Wild opening night: Southlake Carroll 72, Rockwall Heath 57

 

It’s going to be weird out there

Considering the context of our times, we knew to expect the unexpected when the Southlake Carroll Dragons took the field last night to face the worthy Rockwall Heath Hawks in the first game of what is likely to be a totally weird season of high school football.

And, brother, we weren’t wrong.

First, the good news. The Dragons’ much-anticipated offensive power was in full, glorious bloom.

Quinn Ewers, the Dragons’ five-star quarterback, had a dazzling debut to his junior season. The UT commit, the nation’s No. 1 recruiting prospect for 2022, threw for five touchdowns, completing almost 78 percent of his passes. His 387 passing yards marked his fifth straight game to exceed 300 yards in the air.

Sophomore Owen Allen, all of 15 years old in his second year on the varsity, ran for 218 yards and scored four times. He said after the game that it was “a lot of fun.”

“We’re playing every game like it could be our last,” Allen told Dragon Radio after the contest.

Boyd out

The Dragons’ No. 1 receiver, senior Brady Boyd, pulled in nine Ewers passes for 211 yards and 3 TDs, his best performance ever. Sadly, he also broke his wrist, making his availability uncertain for the rest of the way.

Quinn Ewers looks at a rosy future.

Now, does that sound like a team that was forced to keep its starters in the game until the bitter end, despite putting more than 70 points on the board?

Or a team whose 624 yards in total offense was eclipsed by its vanquished foe’s 691?

The explanation is simple and stark. As superb as the Carroll offense was – and it was everything we had hoped it would be – its young and untested defense, in a word, wasn’t.

The defense is a work in progress, as we all knew it would be. Significantly, it returned no starters this season, and its members – who it must be said played their hearts out last night – are new to their positions and new to working with each other. They’ll get better.

Until then, the Dragons will have to rely on their offensive stars to keep the wolves at bay, and they’re perfectly capable of doing so.

Carroll’s Big Guys would have had their hands full last night regardless of experience or talent. Heath has scored 129 points in its last two games. That’s not too shabby, is it?

Outpacing Ewers

Hawk quarterback Josh Hoover was excellent, throwing for 391 yards and 3 TDs, managing to barely outpace the brilliant Ewers in passing yardage. Between his arm and running backs Preston Landis (24 carries for 134 yards) and Zach Evans (17 for 141), Heath remained relevant until the very end,

Brady Boyd was in fine form last night.

In compiling 300 rushing yards, compared to the Dragons’ 237, Heath runners shredded the D-line at will, rolling up the middle through huge gaps and cruising easily around the corner on either side. The Carroll secondary played better – particularly cornerbacks Avyonne Jones and Cinque Williams, who also returned kickoffs.

Keep your eye on Williams, a transfer from Mansfield Legacy who was forced to sit out last season by the UIL. He’s going to be special.

“It was a blessing to get out there and show everyone what I can do,” he said in a radio interview after the game. “Sitting on the sidelines last year was difficult, but I just concentrated on getting ready to play.”

He acknowledged, “We have a lot to work on.”

Head coach Riley Dodge agreed.

“This is not our standard for defense,” he told Dragon radio of last night’s performance. “We’ve got some things to clean up. We’ll get to work doing that.”

The Dragons jumped off to a nifty start last night, and it looked for a while like a blowout was developing. They scored on their first two possessions and held Heath to a 3-and-out. Then on the Hawks’ second possession, the Dragons’ Jones intercepted a Hoover pass at the Heath 35. Ewers sent a scoring strike to Boyd on the next play, and the Dragons led 20-0 after only 6 minutes of play.

Needed cushion

That provided Carroll with the cushion it would need when the unintimidated Hawk offense began to assert itself against the Dragon D-line.

Brady Boyd brings in another one.

After forcing a Carroll punt near the end of the first quarter, Hoover marched his team to his own 48, then tossed a 46-yard pass to the Dragon 6. Two plays later, Heath was on the board.

At that point, the game became a shooting match, with each team trading punch for punch. At halftime, the score stood at 37-20, a healthy enough lead, that’s true. But the Hawks’ ability to move the ball and to get into the end zone indicated the second half was going to be a heart racer.

During the first Dragon possession of the second half, Ewers, operating from his own 26 after a Hawk punt, connected with the ubiquitous Boyd for a 74-yard catch and run to the end zone. That secured the Dragons with their largest lead of the night, 44-20.

