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JIM STEELE
COLUMN FOR WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2004
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From the
Upper Deck
Hard Luck
Rebels Can Succeed
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By Jim Steele
steele@mckenziebanner.com |
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McKenzie's football team is 3-3 right now.
Consider that the Rebels are three plays away from being
6-0. Right now, people across West Tennessee are looking
at the scores from last Friday night and wondering
what's going on with the Rebels. It's an easy assessment
to make. Look at us. We're doing it with Milan right now
after it has lost two successive games.
The truth is that there is so much parity in West
Tennessee high school football right now that anyone can
indeed beat anyone.
Riverside's victory over McKenzie is proof of that. So
is Trenton's triumph at Milan. Consider that Chester
County beat both Trenton and Riverside. Is Chester
County better than Milan? McKenzie? To be honest, I
can't say. Tradition tells me no, but evidence in 2004
points in another direction.
True, McKenzie has gotten the raw end of some bad calls
and that was made manifest in Friday night's game where
two horrid interference calls on McKenzie led to two
Riverside touchdowns and one abhorrent pass-interference
no-call on the last play of the game prevented a Rebel
TD.
Last Friday, against Trenton, a suspect spot on a
fourth-down play at the Tide 5 with :19.5 to play ended
what could have been the game-winning drive. In the last
minute against Camden, McKenzie was knocking on the door
again as time ran down. Was there a bump on the last
interception? Who knows?
McKenzie is 3-3 and could be 6-0.
It would be easy to blame officiating. It could be easy
to point to McKenzie's anemic production in the
so-called "red zone" last week (1-for-5 against
Riverside). But what's done is done. McKenzie has four
games left. Despite its performance in recent weeks,
McKenzie has a pretty good football team. It is a
juggernaut on offense as its numbers will attest. I
thought it was amusing that the Rebels amassed 373 yards
against Riverside, yet a regional paper proclaimed that
McKenzie's offense was "shut down."
Ha! Way to be on the pulse of the waterfront.
With the parity going on in West Tennessee, McKenzie
could run the table, have the table run against it or
embrace some permutation of the two. A lot of people
thought that McKenzie had dropped the chalupa two years
ago. While everyone was reading the press clippings,
McKenzie made it to the state semifinals.
Don't stick a fork in these Rebels just yet. This is
still a good football team.
If you want to talk about lousy results, my picks have
been somewhat pungent these past few weeks. I was 15-9
last week for 105-145 overall. That puts me at an
abysmal 72.4 percent for the season. Here's to this
week's menu:
Dresden over McKenzie: The struggling Rebels catch a
rebounding Lion team at home.
Huntingdon over Milan: While Milan is reeling,
Huntingdon has recovered from its lone setback.
JCS over West Carroll: A little bulletin board material
never hurts, does it?
Bruceton over Greenfield: The Tigers have too much speed
for Greenfield. But this is for second place in the
region.
Georgia over Tennessee: This just in, Auburn has scored
again. The Vols have been exposed and Georgia is going
to take over for the Tigers and pick up where it left
off in Knoxville a year ago. Look for this game to be
very ugly...unless Tennessee pulls a 1992 on us.
Elsewhere I see:
Rosemark over Trinity, Halls over Gleason, Camden over
Dyer County, Adamsville over Middleton, Trenton over
Obion Central, Bolivar over Fayette-Ware, McNairy over
USJ, JCM over Liberty, Crockett Co. over Lexington,
South Side over North Side, Brighton over Humboldt,
Ripley over Dyersburg, Chester Co. over Gibson Co.,
Bolton over Munford, Haywood over Millington, Hardin Co.
over Riverside and Henry County over Ravenwood. |
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