Football's Second Round

The Tarboro Vikings have won 16 straight playoff games and any time you get to the point when you can add to a streak there is always the possibility that the streak will end.  Case in point the Vikings will be at home against the only team this season that really late in the game still had a chance to beat the Vikings.  Those other Vikings from Kinston will try to score  28 points like the first time they played Tarboro but will try to hold Tarboro to less than the 34 they got last time.  I doubt Kinston can do either score 28 this time around or hold Tarboro to less than 34.  The first time they met this year was in Kinston but Friday night it is in Tarboro.  I need to research the last time Tarboro lost a home game to a 2-A team.  Tarboro 34 Kinston 20.  A B Whitley's back surgery from what I hear went well and  should be able to listen to the game on the radio  Friday night.

Any time a  team plays Cardinal Gibbons you know you are going up against a school that has every thing that every other school would like to have.  Hunt's second round playoff game if you plan on going you had better get there early because N C State basketball opens it basketball  season across the street Friday night at PNC Arena.  That area around Edwards Mill Road will be bumper to bumper around 7pm.

As this season has unfolded I honestly think that for the first time during Randy Rapers coaching career at Hunt they just may have his best team ever and would lead you to think this team can win the State Title.  These two met in the playoffs last year with Hunt winning and I believe this year's Warrior team is better than last year I'll take Hunt 28-20 over CG.

Bunn will be hosting SouthWest Edgecombe  and I don't know why but I think the Cougars are going to win.  This just might be the best game of the night for any our our local teams or conference teams still left in the playoffs.   I think SWE's schedule has prepared them to get at least to round three.  Cougars 35 Bunn 32

Talk about falling in your lap but North Edgecombe could not sit down at a table  and plan a playoff any better than what has been presented to them.  3-8 Princton comes to Leggett and the Warriors had better be appreciative of the gifts handed them  North Edgecombe 34 Princton 18

Tax Payers Say No

There is always  a professionals  sports team looking  to ask the city in which they are in to help pay for stadiums or for repairs.  Yesterday the City Of Wilmington voted down a request to built a minor league stadium on the Cape Fear River by a 70% to 30% vote.

Professional teams  like to use as hostage the threat to leave a city if the local govenments don't finance their  building.  There are rumors floating about that Jerry Richardon would like to do about $30 million dollars worth of improvements to B Of A Stadium in Charlotte.  Remember LA is looking possibly two team to go there and you just might hear rumblings in Charlotte.

Last year Carolina and Michigan played the so called first game of the college basketball season on the Air Craft Carrier Carl Vinson.  This year's game is to be played on the Museum AirCraft carrier Midway which is stationed in San Diego harbour.  The forecast is for rain Friday  night in San Diego and the game has been moved to Sunday.  Syracuse had to change their travel plans in order to shift the game.  The game is suppose to be played inside an arena  in San Diego if rain did occur but not enough tickets were sold in San Diego to see San Diego State and Syracuse play.  I suspect this will be the last year of this event.

Last month Carolina held their fall baseball  series and former Gryphon Hobbs Johnson kept right on pitching like he finished the season last year.  He went seven innings allowed two runs .  Sure does look like when Carolina plays this year  the Friday pitcher will be Kent Emanuel, Saturday Benton Moss and Sunday Hobbs Johnson.  Not many high schools can say they have two starting weekend pitchers on many college rosters.

Finally under WHERE is he now?  I went on the Modest Junior College basketball web page and found TaShawn Mabry is on the roster again this year.  Mabry who sat out last year after blowing out his achilles after the 11th game in 2010 is back in California.

BIG AND BAD

We like to think around here that the ACC is the biggest and baddest when it comes to basketball.  There is some truth in that statement when the ACC has won five national titles this century.  Likewise the SEC says the are the best in football and winning like 19 National Championships in a row or what ever it is just might make them the best in football.

There is a hole in the SEC dyke this year however as the biggest and baddest can't explain why new comer Texas A&M is 4-2 in the league and I heard a prediction on the radio today that said A&M would beat Alabama this Saturday.  A&M is second behind Alabama in the West division.  If the SEC was so big  and bad how come A&M is not 0-6.  Even in the East division Missouri  the other Big 12 defector is fifth out of seven.  They are a lot closer to where the Big and Bad conference new comer should be if the SEC is all that big and bad.

I haven't talked about Tarboro's Todd Gurley lately and since I'm talking about big and bad this would be a good time to bring Gurley up.  So far this year for the 8-1 Georgia Bulldogs Gurley has carried 138 times for 857 yards which works out to a very neat 6.2 yards per carry.  Early in the season he was sharing the carries with the other super freshman from North Carolina Keith Marshall but Gurley has taken more snaps lately while Marshall has had 82 totes.  Gurley is becoming the man for the Bulldogs and he has also scored 10 times this season.