But Heath answered, and the two teams traded scores for most of the third quarter. Then with less than 2 minutes left – the Dragons leading by 51-35 – Ewers dropped back from his 47 and was sacked 20 yards behind the line.

Narrowing the lead

After a Carroll punt, Hoover called a running play and then lofted a 68-yard TD strike to Jordan Nabors (5 for 118). A successful 2-point conversion narrowed the Dragon lead to a nerve-wracking 8 points.

As Dragon Nation shifted nervously in our socially distanced seats, Carroll set up shop on its own 13 following a 15-yard penalty on kickoff. Ewers took the snap, shoved the ball into Allen’s gut and watched as the youngster staged the most electrifying run of the night, sprinting 87 yards to the end zone. We all sighed in relief as the moment of danger passed.

Boyd ended Dragon scoring for the night with a 17-yard grab, the play where he presumably received his injury. I hope the sweet strains of “Hey, Baby” by the Dragon Band – the signal that Dragon victory is nigh – provided some meager comfort.

All that was left was a final act of defiance by Heath, who tagged on another touchdown with 3 minutes left, finally, mercifully, bringing down the curtain on a 72-56 melee..

So the Dragons kick off the third season under Riley Dodge with a messy win. But who’ll remember that at season’s end?

That is, if we are able to have a season in this plague-cloaked year. There are no guarantees, as the young Dragons and their fans know only too well.

I’m particularly disappointed for Boyd, injured on the night of his greatest game with his future as a Dragon now in doubt. If this is his last game as a Dragon, he can comfort himself with the knowledge that he went out on top. He caught a total of 8 TD passes all last year. Last night, he caught three. Here's hoping he has a complete and speedy recovery.

After the game, he tweeted, “Gonna get an estimation on the recovery tomorrow. Appreciate all the well wishes and prayers. But I (know) my boys got me while I’m gone.”

Picking up the slack

And so they will. While Boyd led the receiving corps in TDs and receptions, Landon Samson (4-58), 1 TD), RJ Maryland (3-86, 1 TD) and Josh Spaeth (4-24) also performed well.

The Dragons face a couple of tough opponents before they enter the District 4-6A fray.

Next week, they’ll travel to Rockwall, which pounded Dallas Jesuit last night 60-38. The defense needs to get better fast before they face these guys. Then on Oct. 16, they’ll host Denton Guyer, who fell 23-20 to Denton Ryan. Guyer almost certainly will show up with a chip on its shoulder. It always does.

On a non-football note, I was dismayed to see many, many unmasked faces on the Carroll side of Dragon Stadium last night. After the events earlier in the day, it seems particularly dumb to me to resist the advice of all medical experts.

And if you don’t give a damn about your own health and safety, it seems to me you should have a little consideration for the people around you. That’s the idea behind the mask, after all. It protects them as much or more as it protects you.

Just wear the damned mask and go Dragons! 

Signs of the times.

The Dragon season opens: What happens now?

 

Nothing normal about this

The Southlake Carroll Dragons, against high odds, open their much-delayed football season against the Rockwall Heath Hawks on Friday. At least we hope they do.

Nothing is certain this year. COVID-19 already has delayed the Dragons’ season for more than a month and robbed us of the most anticipated matchup in many a year: the planned season opener between Todd Dodge’s Austin Westlake Chapparals and Riley Dodge’s Carroll Dragons, a father-son battle that had Texas high school football fans salivating.

All it would take for the entire season to be shelved is a widespread breakout of the corona virus among the young Dragons. Isolated cases have been reported around the district.

So it is with bated breath that we await the opening of the Dragons’ nine-game season. While the rest of 6A schools began their season last weekend, Carroll decided to postpone its startup for another week, sacrificing a game in the process.

Salty lineup

Along with the Westlake game, Carroll also had to drop Prosper and Arlington Martin from its pre-district schedule. Rockwall Heath remains, joined by replacements Rockwall and Denton Guyer. That’s a pretty salty opening lineup.

The Guyer game will be much anticipated. District mates for the past two years, Guyer and Carroll have a flowering rivalry that is becoming more testy all the time. The Dragons whipped the Wildcats in district play the past two years. But Guyer had the immense satisfaction of making it all the way to the state championship game last year before falling to Papa Dodge’s Westlake Chaps. It would dearly love to humble the Dragons on their home field on Oct. 16, and Guyer knows how since it's one of the few teams to have done so.

But the Wildcats will have their hands full. That’s because the anticipation surrounding this season for Dragon fans extended beyond the delicious prospect of seeing father and son battle for football supremacy within the Dodge family.

