A quick look back at 2008
How to label the 2008 sports year in Augusta County is both an easy and, let’s be honest here, hurtful choice.
As much as we would like to tell you that 2008 was a year kids did great things, brought pride to local high schools and gave it all on the field, it’s sad to admit that it was hoity-toity administrators, schedule makers that couldn’t schedule-make themselves out of an over-boiled sausage casing and parents, sigh, yes, “those” kind of parents, that ruled the year.
If you wanted to sum up 2008, call it the Year of Adults Acting All Wild.
But we’re going to ignore administrators that don’t tell kids a lick, or parents that rain insults down from the stands toward coaches and, egads, even the kids. And we won’t type anything about how bad the basketball scheduling in the Southern Valley DoesStink is.
Nope, not us. Not here. Not now.
Instead, let’s try hard to focus on all the great things your sons and daughters did on the field of play. That’s more fun and, as long as we’re staying honest, a lot less embarrassing.
So, much like everything else in life, things are much more fun when they’re done in a totally random style. Random? Yeah, that’s us. Enjoy.
The Shut The Heck Up Moment comes straight from the football field courtesy of the R.E. Lee defense. After hearing all season that they were the weak link on a talented football team, defensive coordinator Mike Roark’s bunch shut all the naysayers up with a 26-6 win over Rockbridge in the regular-season finale. The defense didn’t give up a point, with the Wildcats lone score coming off an interception return.
Head coach David Tibbs made it a point to remind the team what was written about them by pencil-neck pen pushers as they gathered around the coach on a rainy night in Lexington. Tibbs then quickly thrust his two defensive captains — Kameron Coverstone and Dwight Godwin—toward the pens and notepads so they could answer us face-to-face.
“We’ve been hearing it all year,“ Godwin said. “[How the] defense is giving up drives.“
They didn’t give up any drives that night as the Leemen picked up their second straight Southern Valley District title.
The Put a Smile On Your Face Moment came from the pitch in Greenville when, after finally beating a Bull Run District team in the Region B playoffs, the Riverheads girls soccer team quickly celebrated after the win before running into the stands to wrap their collective arms around Marsha Datillio, widow of Mike Datillio. Mike was an assistant coach that passed away the week before the big match and as much as the girls wanted to win to keep their season going, they also wanted to win for Coach.
Watching Kristen Moody and Kristin Shomo run into the stands to hug Marsha was tough to watch no matter what team you root for (or even if you don’t root for one at all.)
They would lose to Goochland in their next match and Shomo and Moody would, once again, wrap their arms around Marsha. This time to apologize for the loss.
Marsha told them they had nothing to be sorry for. Yeah, she was right.
Most Telling Football Moment: Easy, Stuarts Draft at R.E. Lee. After the Cougars dumped the Leemen out of the playoff last season, you knew this game was going to be an epic battle. And when the Cougars took the field past a sea of posturing Leemen intent on reminded the Cougars that, yeah, they were now in their house, it was time to put your seatbelt on.
“If that don’t get you fired up,“ yelled Draft coach Rod Bowers, trolling back and forth in front of his team while sporting a give-me-a-helmet-‘cus-I-want-to-play smile, “then you don’t have no heart.“
We interrupt this regularly scheduled look-back blog with a stupid adult moment
After that R.E. Lee-Stuarts Draft football game a few thought that Lee posturing before the game was “classless.“ Um, hello. It’s football. They play it. It gets them fired up. Nobody was hurt. They all shook hands afterward. No punches were even close to be thrown. Geez, get out of your parents’ basement and move on with your lives. You’re not in high school anymore.
Now back to the blog
Another big theme this year was taking teams in different directions (no, we won’t go there, we promised). And no team went in a different direction more than the Waynesboro girls basketball team.
Long the doormat in the Valley District, the Little Giants took the inaugural Southern Valley District season and turned it into their own personal coming-out party.
With a head coach— Secrett Stubblefield—- dubbed “controversial” by, yeah, you guessed it, other adults (and wanna-be sports writers who longed for the days when they weren’t selling ads), the Little Giants ran roughshod through the district, upset undefeated Turner Ashby in the Region III semifinals thanks to a last-second 3-pointer from Shanda Brown and made it all the way the Group AA title game before falling to Hidden Valley.
“Honestly, there’d be a lot of dead people if they bet their lives on that game. Right now, I don’t like to be thought of as Cinderella, I want the other team to be Cinderella and we are midnight,“ Stubblefield said after the Little Giants beat the Knights.
Seriously, what’s not to like about a coach that says that? I mean, that quote is so solid it’s sick.
(We’d like to take this moment to remind all Waynesboro students that, despite the fact that it sucks all the fun out of attending a football game, they have to be seated in the stands during play. I know. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. OK, back to the blog.)
Did a team from Buffalo Gap win another state title in 2008? As Sarah Palin would say, “You betcha.“ And in his first season as girls basketball coach in Swoope, Chad Coffey proved he’s a keeper.
And another thing: One of the most underappreciated coaches in the area stepped down when Waynesboro baseball skipper Jim Critzer hung up that doggy chew toy he calls a hat for the last time.
I won’t forget that in his first year everybody wanted him gone. Nor should you forget that he not only led the Little Giants over the Evil Empire Turner Ashby, but to the Group AA Final Four two straight years. Yeah, so if you wanted him gone, you have your wish now.
Did we mention that Stubblefield didn’t win coach of the year because, as one former coach told us, she didn’t show up for the district meeting. Seriously? This is why you shut a coach out of the award she deserved?
Give the kids a better reason than that, please.
(And, whilst we’re on the subject, nobody has told me yet how Lori Aleshire, after taking the Little Giants from worst to a three-way tie for first in her second season, wasn’t named the volleyball coach of the year. Anybody? Anyone? Crickets?)
Before the season started, Riverheads football coach Robert Casto said it was going to take a few weeks for his team to come together. He was right and, once again, the Gladiators made the playoffs proving that, yes, if Casto runs for Mayor of Greenville (is there even one?) he’s winning in a landslide. (Oh, and did we mention he reached the 100-win milestone at the school? Good on him and good on the program he’s built.)
We had a coach, not plead, but demand to his players that they respect the jersey they wear because he wore it and played for it with pride. (Yes, we’re looking at you Wilson baseball coach Derek McDaniel.) And we sat back and watched it work as his Green Hornets ran off a 6-1 record after his rant and win the Shenandoah District tournament.
We followed Buffalo Gap football pick up win after win after win.
All the while watching Pickle Nuckols run for miles though burley defenders, yet shy away from the spotlight.
We watched Wilson volleyball come oh-so-close. We saw Nelson County boys basketball score the big prize led by one of the more amicable high school athletes we’ve ever run across. (Yes, that’s Thomas Brown we’re talking about.)
We watched Dae’ Quan Scott turn the gridiron into his personal magic show. His reward? He’ll be playing for the defending FCS National Champion Richmond.
Who else? Too many to write about.
But hey, years can be long and clouded by a flurry of last names, scores and great plays.
Don’t blame us if we forgot anything, just add your own. Or blame the Southern Valley DoesStink’s inability to schedule basketball games. It works for us and you know it’s true.
They are, after all, adults. Right?
