Multi-Tasking

I really hate to hear that Chad Smith is leaving Northern Nash and the area at school's end.

Being on the Rocky Mount coaching staff for four years, I got to know Chad and I am disappointed for him that the Northern gig did not work out for him.

I know many at Rocky Mount High remember Martha (Sykes) Proctor when she worked in the athletic office at RMHS. She is now at North Carolina Wesleyan working for athletic director John Thompson. Tuesday, she underwent a heart cauterization at Wake Med.

With homecoming going on this coming weekend at NCWC, I know she will and is greatly missed and if all goes well, she may be home on Friday.

You know the way the Gryphons keep breaking records, it is hard to keep up with all of them. There is one that has slipped by all of us and that is the record for most consecutive PATs made.

The record has been held by Howard McCullough since 1971 of 16 straight. Senior Nick Hahula has not missed an extra point since the third quarter of the Northern Vance game. He made one in the fourth quarter and the new string was started. After making seven more against Fike last week, he has now made 24 in a row.

You know one of the great successes this team has enjoyed this year is that Nick's has only punted 18 times all year for almost a 40-yard average. And his kickoffs, over two-thirds have been in the end zone, so the opposing team goes out and starts 80 yards away from the goal.

As begrudging as this defense is (ony allowing 6.5 points a game), the further you are from the goal line, the less likely you will get any points at all.

That is a great advantage for the defense. You know last year, one of the weakest parts of our defense was kickoff coverage where teams were starting on their 40 or beyond. I don't know the exact number ,but I can only think of three times all year a team has gotten beyond their own 40.

This year's squad is predominately seniors, so now is as good a time as the Gryphons are going to get to win a state championship.

With that in mind there are only five more possible games this season. This team has played like they were on a mission.

The first game of the playoffs they sit on the launch pad ready to sky rocket into history. Let's play these next five like we played the first 11.

Tonight, I will be at Rocky Mount High as I will be covering the wrestling match with Rose. This will be the first time I have ever covered wrestling.

In order to get as many sports as possible covered on the Stretchlon Sports Show, just this year alone I have cover volleyball and soccer for the first time.

Over the years, of course, I have covered football, basketball, baseball, softball and also a 10K race. You talking about and unusual event to cover on radio - that will be a good subject one day when the sports world is slow.

I enjoy high school wrestling and can't understand how a fake entertainment like the WWE is so popular when there is really no competition at all.

The Matchup

Opening round of the playoffs are three days away and I suspect the Gryphons will be 40-point favorites.

Looking at the past games played against Rocky Mount and Jacksonville, there one thing that stands out.

Games with them have generally been defensive struggles.

Four of the seven games the winning team could muster only 13 points.

Only three times has the winner scored at least 20

I would hope we have 20 by the half this Friday night.

This year, the Gryphons are averaging 38 points per game. Jacksonville is averaging 13 per game.
The Cardinals scored in double digits just four times. The Gryphons score at least 24 10 times.

The Cardinal defense gave up at least 40 four times while the Gryphon offense scored 40 or more points six times.

The Gryphon defense gave up 71 points on the season. In its nine losses, Jacksonville could muster only scoring 91.

As the old saying goes, that's why they play the game. You never know that the Gryphons might turn the ball over three times and two are returned for score.

The Gryphons will need to be focused. Maybe the Northern Vance game is the only game all year where we didn't seem ready to play and yet, we lead 10-0 in the first quarter.

Friday starts a brand new season. A season of one-and-done. Survive and advance. Friday night should be their only easy game as starting with the second round the noose tightens.

The schedule Gods have granted us an easy one this Friday. Why not take advantage and do like we have done in so many other games this year.

I want to see the taillights of cars in the parking lot heading home at the half because another victim is down by 30.

The team practiced this morning since school is out for the holiday so the players will get to enjoy the afternoon off.

My pick: Gryphons 49, Cardinals 6

I would like to finish this today by saying THANK YOU to all our Veterans who have served to make this country free.

Step One For A Championship

I would be very tempted if I were B W Holt to start the eleven JVs brought up to be with the varsity this Friday.

Did our offense show the state of North Carolina what we can do when healthy or what?

I know it won't happen and it shouldn't happen but I hope by half time the game is secure and players can rest for there are 4 games left and each step gets tougher and tougher.

We have already seen what Marquavis Alston means when he plays over the games he sat out with injury.