Best of the best?

It also centers around junior Quinn Ewers, who stands a good chance of becoming the best quarterback in Carroll history – not a meager goal in its own right – and one of the best in Texas high school history.

Quinn Ewers is one cool customer.

As a sophomore, Ewers fielded offers from a score of the nation's collegiate bluebloods before committing to UT. He's considered the No. 1 quarterback recruiting prospect in the nation.

Last year, Dallas Morning News sportswriter Greg Riddle, the DMN’s high school football expert, compared Ewers to Highland Park’s Matthew Stafford and Allen’s Kyler Murray, both No. 1 overall picks in the NFL draft, and other Texas-spawned greats. His judgment?

“Quinn Ewers could end up being better than all of them,” he wrote.

Consider this. Last year as a sophomore, Ewers completed 72.4 percent of his passes, threw for 4,003 yards and 45 touchdowns, with only three interceptions, during Carroll’s 13-1 season that ended in the regional finals. Along the way, he also ran for 569 yards and nine TDs.

According to Riddle, that puts Ewers on pace to throw for 12,009 yards and 135 TDs in his three years of varsity ball.

Murray, now playing for the Arizona Cardinals and AP’s 2019 NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year, passed for 10,386 and 117 TDs during his high school career. Stafford, who ranks in the top 20 in NFL history for career passing yards and career TD passes, threw for 8,711 yards and 92 TDs in his last three years of high school.

Who knows if all these numbers mean anything. But they do strongly suggest that young Ewers is very special and stands poised to do great things. If the gods allow.

And that’s a mighty big IF. Unfortunately, almost anything that happens during this strange season is going to have an asterisk attached. Nothing’s normal.

The “it” factor

That said, there’s no doubt about it. Ewers has the “it” factor. Anyone watching him during his first year on varsity last year sensed it immediately. A certain electricity swept through the stadium when he came on the field. During the playoff game against Duncanville, the Carroll side of the stadium was going bonkers during a 4^th quarter comeback that ultimately fell short. On the field, however, Ewers was cool as a cucumber.

“His strength right now is he is so even-keeled,” coach Riley Dodge told 76092 magazine in an article entitled “The Young Gun.” “That’s want you want in a quarterback. He’s cool, calm, collected. He doesn’t get too high with his highs or too low with his lows.

“He’s tough kid,” Dodge continued. “He’s going to stay in the pocket and deliver the football.”

The 6-3, 200-pound Ewers will have plenty of targets for his rocket right arm.

Senior Brady Boyd (6-1, 175 pounds) had a solid year in 2019, snagging 66 passes, eight for TDs. They included a stunning one-handed grab in the playoffs against Midland Lee that ended up on ESPN’s SportsCenter as one of the Top 10 plays of the day. Eleven of those receptions came in the pressure-cooker game against Duncanville.

Brady Boyd and his ESPN moment. 

Young and tested

Boyd will lead a receiving corps that includes juniors Landon Samson and Josh Spaeth. RJ Maryland, son of former Dallas Cowboy Russell Maryland, also will be a Ewers target. He's taking over the tight end/halfback spot handled so ably last year by Blake Smith, now at Texas A&M. 

And let’s don’t forget about sophomore Owen Allen, who turned 15 last year as the Dragons’ starting running back. The youngster rushed for 1,266 yards and 23 TDs in a phenomenal freshman campaign that had Dragon fans gasping in astonishment.

He’ll lead a ground attack that will include several stalwart backups, including senior Kannon Kadi.

Senior Joe McFadden, the latest in a long line of standout kickers produced by the Dragon program, rounds out Carroll’s offensive might. McFadden, ranked No. 3 kicker and No. 11 punter in the country, kicked seven out of 10 field-goal attempts last season and booted 84 of 86 point-after attempts. Combined, he accounted for 105 points, according to 76092 magazine.

They’ll all play behind an offensive front that looked good in last week’s scrimmage against DeSoto. It’s hard to tell much from a scrimmage, of course, but the Dragons should be able to put plenty of points on the scoreboard this year.

Whether they can stop their opponents from doing the same is a question still seeking an answer. Not a single member of last year’s D-line returned this year, and a new crop of linebackers and pass defenders are stepping into the fray. According to reports, they looked pretty ragged during the DeSoto scrimmage.

That’s hardly surprising. DeSoto is no slouch at offense, and the Dragons’ Big Guys still are getting their timing and rhythm down. And truth to tell, it’s a longstanding Carroll tradition for its almost-always undersized defensive squad to struggle in the beginning and get steadily better as the season wears on.

