From My View For Dec. 20
After coming back from my short vacation, there have been a few things that have puzzled me.
The first one is archery. Yes, there is a school that has a team, Magnolia. Though it is in its third year, I didn’t know that Magnolia even had such a team. No one ever told me that.
Would you believe that they have 33 shooters out? Yes, 33! When writing my archery preview, I noticed there was only one person watching all 33 kids.
The sport of archery may not require a lot of athleticism, but you have to have patience and intelligence to be able to shoot. You must have a clear head – clear everything out of your mind, and concentrate on your target.
Archery is a sport in which boys and girls participate. The team can only have 12 of its members participate in a tournament. There must be at least four of each gender. Magnolia has 12 girls and 21 boys, so they will be able to take a team.
Magnolia’s team has an area to practice – the basement below the Supply Closet. It’s not a huge space, but it suffices.
Safety is a big deal in archery, and MHS Head Coach Jesse Robinson has four good captains to help keep her team in line. Trust me, they do.
The archery team could use a lot of stuff to help them in having a nice place to practice, and conduct their tournament. If there are any persons or businesses out there that want to help, please feel free to get in touch with Coach Robinson. She thought it would be nice if businesses wanted to put up banners, letting people know about the team.
With more than 30 kids participating, Robinson split the practices in half to be able to keep order. The team members are buying their own t-shirts, but I’m sure if somebody wants to donate for team shirts, they wouldn’t mind at all.
Another thing I witnessed is the participation in girls basketball is down, but the attendance is above average. The Valley versus Tyler game was fairly full, and it was hard to concentrate with the crowd noise on both sides.
The ‘Jills second leading scorer, Caitlyn Underwood, went down early in the first quarter. Valley will need for someone else to step up for their game and help the Lumberjills stay up at the top with the other elite teams.
Also, most of the basketball officials are doing a great job in general, but I would hope they would let some of these better teams – when they try to get the ball, and two players from opposite teams have hand on the ball – not call a jump ball. Most of these girls really can play basketball, and they should be treated as the same when it comes to call a game.
They are strong, and when two girls both have the ball, don’t be so quick into calling a jump ball. Plus, I must say – in both boys and girls basketball – referees, please make the coaches stay in their box. They might not agree, but in some way they crowd riled up. It’s a rule that should be enforced every game, not just in the state tournaments.
The last thing I wanted to mention is the lack of involvement in a lot of sports in high school.
River only has one wrestler, in a sport that it has a great tradition. Also, there is a lack of players in the junior varsity teams. Many are only playing two quarters, because they don’t have enough to play both a JV and varsity team.