never really meant that much to me.  It was just something we all lined up and did.  Now, while looking at the Flag presented by any school's Color Guard, I get emotional when thinking about the bravery of the members of our armed forces.  My son is my hero, and I take the National Anthem very seriously.  I try to stress my feeling on the players as well. 

 

Now the game:  All and all, it was a decent game even though we ran out of time.  In my mind, we have never really LOST a game.  Instead, I prefer to say we ran out of time to catch up in the score.  Sometimes the game ends and the other team has more points than we do.  It happens.  The Defense played GREAT all night long and kept us in the game.  They were really flying around the ball, and preventing Melbourne from scoring.  As expected, Bookie Taylor was fantastic.  I lost count of how many tackles that dude made, but I know it was a lot.  (He also blocked and ran like a beast on offense.)  Millers LB's played really well, and I thought Mason and Bubba had good nights.  Pork Chop and Gage has strong nights too.  On offense, we moved the ball all night long.  We were actually inside the "red zone" several times, but we just could not punch it in.  OJ Jefferson and Nick Cooper each ran hard behind some solid play behind our "Big Boys."

 

  Hakeem had a solid night too.  I promised Hakeem that I "had his back" during the game....and I kept that promise.  Like I stated before:  The QB has the pressure of several hundred fans (in the stands)  on him every play, so berating him on the sideline is counter productive for me.  This is a hard lesson I learned from coaching my own son Mike. 

 

Here is a funny story about Mike.  We used to have this player on our JV team who was kind of slow....lets call him Jake.   Jake used to drive the other players crazy with his antics during practice and games.  However, the players knew 'Jake' was a little slow, so they left him alone for the most part.  During one game, Mike made a horrible read on the defense, and he threw an interception.  I got Mike on the sideline and I was just chewing his butt up and down.  I never noticed Jake standing beside me during my tirade.  When I was finished with Mike, Jake decided to get in a few shots of his own.  Jake said: " YEAH, YOU STUPID SON-OF-A-BITCH"  and then walked off.  I turned around and Mike just dropped his head laughing. 

 

 

 

Hakeem Rainey Before the Game 



 

This was a good learning tool for our team.  We have some adjustments to make, but nothing major.  I think this is going to be a very solid team.  Anyway, we are moving on to our first regular season game with Vero Beach next week.  This is a HUGE GAME, and we are preparing already.  I will pick the blog up again tomorrow night. 

 

BYE!!