Meanwhile, defensive coordinator Lee Munn told 76092 readers to be on the lookout for cornerbacks Avyonne Jones and Cinque Williams and for linebackers Nate Gall and Travis Keener, a jack of all trades.

Going with the flow

Who knows what’s in store for the Dragons – or, frankly, for any of us – in this very strange, make-it-up-as-you-go-along season. Nothing is normal. I’m not even sure how many away games I’ll be able to attend this year. That’s unsettling because I’ve only missed a handful of Dragon games since I started following the team in 2006, the year my daughter started high school.

Most districts are limiting their stadiums to 50 percent capacity, with ticket priority going to their own fans and families of participants, of course. I plan to attend as many as I can, but as with everything else in this screwy year, it’ll be a weekly adventure.

I’ll be taking precautions, observing social distancing and wearing a mask. I can handle that all right, but the thing I worry about most is spending the evening at Dragon Stadium without fortifying myself with a Feedstore BBQ sandwich, which will be unavailable for the duration of the emergency.

I understand the necessity of the move. After all, I’m in the most COVID-vulnerable cohort. But no Feedstore BBQ? It’s just one more reason to damn COVID to the lowest pits of hell.

Stay safe everyone and go Dragons!

A working stiff no more

Turn the page

I was informed yesterday that my position as the communications director at UNT Health Science Center in Fort Worth is being eliminated and my services are needed no longer. My last day will be July 31.

For the second time in a decade, I’ve been laid off, a victim of economic forces beyond my control or the control of my employers.

 In 2011, it was the not-so-slow collapse of the newspaper industry that sent me to the curb. Today, it’s the wreckage the coronavirus has imposed on university budgets. HSC faced a 15 percent budget reduction, and I’m to be part of the 15 percent.

The math sucks, but it doesn’t change the outcome.

Dream job

So it’s time to call it quits. I’ve been working since the summer I turned 16, when I got a dream job working in the concession stand at the Jet Drive-In in my hometown of Big Spring. All the boiled hot dogs I could eat and the chance to watch the last 20 minutes of every movie that came through.

Then came sacking groceries and checking out customers at Furr’s Supermarket, where I once demurred when a nice woman offered me a tip for carrying her purchases to her car. “I get a salary, ma’am,” I explained politely. “Young man,” she scolded me, “when someone offers you a tip, you damned well take it.” It’s good advice I’ve had precious little opportunity to follow.

Because my next job was at the Big Spring Herald, which I took to like a heroin addict takes to the needle. For the next 40 years – including my journalism-besotted time at North Texas State University – I would work a succession of newspaper jobs, where opportunities to collect tips from customers were nonexistent – and considered unethical to boot. Not that I couldn’t have used a few extra bucks in the early years. My first real newspaper job after college paid $130 a week. Thank God you could buy beer for $1.25 a pitcher.

Satisfying work

I’ve spend almost 8 ½ years working in communications for health care institutions – first at UT Southwestern in Dallas and for the last 7 years at HSC in Fort Worth. It’s been satisfying work all in all. These two institutions are training the health care providers of the future and working to combat the diseases that bedevil mankind.

Here’s the joke I’ve told so many times that my colleagues can finish it for me: I first got into journalism to make the world a better place. And now, at the end of my career, I’m finally at a place that is doing exactly that.

Satisfying work, yes, but I never loved it with the enduring intensity that I loved, that I still love, journalism. Newspaper ink still runs in my veins. My heart – beaten, battered and bruised by 40 years of deadlines – still yearns for the wild energy of the newsroom, the exhilaration of a well-turned phrase, the smell of ink that permeates the building when the presses are roaring.

Comes with the territory

When I look at the world, I look at it through a newsman’s eyes. I have a sense of humor warped by years spent with other news folk. I have a potty mouth – which alas, I’ve passed on to my children – forged by the backbreaking pressure of putting out a daily newspaper and by the daily exposure to the absurdities of the human condition. I’m suspicious, cynical and distrustful. It comes with the territory.

And when I die, I will die a newspaper man. Nothing that’s happened in the last nine years will change that. Is it a blessing or a curse? Who’s to say?

Retirement now beckons, and I’m not ashamed to admit that I contemplate it with more than a little trepidation. What the hell am I going to do now? I have no hobbies, no grand bucket list waiting to be checked off. My kids are grown, and so far no grandkids are around to bounce on my arthritic knee and to stuff with ice cream. The damned COVID-19 pandemic has limited my options even more.