Sunday night while working with buddy Wes Bradshaw on WHIG-TV he brought up Brian Goodwin's yearly totals playing in his first full year in the minors between A ans AA ball.  He hit 280 slammed 14 home runs and drove in 52.  In fall ball this year he hit another three home runs and hit 268.  If he keeps this up he might see the inside of the baseball stadium in Washington D C by the end of the year next season.

Just got word that Tarboro defensive coordinator A B Whitley will undergo back surgery on Wednesday.  This have been a tough fall for A B.  He had to have an old high school injury fixed earlier this fall and while recuperating from that has hurt his back.   He has tried his best to be on the sidelines with the Vikings until the season was over but obviously that won't happen for him after tomorrow..  We will be praying for him

I hope each and every one of you did you civic duty today on at least like me during the early voting period and voted for the candidates that you think can run our town, county , state and federal government the best.  You lose the right to fuss  about how it is going if you didn't!

The Only One Left

The Firebirds of Southern Nash are the only Nash County school still playing in any playoff still going on.  The soccer team has advanced to the third round of the soccer playoffs and Wednesday is the next day for a game  with the Firbirds the top seeded team and if they win Wednesday they would host the fourth round Saturday.

 Standing in their way is Cleveland the #1 seed from the Eastern Carolina and they have a 19-6 record.  The Firebirds not to shabby themselves at 17-4-1.  Should the Firebirds advance to Saturday  them could meet conference foe Hunt who is playing Jacksonville  at Jacksonville Wednesday.  In the past few years Jax has proven to be a worthy foe for anybody in the Big East .  They knocked both Rocky Mount and Hunt out last year in back to back games.

Round two of the football playoffs will go on without a Nash County team as Hunt the only Big East team left travels to Cardinal Gibbons.  This is a rematch game from last year and I suspect  it will be another tight game.  CG gave up 52 points last Friday and still won. I  Don't believe Hunt will let them get 57 like they did last Friday.

Talk about a crazy world but the 1-A playoffs in this area's POD has the #4 seeded North Edgecombe Warriors as the highest seeded team left and by that happening they will get home games for at least the next two weeks if they win Friday against Princeton who upset the #1 seed.  Even after winning Friday Princeton is only 3-8.  The other game of interest for North Edgecombe has #6 Rosewood playing #7 Jones County.

Old Raymond Cobb wants another week of being the old Football Coach as SouthWest Edgecombe survives and travels to Bunn.  This will be a game of Athletes in Bunn going up against power in SWE.  They may only be 6-5 but when you have losses to Hunt, Tarboro, Southern Nash and Rocky Mount  who had a combined 36-4 regular season record Bunn should not scare SWE.  If nothing else their non conference games prepared them for the playoffs.

Tarboro will try to win another conference game as they host Kinston the one team this season in their conference that gave them their toughest test all year.  I think the score was 34-27.  You know Tarboro question all season was their defense and that has come around in the last three weeks giving up 0-0-13.  We can count on at least 34 or more from the Vikings of Tarboro, in order to beat  them the Vikings of Kinston will have to score 35.  Nobody has done that to the Tarboro Vikings this year.

Last night helped out Wes Bradshaw on the All NEW Sports Show.  With my obligations to volleyball this fall at Campbell University there hasn't been many opportunities to be at or do a football game on the radio this year.

Laying On My Heart

I want to go away from sports today to just get something off my chest.  Every now and then we have a major disaster that occurs sometimes they are man made like 9-11 but most are heavenly events.  Our most recent heavenly event  has devastated the most populated place in America the Metro area of New York.

We live in a small world due to the fact that electronics have made every thing in this world is  arms length from us.  We can talk   to anyone in the world  in a matter of seconds.  We even have capability now to see them as we talk to them so we feel that the world isn't all that big any more.  Yet this world is huge.

Back during the floods from Hurricane Floyd we saw first hand how difficult it was to get help.  The flooding didn't allow transportation movement like we normally see.  The lights were out for days and a bag of ice was precious when one could be found.  We all feel the pain that those who have lost every thing  from this recent storm.

Like in 1999 people from all over the country are rushing to the Metro area to help.  While working at the food pantry set up in the Mall in 99 a man on his motor cycle road from Chicago just to help where he could.  When we are faced with our backs to the wall this country steps forward and lends a helping hand when ever.