I would doubt whether Hiawatha Bunn plays Friday with his leg injury from this past Friday. I think we can afford having him sit out this week to be ready for the second round. Our hope is he can play then.

The NFL is debating adding two regular season games and dropping two preseason games. That's too many games for the pros with their high dollar players.

What do you think 16 for high school kids is? Way too many.

Whatever happened to the rule you had to win four games to make the playoffs? A 4-7 team has no business being allowed to play much less a 2-9 Team like Jacksonville..

I hate to say this but I hope we score 75 just to prove a point. I know that will not happen because B W has cleared the bench once he has gotten a 28 point lead in the first half of most games.

Any time a team gets to 60 points in a game it pretty much tells you that the other side was out manned and threw in the towel. Southern Wayne comes to mind.

I think if we want to stay with a 32 team bracket lets drop the AA portion of the playoffs and use the same criteria for seeding that we use now.

That would eliminate the Northern Nash debacle of 2001 where a co-champion stayed home.

If we went back to just one division in 3-A here what the 3-A eastern playoff could look like this year.

Washington 7-3 @West Craven 10-0
Sothwest Edgecombe 8-2 @Kinston 9-1
Oxford Webb 8-2 @ Rocky Mount 10-0
Eastern Alamance 9-1@ Hertford County 9-1
Asheboro 8-2 @ Dudley 10-0
Triton 8-2 @ Ragsdale 10-0
NE Guilford 5-5 @ Western Harnett 10-0
West Brunswick6-4 @Northern Vance 6-4

Now doesn't that look more like what a playoff should be? If all the higher seeds win their round one game. These will be the second round matchups.

The playoffs should be a reward for showing grit when the chips were down you didn't give up.

The playoffs should not be who do we have left to fill out the brackets.

Home Sweet Home

Ever since opening night when the Rocky Mount Gryphons jumped out to a 43-0 lead on 4-A East Forsyth, the feeling in the Gryphon Nation was that anything less than a No. 1 seed would be a letdown.

Even though we feel we are No. 1 in the east, it took a drawing with West Craven to make it happen.

The Gryphons got that No. 1 seed and a date with the 2-8 Cardinals of Jacksonville High, which is a playoff foe from out of our 4-A past.

The big prize is that whoever wins the east 3-A will have to win it by beating Rocky Mount at the Rocky Mount Athletic Complex, where the Gryphons have not lost at home since Dec. 5, 2005 to Western Alamance in the eastern 3-A finals.

As long as the Gryphons win, they will play in front of the home folks. A victory Friday and they would play host to the winner of the Beddingfield-Oxford Webb (a possible return for former RM head coach John Hammett) game.

If they win four straight at home, they will have a date at high noon on Dec. 13 with the western berth winner in Winston-Salem at the old Groves Stadium, which is now called BB&T field until someone offers more money for the naming rights.

SouthWest Edgecombe, the NEW 6's No. 2 seed, will have a home game against South Granville Friday. SouthWest is the only team in the 3-A bracket to play both West Craven and Rocky Mount and if it wins its first two games , it would get a rematch first with West Craven - assuming all teams are still alive, and an eastern final is possible against SWE.

Nash Central, having won Friday, is the luckiest team in the 3-A bracket. Yes, this year they are a 3-A playoff team. Fike, which had a ADM of 1244, drew the AA bracket and Nash Central with a 1243 stayed in the small A.

So we have to assume Fike is the last team in the 3-AA and Nash Central is the first team that qualified as a 3-A school. Their Bulldogs' first-round game will be at Kinston.

Remember, I said a couple of days ago that who ever got Nash Central was getting a 7-win team, but because of the two forfeits, it is disguised as a 5-win squad. Kinston is the unlucky team that drew the Bulldogs.

Fike, as I said, is in the 3-AA and travels Friday to Asheboro in the first round.

Southern Nash is the most disappointed team in the league as they failed to get in with four wins.

Rocky Mount is not the only local team that will enjoy their confines of home. Tarboro is the No. 1 seed in the east in the NCHSAA 2-A bracket and have drawn Pasquotank from Elizabeth City in the opening round.

I understand that Jacksonville is in a 3-A school in a 4-A/3-A league and they are seeded as a No. 3 in its league, but there is something wrong when a four-win team like Southern Nash sits and Jacksonville plays.