A lucky guy

I don’t mean to sound whiny. After all, I’m a lucky guy. Some of my colleagues who follow me out the door must scramble for jobs in an abysmal job market. Having been in their situation back in 2011, when I was out of work for six months, I know the obstacles they face and the fear they feel deep inside. I pray for their success.

My concerns feel petty by comparison. How will I spend the days I have left, which I hope to be many and joyful? My family wants me to write a book. “About what?” I ask. They have no answer, and neither do I.

Stay tuned. I can’t wait to see what I come up with.

Gregory Katz, journalist and friend

Member of a dying breed

Gregory Katz, Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent extraordinaire, has died of complications arising from the coronavirus, leaving a ragged tear in this country's journalistic fabric and a hole in the hearts of his many colleagues and friends, among whom I am proud to include myself.

Greg and I worked together for many years on the foreign desk of The Dallas Morning News, where he was bureau chief of first the Mexico City Bureau and later the European Bureau.

He was a member of the DMN team that won the 1994 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for a series of ground-breaking articles about violence against women in countries across the globe.

Important journalism

Greg's contribution to that tremendous example of good and important journalism was a story about the women of the small Mexican city of Juchitan, who despite their positions of political authority, still suffered sexual and physical abuse at the hands of their husbands and other men in the city.

In typical Katz fashion, it was a tale that defied expectations, ran counter to conventional wisdom and revealed truths the citizens of Juchitan would rather have remained hidden.

Greg, 67, was recovering from cancer surgery when he contracted COVID-19. He died Monday.

He was everything a foreign correspondent should be – smart, savvy, courageous, cool under pressure and fiercely loyal to those he trusted. In a job where logistical skills can be just as important as journalistic prowess, Greg excelled at both.

He could arrive at the scene of a breaking story, immediately commandeer hotel phone lines or set up satellite phones, all the while sizing up the situation and gathering material for a first-edition story. With Greg on the ground, you never worried about making deadline.

He covered many important stories in Mexico – the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas and the assassination of presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio among them.

A close call

I remember a phone call I got from Greg during the Zapatista conflict. He calmly told me he and another reporter had been ambushed earlier in the day at a remote crossroads in Chiapas, narrowly escaping injury. Thirty minutes later, he filed his story, but didn’t mention his close call. For him, it was just another day at the office.

During the Kosovo civil war in the Balkans, Greg suffered a detached retina, the result of a mugging in New York he had received many years earlier. Despite his doctor’s warnings – and my persistent nagging – Greg traveled by taxi daily to the conflicted area. He filed every day for eight straight days.

Foreign correspondents like Greg Katz are rapidly fading from the scene. Newspapers simply can’t afford them any longer. As a society, and as individuals, we will be less informed, more vulnerable to xenophobia and ignorance and less prepared to live in a world economy as a result.

But Greg was more than just a fine journalist. He was a stellar man – full of kindness and virtue, with a generous heart, a forgiving spirit and unshakable integrity. In fact, his only flaw was his unfathomable devotion to the New York Yankees. For that, we must forget and forgive.

I am heartbroken for Greg’s beloved wife, Bea Sennewald, and his daughter, Sophia. I’m not ashamed to say that I wept when I heard the news of his death. That’s what we do when good friends, friends with whom we’ve shared great things and who have helped shape our lives, leave us.

Note from AP

Greg was working for The Associated Press when he died. Here’s the note AP CEO Gary Pruitt sent to AP staffers:

I am so very sorry to have to let you know of another death of an AP colleague. Greg Katz, our London correspondent and formerly our acting chief of bureau in London, has died. Greg had been ill and in the last few months had contracted COVID-19.

Greg came to the AP in 2008, from the Houston Chronicle’s London office, where he was bureau chief for Europe and the Middle East. In 2013 he was promoted to acting Bureau Chief for London. He did excellent work in that role, including leading AP’s news coverage of Brexit and the election of Boris Johnson as prime minister. His death is a loss to the AP and a loss to journalism.

Greg, a native of Connecticut, was passionate about news, rock and roll, the New York Yankees and his family. He was the only journalist to cover John Lennon’s death from inside the Dakota Apartments where Lennon lived. Greg was part of the team in 1994 that won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for a series on violence against women around the world, when he worked at the Dallas Morning News. He is survived by his wife, Beatrice Sennewald, and their daughter Sophia.

