The Good, The Bad and The Ugly...

PE Pride (black) MS girls lax team wins Van Tourney MS Girls Championship

RJ (green) in one of U15B games last weekend at The Van

Boy, oh boy, I'm really behind with this week's post. So late that it's practically time for next week's! Geez! RJ (my 8th grade son) was in a lacrosse tournament this past weekend, The Van Classic down in Rock Hill. That took up a good bit of my time as he played five games in three days. Plus I decided to shoot a few of the other games when he wasn't playing. There were 72 teams (59 boys, 13 girls) from across the Southeast. It was a lovely Sunday morning standing in the pouring rain shooting a middle school girls lacrosse game filled with players I didn't know. But, hey, that's just me. The upside was that one of the teams was from the Performance Edge Lacrosse organization (the Pride), which is the group that RJ plays for, and they ended up winning the championship for that division. Performance Edge Lax is run by Brian Holland, who is the Nation Ford HS varsity boys lacrosse coach.

Ok, enough about the lacrosse tourney. Time to recap what happened last week in the Banks Trail and high school sports scene. I'm calling it The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.





The Good: Banks Trail's 8th grade volleyball won it's 5th and 6th matches in a row last week by beating Springfield at home and Fort Mill on the road. The win streak has pulled the Lady Timberwolves

Coach Amanda Scott celebrates win
over Springfield

8th grader Grace Howell gets low to play a ball during Springfield match.

into second place in the division, at 6-3, one game behind Springfield and Oakridge, who are both 7-2. It's interesting to note that Banks Trail has beaten both of those teams during their current run. With one more regular season match to play on Thursday, the T'Wolves will have to beat Gold Hill and hope that Fort Mill (0-9) or Clover (3-6) can pull off an upset if they are to get a share of the division title.

Zeb Graham gets a little face mask of Fort Mill defender as he turns the corner

The 8th grade football team remains undefeated
after beating Fort Mill last Wednesday, 28-6. The game started quick for the Timberwolves as they scored on short pass-long run plays by Zeb Graham on two of the first three offensive plays of the game. The Fort Mill coaches quickly made some defensive adjustments to take away that play, and it got kinda weird after that. Banks Trail punched in another score in the first half for a 20-0 halftime lead. The second half was the weird part, as Fort Mill was generally able to run its offense effectively against the Wolves, who seemed to be having some trouble with their tackling skills. And the Fort Mill defense came up with some answers for the JT Marr-Zeb Graham connection and shut down the Banks Trail offense. But the Yellow Jackets had some trouble with penalties and turnovers that stopped their offense. In the end, even on an off day, the Timberwolves would not be denied. JT and Zeb connected one more time, and Banks Trail walked away with a 28-6 victory. With two games to play, against Springfield and Gold Hill, this team seems headed for a rematch against probable West Division champ, Dutchman Creek. Although, as it stands now over there, DC and Saluda Trail are both undefeated and headed for a final game showdown on Oct. 22.

Award-winning photo from 7th grade football game.

The 7th graders improved to 3-2 with a 41-24 win over Fort Mill at home. I was able to get this amazing, awe-inspiring photo from that game when I got back to the school. This is all I know about what happened it the 7th grade game. We scored more than they did, so we win! The Wolves are 3-0 in division games and headed for a probable York Co. title tilt with West Division's Castle Heights. CH could stumble in its last two games, but they are currently undefeated. We'll have to wait to see how this one plays out.


The Bad: Well, it's only bad in the sense that, if you're a fan of BTMS 7th grade volleyball, then you don't like to to see them lose, which they did twice last week. The girls played well and fought hard, but weren't able to win in matches with Springfield and Fort Mill. I didn't get any photos from the match, as I missed it while covering the Fort Mill-NaFo cross country meet. First, they lost in a three-set nail-biter to Springfield, in a match that closely resembled BT's three-set nail-biter victory over the Mustangs back on Sept. 18. On Thursday at Fort Mill MS, the 7th graders lost in two sets to a tough Fort Mill team that has lost only three sets of the 18 it has played in eight matches this season. Their match on Thursday with Springfield will be for the division title, I believe. If Springfield wins, that will give both teams an 8-2 record. But both of Fort Mill's losses will be to Springfield, which will give the Mustangs the tie-breaker. There's nothing like a winner-take-all contest to end a regular season, no matter what the sport. It's why we play the games!

Banks Trail/Fort Mill runners get ready to take on NaFo last week.

BTMS's Jackson Brown runs for FMHS

BTMS's Harper Griffen runs for NaFo

It was bad last week for any team from NaFo who happened to competing against a team from Fort Mill HS. On Tuesday, the two schools hooked up on the cross country course, and both the FMHS boys and girls teams came out on top. Both the FM and NaFo XC teams have middle school students members, including several from BTMS, so I went out to capture some of the action from the races and grabbed a few shots of the Timberwolf runners.















This was also Milltown Showdown week, complete with a new trophy for the annual winner of the newly dubbed 'Crosstown Classic' football game between Fort Mill HS and NaFo HS.

NaFo Freshman receiver runs after
the catch for long TD play.

FMHS RB breaks a long run for a late
TD to secure the JV win.

On Thursday night, the Freshman and JV football teams played, and Fort Mill won both games at Bob Jones Stadium: Freshman-7-6 and JV 25-14. Whiiiich, leads us to:

Fort Mill players hoist the 'Crosstown Classic' trophy.

Fort Mill's Malik Long runs over another NaFo defender

The Ugly: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so I guess it depends on which side you were viewing from, but from the casual observer's viewpoint, the annual NaFo-Fort Mill 'Milltown Showdown" last Friday night was an ugly affair.  I arrived late, just before kick-off, because of being in Rock Hill for a 6 o'clock lacrosse game in the opening night of the previously mentioned lax tourney.  Of course, there was nowhere to park by then, so I had a fairly long walk up the hill to the NaFo stadium. Fort Mill scored twice before I could get in the stadium and it was pretty much over after that. NaFo's defensive front was no match for wall of humanity put up by Fort Mill, and running back Malik Long ran practically unhindered all night, racking 244 yards on just 18 carries. That's 13.6 yards/carry. That's ugly, no matter how much make-up you put on it. NaFo's offense did have some big numbers of its own. Quaterback Cole Martin set a school record with 492 yards of passing, going 30-50 with four touchdowns. He had many big plays, hitting his favorite receivers, Jordan Helms and Hank Tuipulotu, but it wasn't nearly enough to keep up with the Fort Mill ground game. Fort Mill quarterback Rogan Wells' big stat of the night was his rushing yards and not his passing yards; 130 yards on 14 carries, and the Nation Ford defense just couldn't stop the Yellow Jackets. Final in this one: 67-38. The two schools' booster club got together to get a big trophy, dubbed the 'Crosstown Classic' that is supposed to passed back and forth with each year's game winner. Hopefully NaFo can bounce back next year and bring the trophy back to A O  Jones Blvd.

As I finish this up today (Tuesday), everything has been canceled due to the weather, so my plans to cover Fort Mill's volleyball Senior Night are nixed. They rescheduled it for Wednesday, but that's football day, so I guess I'll have to miss the volleyball match. Football double-headers this week and next so I'll be able to get more 7th grade action. Thursday night I'll be at NaFo's volleyball Senior Night.

Finally, I have a special offer for the next several weeks for a short family portrait session for your Holiday greeting cards. Check out the information below and then let's get your session scheduled! As always, thank you for your continued interest and I'll see you on the sidelines.