It's the way the split leagues are looked at by the NCHSAA. I will use Hertford County as an example. Hertford County lost to Northeastern ,which is a 2-A school in that league. Northeastern got the No. 1 seed as the 2-A representative and Hertford County got a top seed as the 3-A rep from their league.

It seems to me that Hertford County should have been a No. 2 in their league. That is one of the screwy rules that I think needs to be changed.

When looking at Jacksonville, it finished seventh in its 4A/3-A league, dead last, but go as the No. 3 seeded 3-A school. A seventh place team in their league is in and a No. 5 in our league, Southern Nash, is out.

Go figure!

Lauren and Terrell

As I have told you, my cousin Lauren Doughtie won her first college golf tournament about a month back.

This week she was in Tampa Florida trying to make the LPGA's Futures tour which is the minor leagues of LPGA golf. I am proud to say out of the 252 golfers who tried to make the tour Lauren finished seventh which means she has made the tour.

However, she will not declare herself as a professional until sometime during the summer after she graduates from N.C. State. A couple of weeks back, Lauren hurt her wrist in a tournament in Chapel Hill which will require surgery. This means she will miss the rest of the spring golfing season as she recovers from surgery.

If Lauren had of declared to turn pro, she would by finishing seventh in the Futures tour qualifying tournament received her first check for playing golf.

I think she is planning on waiting until after she has another shot at the U.S. Women's Amateur before turning pro.

Now for Terrell Hudgins:

Going into Saturday's game against Western Carolina ,Terrell needed 37 yards to break the all- time career yardage receiving record at Elon.

What is the importance of this record in the history of Elon University? It is the last receiving record at Elon that Terrell Hudgins name is not at the top of the list.

If it has anything to do with a receiving record in a game Terrell owns it. If it has anything to do with receiving record for a season Terrell owns it and Saturday the last career record that Terrell didn't already own became his.

Terrell tried the best he could to make this career yardage total with a big splash but his first catch of the day for a 79-yard touchdown catch was called back for offensive holding.

In the second quarter, he had to settle for a 39-yard catch his first grab of the day to break the record by two yards.

In order to keep the rest of the game from being a complete bore for Terrell now that he has no more Elon Record to break his seventh catch of the game was good for 13 yards which gave him 106 yards in the game. That broke the Southern Conference total yardage receiving record.

Now remember that the Southern Conference is the league where State, Carolina, Duke and Wake use to call home in the first half of the 20th century.

Terrell finished the day with seven catches which gives him 262 for his career. He is 38 short of the all-time FCS record of 300 in a career. Terrell has two regular season games and ever how many playoff games than Elon will get to break the record this year. We are talking what use to be a Division II record.

So Terrell has gone past Elon records. He still has a few Southern conference records to get but now he is after all time records in college football

Also Terrell broke the career Southern Conference record of 18 games getting at least 100 in a game.

I think we have to go back to Phil Ford and Buck Williams to see a Rocky Mount player have the impact on his college sport the way Terrell has.


He was the North Carolina High School Athlete of the Year in 2005. He excelled in football basketball and baseball.

The only major college to offer Terrell a football scholarship was East Carolina and off to Greenville he went.

The visit did not last long as it became apparent that being a D-I quarterback was not in the cards for the pirates.

Transferring to Elon it didn't take long there either before he found himself split out away from the backfield at wide receiver.

Terrell found a home at wide receiver and from his very first game Elon had found maybe there best football player in the history of the school.

That is not to shabby considering that Elon won two national NAIA championship back to back in the late 70s.

Terrell will have a decision to make come this spring as he will be eligible for the NFL Draft. It is hard to believe but he still has one more year at Elon if he chooses to do so.

Not bad for a player that wanted to be a college quarterback.

Conference Champs!!!!

The last three weeks of NEW 6 Conference play have been three wins for the Gryphons, but they have scored only 66 points while allowing just 14.

People have been asking me what is wrong with the Gryphons. My answer has been I think our competition has had something to do with it.

The real answer may have been 'wait until we are healthy'. Tonight, the Gryphons showed what they can do when 100 percent healthy on offense.

By midway through the third quarter, the Gryphons had nine offensive possession and scored on eight of them - seven touchdowns and a field goal.

With 11 minutes to play last week at Nash Central, the Gryphons put 28 points on the board in the fourth quarter. Tonight, with 11 minutes to play, they had added 52 points in the first three quarters. So in a four-quarter stretch, the Gryphons had laid out 80 points against Nash Central and Fike.