Even as this week has underscored the pandemic’s dreadful course, my spirits are buoyed by all the ways in which our AP colleagues have been providing help and support for one another. Please remember that if you need additional support, you can speak with your manager or HR representative, and employee assistance plan services are available to you.

With sympathy,

Gary Pruitt

Kent State 50 years later

How can you run when you know?

Fifty years ago today, a group of poorly trained, abysmally led Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire on an unruly crowd of unarmed Kent State University students protesting the military occupation of their campus.

Four students were killed and nine others wounded, shocking the nation and offering a sobering reminder of the limits to – and inherent dangers of – political protest in America.

The 1970 shootings capped several days of protest on and around the Kent State campus, which were sparked by Richard Nixon’s decision on May 1 to invade Cambodia, thereby expanding the war he had promised during the 1968 presidential election to end.

Campus protests had exploded across the nation following the Cambodian incursion, but in Kent, Ohio, they turned ugly. In the three days before the shooting, some Kent businesses had been damaged and Kent State’s ROTC building had been burned to the ground.

 State of emergency

Alarmed, Kent’s mayor declared a state of emergency and asked for assistance from Ohio’s fire-breathing Republican governor, James Rhodes, who described the protesters as “brownshirts and communists” – then as now, Republicans had no sense of irony – and some of the worst people in America.

He ordered in the Ohio National Guard, setting the stage for tragedy. In his seminal work about the Kent State shootings, James Michener placed much of the blame for the tragedy on Rhodes, both for his decision to escalate the confrontation by sending in Guardsmen armed with M-1 rifles and live ammunition and for his fire-and-brimstone rhetoric.

On May 4, a Monday, 100 Guardsmen stationed near the charred ruins of the ROTC building were ordered to disperse a largely peaceful demonstration. Things deteriorated rapidly, and after an exchange of rocks from one side and tear gas from the other, the Guardsmen, who had retreated to the top of a hill, turned and without provocation fired, some in the air and many directly into the crowd.

Jeffrey Miller, Allison Krause, William Schroeder and Sandra Scheuer fell dead. Schroeder and two of the injured were shot in the back. So much for the Guardsmen’s defense that they felt threatened by the crowd.

Famous photo

Most of you have seen the famous photograph from that day, the one taken by Pulitzer Prize-winner John Filo of 14-year-old runaway Mary Vecchio crying hysterically over Miller’s lifeless body.

 I was just ending my freshman year at Howard College in the spring of 1970, counting the days until I could get out of Big Spring and put West Texas in my rear-view mirror forever.

Kent State had a profound impact on me – just as it did on almost every American college student. “It could have been me,” I remember thinking.

Opposition to Vietnam – always a difficult and unpopular political stance in the uncompromisingly conservative environs of “love it or leave it” West Texas – had been one of the compass points in my personal political journey. That and the civil rights movement had nudged me to the left of the political spectrum.

 I didn’t have much company there in Big Spring in 1970. But after Kent State, there would be no going back. I knew which side I was on. Which side I would always be on.

Before my ultimate escape, I was looking forward to a temporary reprieve from the tedium of a West Texas summer. I was spending the next three months in southern Utah, working for the Union Pacific Railroad as a desk clerk in the lodge at Bryce Canyon National Park, where UP had concessionary rights.

It was an idyllic summer. The lodge was at 9,000 feet, cool during the days and frosty at night. Most of the park employees were college kids. I made friends, had adventures, wrote a poem about a girl named Mary Ann with red curls and freckles. Surrounded by the beauty of Bryce Canyon, I felt the pain and bitterness of Kent State fade.

Draft lottery

Harsh reality reared its head only once. The Selective Service lottery occurred that summer. And because we were so isolated, we had no radio or TV reception. I had to call home to find out what my draft number was. No. 165. But it didn’t really make any difference, at least not yet. My II-S student deferment would keep me safe for a while.

Then, at summer’s end, it was time to return to Texas. I loaded up the Dodge and headed south and east.

I listened to the radio on the way back, Top 40 tunes carrying me across the top of Arizona and down into New Mexico. On the top of a hill overlooking Albuquerque, the KQUO deejay came on and said:

“You’re going to want to hear this. It’s the latest from Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.”

Only a sojourn

After the first line, I had to pull the car over. Suddenly, tears were in my eyes. I sobbed and couldn’t stop. Even after the song ended, I sat in my car for a long time, realizing that my time in Utah had been only a sojourn, not an escape. Eventually, I eased the car into gear and continued my journey home, the words to Neil Young’s Ohio, echoing in my head.

