Cautiously Optimistic

Half way through the regular season. Wow, where does the time go. It sure was cold this morning!

Along with the progression of the seasons, I like that I think I’m seeing progression in our football team. Now I’m not DK, and I know I don’t see certain details that eyes like his will see. But I do think my 160 game spectatorship streak gives me at least a bit of credibility.

Here are some of the good things that I am seeing so far:

A solid physical game – we are showing that we are big, strong, and physical. Unless you have a team full of 4.5 40 yd runners, physicality is obviously the basis for most strong teams. On both sides of the ball, any opponent is going to have to be prepared to be smashed in the mouth by what we are bringing.

Strength through to the very end of games – I was going to call this one 4-quarter strength, but I do notice that we have been at our weakest at the very beginning of games it seems, so I thought I’d emphasize the end. In the 1^st week against Liberty, I was getting nervous, worrying that in the early season high temperatures that our large players would start to fade a bit at the end. Didn’t happen though, and we actually took the game over in the end. Interestingly, our 2001 state championship team had a reputation for blasting out of the gates, just blowing teams away in the 1^st quarter, then fading a bit later (even in the state final, we jumped to a 3 TD lead, then it was later closed to 11 points, and the other team was 11 yards from making it even less). At first glance you might worry that we don’t share that trait with the championship team, but I’m not too worried. While we’ve waited a bit to get started, it’s not like we’ve been overly lethargic. I think it’s just a personality type thing. And it is beautiful because we have been able to close things out in the end.

Ability to fight through injuries – we’ve had some injuries here and there, and others have stepped up fairly well. Like DK said to one of the papers, we are deeper at some positions than others, but I still like the fact that we don’t look like we’ve skipped a beat through a few people going down.

We look like a team – I think we look a bit more disciplined than expected for some reason. I’m not sure if it’s my imagination, or if it is reality. I like how we’ve coaxed other teams into numerous off sides and false start penalties, while only getting a few ourselves. Those things can kill drives (or make drives for the other team). I think we just in general have a sharp, unified look and feel to us.

Defense, defense, defense – this has been my favorite thing so far this year. I hope it doesn’t let up. There are still some things we haven’t yet seen (gobs of speed, or maybe a first rate passing game), but I really like what I see. I like that physically we’re dominating the line.

Now a word of caution, this could easily be a time when a bad corner is turned. The 1998 team looked great for the first 3 or 4 games, with all the pieces in place. We didn’t really turn into a bad team at that point, but we suffered a key injury, and just didn’t get any better after that. We lost to a tough Hancock team, then a 22-0 loss to Walton, then we worked our way back to a potential playoff spot if we could just beat Unatego, but we couldn’t pull that out either (lost 14-7). Finally we played a crossover with Tioga and were lackluster there as well, losing again to end with a 5-4 record. We MUST keep up the intensity and the focus if we don’t want to be disappointed.

I lied (unintentionally) last week and said we were playing Oxford this week. Gray matter. Anyway, we are of course playing Deposit. And please note that this will be their annual event where they bring in portable lights, so the game will be at 7:30 pm.

For picks, I did well in what I thought was a very tough week, ending 20-4 (0.833). OK, will the total be over 0.800? Drum roll please…..running total is….76-20 (0.792)……doh! Oh well, I think I’m still way ahead of where I’ve been most years. Let’s see how this week looks…..Corning East over Vestal, Maine Endwell over Binghamton, Sidney over UVE, Tioga over Moravia, Waverly over Watkins Glen, Oxford over Hancock, Candor over Odessa, Groton over Edison, BG over Livingston Manor, Notre Dame over Southern Springs, Dryden over Lansing, Ithaca over Horseheads (had you told me they’d be 5-0 I’d have eaten my hat), Corning West over Southside, Newark Valley over Trumansburg, Forks over Whitney Point, Chenango Valley over Windsor, Norwich over Sus Valley, Johnson City over Owego, Walton over Greene (time for the pumpkins to step up or say goodbye to the post-season), SVE over Newfield, Oneonta over Unatego, UE over EFA, and Seton over Harpursville (though my gut is telling me to go with the Hornets). For the 3^rd week in a row, it is VERY tough.

See you under the lights at 7:30….