B.W. Holt had the Gryphons ready and willing tonight as they, even leading 21-0, executed a perfect onside kick.

Gryphons won their third NEW 6 Conference championship in four years. Including the last Big East crown, they have won titles four out of the last five years.

In the four-year history of the NEW 6, the Gryphons were 18-2 in league play.

Tonight was also and this is correct this time, the 100th straight game in which the Gryphons have scored in a game.

Gryphons blast the Golden Demons 52-7.

This was a team effort and now the Gryphons wait for the seeding announcement some time between 3-6 p.m.

Most of the time, there is a posting at 3 p.m. and if someone sees there is a seeding error, they have until 6 p.m. to correct any mistakes.

If you remember a couple of years ago, Coach Holt looked at the seeding, called the coach he thought he was playing and made arrangements to meet him Saturday afternoon and on the way there, got a call that the seeding was changed we were playing someone else.

In essence, the brackets will not be official until 6 p.m.

In other NEW 6 action tonight....

Nash Central, needing a win in order to solidify its playoff hopes, took care of business at Northern Nash, 42-13.

SouthWest Edgecombe needed a win against Southern Nash and a Gryphon loss in order to create a three-way tie in the NEW 6. Well, they got half of it a 29-22 victory over Southern Nash.

We all must sit around and wait for the brackets. I feel like we are in the small 3-A, but we will have to hold our breath until we see it in black and white.

Depending on whether they are big AA or small A, Southern Nash, by only having four wins, could possible get Dudley or Rocky Mount in the first round.

I would like to pass along the JV score from last night as the Baby Gryphons, down 14-13 at the half at Wilson Fike, smoked the little Golden Demons in the second half to win 46-14. They finished the season at 9-1.

During the Holt era in Rocky Mount, the JV program under Chris Lee and Kent Cox, are 54-5. While the big team playing a little tougher brand of football has managed a fairly respectable 67-12 benchmark.

As soon as I know the brackets, I'll blog about it tomorrow night.

The Stakes Are High

Friday night's game with Fike is for the outright conference crown.

If Fike wins, there is a chance for some odd occurrences happening like in 2001 when Northern lost one game and a draw which left it home for the playoffs.

Nothing that bad can occur, but when you have been expecting to possibly be the No. 1 seed in the tournament and wind up No. 3 in your own league, that is a big come down.

A victory will mean a high seed. If the Gryphons stay in 3-A, it looks as if their worse possible seeding would be second and a potential for three home games.

A loss to Fike could set up a three way tie with Southwest Edgecombe, Fike and the Gryphons.

Since the three-way tie occurred because they all beat each other, then a drawing will be held and if the Gryphons win the draw, they could be seeded from second to maybe sixth in the state playoffs.

If they were to draw second, then their seeding could be from somewhere like seventh to 12th and third from 13th to maybe 20th.

Any seeding beyond sixth will mean only one possible home game during the playoffs.

The 3-A bracket seems as if it is down to us or West Craven for the No. 1 seeding.

SouthWest Edgecombe and Fike can not win the championship outright so a three-way tie is their only hope which means Fike has to win Friday.

If SWE was to lose at Southern Nash and Fike win, then Fike would be the conference champion due to the fact it would be a two-way tie with the Gryphons and Golden Demons and Fike won the head to head matchup.

The Gryphons can do themselves a favor by winning Friday evening and making our lives less stressful.

The only conference team that is truly preparing for basketball is Northern Nash. One win on the season so far and they are too far down the list to make the playoffs if they were to upset Nash Central Friday.

Nash Central is the team on the hot seat. It looks as if they will be a 3-AA team if they make the playoffs. Their two forfeits have them in a must-win situation Friday night in order to breathe easier Saturday as they wait for the playoff pairings.

A loss to Northern would make them a four-win team. If they do get in with four wins, remember they actually won two games on the field which really makes them a six-win team.

They could be a hard draw for who ever will get them in the first game of the playoffs.

A win Friday by Nash Central would be their seventh on the season, but minus the two forfeits they will be seeded as a five win or four win team.

Some 8-2 or 7-3 team will get them in the first round and Nash Central will actually be just as good as them except they will be on the road.

Championship coverage begins at 7 p.m. on AM 1390 Friday night. I would hope with the magnitude of this game you are in the stands cheering for the Gryphons.

Have your Walkman radio on 1390, of course.