Tin solders and Nixon’s comin’

We’re finally on our own

This summer I hear the drummin’

Four dead in Ohio

Gotta get down to it

Soldiers are gunning us down

Should have been done long ago

What if you knew her and

Found her dead on the ground?

How can you run when you know?

Four dead in Ohio

Four dead in Ohio

UIL realignment 2020: Hello, again

Weary resignation

The University Interscholastic League announced its district realignments for this season and next, and its decisions have been met with a loud and sharp, “WTF?!?”

Except in Southlake, where fans of the Carroll Dragons greeted with weary resignation news that they will remain in the same district as the Keller and Northwest ISD 6A schools.

Here are the headlines:

n  Allen, for the first time ever, will no longer be district mates with the Plano schools, ending up instead in District 5-6A with Denton Guyer and the McKinney schools. That’s right, Guyer and Carroll no longer will be in the same district, ending for the time being a budding – and increasingly bitter – football rivalry.

n  District 11-6A immediately has been dubbed the “District of Doom” in recognition of the fact that it now is home to Duncanville, Cedar Hill, DeSoto, Mansfield and Waco Midway, a murderer’s row if ever there was one in high school football. There’s probably no tougher district in the country.

n  Euless Trinity was placed in District 3-6A with Fort Worth's 6A schools and Haltom City, almost assuring it a district championship and first seed in the playoffs.

n  The old West Texas district nicknamed “the little Southwest Conference” in the 1960s and ’70s has been recreated by grouping Abilene, the Midland and Odessa schools and San Angelo Central in District 2-6A. Sadly, it’ll be a powerhouse in memory only.

n  In the smaller-school category, Highland Park and Longview will play “this district ain’t big enough for both of us” in 7-5A. This year, the Scotties will have to fight for what they consider to be a birthright – a district championship.

District realignments always are controversial. The separation of mammoth Allen from the mega-schools in Plano drew particular fire. Allen, at 6,000-plus students, will be playing against schools in the 2,200- to 2,600 enrollment category. That’s a mismatch by anybody’s standards.

But the UIL decided against forming a supersize 7A school category in which to dump Allen and some of the other schools whose enrollments either top or near 3,000. So far, logistical considerations have nixed that idea since it would force 7A schools to travel long distances to compete and still not completely solve the inequity problem.

For Dragon Nation, the realignment means all things new are old again. Familiar foes fill 3-6A, and none should pose a particular problem for the Dragons, who return this fall with an impressive offensive arsenal. The only team that might have offered the Dragons a chance to sharpen their claws for the playoffs, the Denton Guyer Wildcats, now must confront the behemoth of the north – the Eagles of Allen.

Carroll will have to settle for using its four pre-district games to test its mettle and hone its skills. And several weeks ago, it took the first step in doing just that.

At the urging of the UIL, which is celebrating the 100^th anniversary of high school football this year, Southlake Carroll and Austin Westlake, reigning Division II state champion, agreed to meet in Jerry's World for the first game of the 2020 season.

Folks are calling it the Dodge Bowl – and why not? Dragon head coach Riley Dodge, a state championship quarterback for Carroll in 2006, will face off against the head coach of the Westlake Chaparrals, who just happens to be his father, the legendary Todd Dodge. He won four state titles at Southlake, including the 2006 game starring his son.

Hollywood couldn’t write it any better than that, wouldn’t you agree?

The hype surrounding this game will be intense and probably a little ridiculous. Fair warning: I intend to be an enthusiastic participant.

The state champs should be favored, but don’t count out the Dragons too quickly.

As a sophomore, returning Carroll quarterback Quinn Ewers threw for more than 4,000 yards and 45 touchdowns last season. Ewers, named by MaxPreps as 2019 National Sophomore of the Year, led the Dragons four rounds deep into the playoffs, engineering a breathtaking 4^th-quarter rally in the quarterfinals against Duncanville before the Dragons fell to the Panthers 49-35.

 Now a seasoned junior, he has potent weapons to employ against the Chaps.

Sophomore Owen Allen, who turned 15 during the 2019 season, returns as running back. Named by MaxPreps to first-team offense of the 2019 Freshman All-American Team, Allen rushed for more than 1,250 yards and 23 TDs last year. He rolled up 100-yard games in seven of his last nine games, including 115 yards and two scores against Duncanville.

 Senior Brady Boyd will form the nucleus of a replenished receiving corps, an aspect of the Dragon game sorely neglected in recent years, but enjoying a new rebirth under Riley Dodge.

