So, it’s officially come to this.
A season that began many moons ago, with conditioning in the dead of winter giving way to training camp in the dead of summer to finally the playoffs in — Halloween’s coming up, right? — the dead of fall.
What was a guaranteed nine-game season has translated into what could be a five-week run or a 48-minute heartbreak. Either way, the competitiveness, agony, jubilation, excitement, and any other adjective you care to use to describe the football state playoffs, is what makes them so, well, I guess I’m out of them, great.
For 256 teams across the state, spilt into eight different divisions, the 2007 playoffs begin Friday night. And of those 256 teams, only eight — less than 4 percent if you’re counting — will end the season with a win.
But my advice has little to do with wins, losses, play calling or strategizing, I leave that to the men with the headsets and flashy jackets. Instead, for all 256 teams, and however many thousands of players that entails, I offer one small bit of advice.
Enjoy this time, however long or short it may be.
Enjoy every last second of it.
It won’t be long before you find yourself in class, at a party, celebrating a holiday, or anywhere in between, and the words, “remember at football…” will come pouring from your mouth.
It may be a story about training camp, a story from the locker room, from practice, from a game, from a bus ride or the playoffs — anything and everything is fair game when it comes to reminiscing about what was such an integral part of the high school career.
A play that may have been a 2-yard touchdown run with seven minutes remaining in the first quarter will turn into a 55-yard score with 12 broken tackles. Hey, there’s nothing wrong with exaggeration, it makes stories better.
While we all tend to look back at what was, many of us look back and wish they could have it once more.
Make one more bus trip.
Listen to one more pre-game speech.
Run onto a field of screaming fans one more time.
For the 256 teams that will take the field this weekend, that “one more time” is still in front of you. Cherish it as if it’s your last. Remember every little detail, every face, every name you go to battle with.
I tender this advice not as a lecturing adult who thinks he knows all (and walked to school uphill both ways in the snow), but as a former player who experienced it.
It was 2000. A bitter-cold November morning with the brightest sun I’d seen in days beamed down and welcomed us into this second-round playoff day.
As our team walked from the locker room to the chapel for a quick prayer before boarding the bus, one of my best friends gave a me a swift slap and said, “Enjoy this walk, you never know how many we have left.”
That was the last one.
My “remember at football…” conversations began days later.
A season that began many moons ago, with conditioning in the dead of winter giving way to training camp in the dead of summer to finally the playoffs in — Halloween’s coming up, right? — the dead of fall.
What was a guaranteed nine-game season has translated into what could be a five-week run or a 48-minute heartbreak. Either way, the competitiveness, agony, jubilation, excitement, and any other adjective you care to use to describe the football state playoffs, is what makes them so, well, I guess I’m out of them, great.
For 256 teams across the state, spilt into eight different divisions, the 2007 playoffs begin Friday night. And of those 256 teams, only eight — less than 4 percent if you’re counting — will end the season with a win.
But my advice has little to do with wins, losses, play calling or strategizing, I leave that to the men with the headsets and flashy jackets. Instead, for all 256 teams, and however many thousands of players that entails, I offer one small bit of advice.
Enjoy this time, however long or short it may be.
Enjoy every last second of it.
It won’t be long before you find yourself in class, at a party, celebrating a holiday, or anywhere in between, and the words, “remember at football…” will come pouring from your mouth.
It may be a story about training camp, a story from the locker room, from practice, from a game, from a bus ride or the playoffs — anything and everything is fair game when it comes to reminiscing about what was such an integral part of the high school career.
A play that may have been a 2-yard touchdown run with seven minutes remaining in the first quarter will turn into a 55-yard score with 12 broken tackles. Hey, there’s nothing wrong with exaggeration, it makes stories better.
While we all tend to look back at what was, many of us look back and wish they could have it once more.
Make one more bus trip.
Listen to one more pre-game speech.
Run onto a field of screaming fans one more time.
For the 256 teams that will take the field this weekend, that “one more time” is still in front of you. Cherish it as if it’s your last. Remember every little detail, every face, every name you go to battle with.
I tender this advice not as a lecturing adult who thinks he knows all (and walked to school uphill both ways in the snow), but as a former player who experienced it.
It was 2000. A bitter-cold November morning with the brightest sun I’d seen in days beamed down and welcomed us into this second-round playoff day.
As our team walked from the locker room to the chapel for a quick prayer before boarding the bus, one of my best friends gave a me a swift slap and said, “Enjoy this walk, you never know how many we have left.”
That was the last one.
My “remember at football…” conversations began days later.