I know we had the same problem in 99 people get frustrated  and show anger when it doesn't seem the help is fast enough.  I don't understand why people would throw eggs at power company people from a far off state that have come to help because they are not getting the power turned on fast enough.

We are a me society and when the power goes off somebody had better get it back on now so I can continue to be absorbed in me.  What everyone forgets and we forgot it too in 1999 that the damage is tremendous.  Our little world isn't as small when everything has to be replace.  Some cases there are no homes to go home to.  Entire cities power structure has to be rebuilt.  It is not going to happen  over night and in some cases not next month.

We have become blind to the message sent to us from this storm.  We the people of me have no control what so ever when GOD speaks.  He has spoken in a clear voice.  I am in control and I am sending you a message.  It is time for America to get down on their knees and thank the Lord for what he has given to us and what he can take away.   We the people of me have no idea when he will speak again.

This Computer World

Sorry that I missed Saturday but when your computer can't find how to come on there is moments in life that you would just love to throw a computer in the river.  I know with all the people in the Northeast that are still without power this is minor item in the realm of life.

Northern Nash Cross Country team finished 15th in the team portion of the State Cross Country Championships held yesterday in Kernersville.  Southern Nash's Neopolian Patel was the top local runner finishing 48th and Gryphon Mason Holt was 61st. 

It helps runners out west to train year round in the hills  over those of us who live east of I-95 where the biggest hill in running through a ditch.  Eastern Runners normally run about thirty seconds slower when ever the championships are west of I-85 because of the rolling hills.

Fike girls finished 15th and Nash Central's Michaela Williams finished 38th to take the top honor for our local runners.

Heart break for the Nash Central girls tennis team who loses to Charlotte Catholic 5-3 in the state championship.  Here we go again with those professional amateurs winning another state title.  So far this fall all team titles have been won by either Cardinal Gibbons or Charlotte Catholic.  Why doesn't the state make private schools play at the 4-a level to give public schools who play with kids from their living district have a chance to win a title?

Southern Nash has advanced to the third round of the of the soccer playoffs with a 3-2 win on Saturday.

Despite how frustrated I was trying to get my computer on last night I was using the flipper on the tv and came across MLB Network who last night had a live baseball game from the Arizona Fall League and it was the All Star game featuring all the rising baseball players who played this fall.  The first batter for the East team was Rocky Mount High former gryphon Brian Goodwin and he proceeded to send one over the fence for a home run.

After a strike out Brian's third at bat he sent the center fielder to the wall in center field as he hit one about 400 feet only to have it caught.  The 7th Brian doubled off the wall driving in a run and he later scored.  Not a bad all star game 2-5 a home run two rbi and two runs scored.

Gryphons Snooze And Lose

Whether it was there was no Gryphon player who had ever been in a playoff football game or what it might have been the Rocky Mount Gryphons played as if they were suppose to win and Jacksonville was suppose to let them .  There was only one problem with that theory is that Jacksonville did not cooperate and jumped on the Gryphons from the get go and never let up until they had a comfortable 27-0 lead.  The Late rising Gryphons came out of their sleep mode in the fourth quarter and made the score respectable in the end 27-14.

In any game that is basically a tossup as this game was you need to come out of the locker room roaring and tonight the Gryphons didn't.  The best perspective on this playoff loss is I don't think too many Gryphon fans expected to be in the playoffs three  months ago and despite a loss tonight Jason Battle has had a very good start on his coaching career.

Hunt once again was the best team in the second half and they are moving on to the second round after the Warriors dump Southern Nash 28-7.  Just like the first time when these two teams met the score was 14-7 and up for grabs but the final two scores come from Hunt.

One of the big wins of the night comes from SouthWest Edgecombe who wins on the Road 30-26 win over East Duplin.  The coaching career of Raymond Cobb is still alive for at least another week.

Tarboro let everyone know that the state title for any 2-A team will have to pass through Tarboro as the Vikings didn't stumble any at all having to play a team they just drubbed last week.  They drubbed them even worse tonight as Tarboro breaks the 50 point barrier and takes out Beddingfield again this time 53-13.

Nash Central girls tennis team plays for the team championship Saturday against Charlotte Catholic  Should the Bulldogs win they will have taken out the top two private shools in the state in three days having beaten Cardinal Gibbons Thursday.

The second round of the boys soccer playoffs will be in Bailey Saturday afternoon as West Brunswick will play Southern Nash at 4pm.

The State Cross Country state championships will be run Saturday in Kernersville.

Got to our motel room in Lillington tonight and cut on the tv and who do I see but Andrew Morales the former Rocky Mount Gryphon playing soccer for SMU on Fox Sports South