And what about the head coach, now in his third year as head of Southlake’s storied football program? Well, his teams enjoy a 26-2 record under his leadership and have reached the quarterfinals twice.

He’s built a strong and confident coaching staff, is adored by his players and respected by the Southlake community, known to be demanding and a little fickle with its favors.

And Riley learned his trade at the knee of one of the best. The Southlake-Westlake match has all the earmarks of a classic.

Alas, the remainder of the regular season looks rather anticlimactic by contrast. Of course, this being high school football, you never know what to expect. So while I might wish there were a little more meat on the District 3-6A bone on which the Dragons can feast as they march to the playoffs, we will have to take what’s given us and be satisfied.

Go Dragons!

Jim Lehrer, 1934-2020

A job well done

In 1970, I was an avid viewer of Jim Lehrer’s Newsroom, a late-afternoon news program on Dallas’ KERA in which Lehrer presided over a roundtable of journalists discussing politics and public affairs.

His colleagues included Billy Porterfield, a balding, fiercely mustachioed observer of politics and culture; Patsy Swank, a matronly icon of the Dallas arts scene; and Lee Collum, attractive, cool and sophisticated, with a steely gaze and an insider’s knowledge of Dallas.

Then there was Lehrer, years away from national fame, smooth as aged Scotch, sensible, tough-minded and fair, with a wry sense of humor and a clear-eyed view of the world in all its messy glory.

Watching Lehrer and his colleagues was to see the possibilities of a career in journalism. I was a college student seeking a career in newspapers, and I burned with envy and admiration as these smart, articulate professionals discussed the news of the day, exposing the mendacity of politicians and peeling away the bureaucratic nonsense of city and county government.

One program stands out. On the day that the Kennedy memorial was dedicated in downtown Dallas, Lehrer opened Newsroom by telling his audience that the format of that day’s show was going to be a little different. Instead of the usual roundtable discussion, they were going to broadcast portions of the dedication ceremonies. Afterward, he said, they would present a photo essay from a KERA photographer who had covered the event.

What followed were large unedited segments of the speeches given by Dallas officials at the ceremony. They were self-congratulatory, self-serving and vapid. Dallas County Judge Lew Sterritt described in detail the number of liquor stores and dilapidated buildings that had been razed to make room for the memorial.

Not a single speech mentioned John Kennedy’s name. Not a single one. The man for whom the ceremony was dedicated was eclipsed completely by Dallas’ elected elite. The emission was both stunning and outrageous.

By contrast, the photo essay, presented without commentary, was powerful and inspiring. It showed, in photo after photo, the wide diversity of the crowd who attended the dedication. Black and white. Men and women. Old and young. A solemn gathering, their faces registering a range of emotions. All brought together to honor the president who had been gunned down on their streets and who had been that day’s forgotten man.

As the photos faded, the studio lights came up and the camera showed Lehrer, sitting alone, eyes shining with tears. “That’s our program for today,” he said. “Good night.”

No mention was made of Dallas leaders’ dismal performance, which contrasted so sharply with the crowd’s authentic and emotional response. None was necessary. The message of that program was so powerful that I remember it vividly a half century later.

Lehrer died yesterday at the age of 85. But his legacy lives on wherever and whenever honest, hard-working journalists endeavor to keep the public well-informed and safe.

Here are Jim Lehrer's Rules of Journalism:

I practice journalism in accordance with the following guidelines:  

• Do nothing I cannot defend.

• Do not distort, lie, slant or hype.

• Do not falsify facts or make up quotes.

• Cover, write and present every story with the care I would want if the story were about me.

• Assume there is at least one other side or version to every story.

• Assume the viewer is as smart and caring and good a person as I am.

• Assume the same about all people on whom I report.

• Assume everyone is innocent until proven guilty.

• Assume personal lives are a private matter until a legitimate turn in the story mandates otherwise.  

• Carefully separate opinion and analysis from straight news stories and clearly label it as such.

• Do not use anonymous sources or blind quotes except on rare and monumental occasions.  No one should ever be allowed to attack another anonymously.

• Do not broadcast profanity or the end result of violence unless it is an integral and necessary part of the story and/or crucial to its understanding.

• Acknowledge that objectivity may be impossible but fairness never is.

• Journalists who are reckless with facts and reputations should be disciplined by their employers.

• My viewers have a right to know what principles guide my work and the process I use in their practice.

• I am not in the entertainment business.

Rest in peace, Jim Lehrer. Thanks for a job well done.