Real guys don’t sit with girls at sporting events and yell at players
Furrowed brow - I like Friday night football games at Sussex Central. I like that when you play there, you are getting a heavy dose of Georgetown culture. Before the game it was Hank Williams Jr.'s “A Country Boy Can Survive.” Then the Cape band did "Dante’s Trilogy" for the seventh time this season, and it was an acceleration from lowbrow to highbrow but mostly furrowed brows in the stadium, with people in ball caps looking like, “What is this mess?” The game starts and it’s Tommy Marvel on the PA all night long. And for three and a half quarters his enthusiasm and commentaries and occasional sing-along are funny if you like "Hee Haw" reruns. The Cape band is better, for my taste, sitting in the stands and playing “Hey Baby” and rocking to “Word Up” which caused Marvel to chime in “It’s Twine Time.” Some fans thought that meant a sale at the hardware store because in addition to duct tape, you can always use a ball of twine.
Chain crew - I was sitting on the Cape football bench Friday night 20 minutes before game time when a referee came up to me and asked, “Are you with the chain crew? I told him, "Yes, I’m the missing link.”
C’mon, Man! - Real guys don’t sit with the girls during games and yell things at stud athletes that are out there playing. I mean, think about it! The Sallies soccer team is an aggravating team to play against because they are relentlessly aggressive and physical and a few stay inside the official's head as well. I wish I could get all “my teams” to play that hard all the time. The closest teams at Cape to reach that level of self-actualization (Be all you can be) are the girls’ teams. So maybe that’s why the guys sit with them, to learn a little mental toughness.
Blood in the game - Some sports issues are not resolvable, and at a talent-laden place like Cape, in certain sports it's just getting harder to find quality minutes for all good players to play. Take the top 13 field hockey players at Cape (subjective draft), give me the next 13 picks and I’m a top 8 varsity team in the state and a dangerous cat come tournament time. There are some stellar athletes in the state who pile up stats against weak opponents because they play the entire game. Any good player wanting stats should choice to one of those schools because we would like to think at Cape when the score is crooked the starters are sitting and hoping the players on the field don’t look so good as to take their jobs.
Hawks beat Hodgson - Head coach of Saint Georges Tech JD Maull, along with assistants and locals Ronnie Burton and Kai Maull, won a huge Division 2 game Oct. 20 as the battle of both 6-0 teams went to the Hawks 28-19. I can hear JD's late grandfather, Joe Maull, steady talking along the fence “Hey! Hey! That’s right! That’s right!” Coach Bill Muehlieisen (Cape head coach '72 to '75) is on the Hodgson staff. Bill is now 75 and has to be approaching 50 years of coaching football.
Little lax guys - Turf field two was crowded brunch time Oct. 21 with little lax guys getting a good dose of instruction over two hours of drills and skills. Shown shooting on net is 10-year-old Milton Elementary School athlete Ja’Vaughn Burton. Older players came on the field at 1 p.m., while on the Bermuda fields, Eastern Shore lax girls were practicing. Down on the Legends Stadium field there were Pop Warner games.
Coach and player - Temple wide receiver Ryan Alderman is coach Jim Alderman’s second cousin once removed. The two met in the parking lot after Temple’s Saturday loss to Rutgers. Ryan was featured on TV as a Big East Scholar Athlete of the Week for his 3.6 average in finance.
Senior Night - I was along the fence Oct. 16 for hockey Senior Night dealing with the reality that grandbaby No. 1, Anna, is a high school senior. Then I noticed little Miss Daisy Elizabeth Hughes stealing my soul trying to get inside my camera. She was in search of a Pop Pop. I looked like one of them, Denny Hughes, and I hang at games with the other one, Dave Robinson, but neither were there, so she locked in on me and now I have to go to all her games and try to be humble and not brag about her. The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
Snippets - This is spirit week leading to Homecoming, a tradition in which no one comes home. One year, two Miss Congeniality candidates got into a fight in the stairwell, ripping down each others' posters. Good stuff. Go on now, git!
