It’s Saturday, November 29th and my wife and I have to drive thru Houston to get to Galveston for our cruise.
Dear Diary,
It’s Sunday, December 7th and my wife and I have to drive thru Houston again on our home from the cruise.
Dear Diary,
It’s Saturday, December 13 and my wife and I have to drive to Houston AGAIN (please stop me if you’ve heard that before) with the final destination being NRG Stadium for a huge match-up between the 13 and 1 Steele Knights and the 13 and 1 Katy Tigers. Winner goes to the state championship next Saturday at Cowboy’s Stadium in Arlington. Combined, the teams have won 8 state championships. Pretty impressive!!!
So, do you really think I have a diary journal on my bedside table and jot down my daily thoughts? The answer is YES, but my diary is actually my BLOG.
I absolutely love sharing my thoughts with you…especially, something that I am extremely passionate for and that is HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL!!! I am so damn lucky that I (not only get paid) but also have the best seat in the house!!!
Steele and Katy
I will only bore you for a paragraph or two about our drive up and drive home. I say our because my sweet wife decided to come with me (or shall I say, she dropped me off at the game and went shopping at IKEA and The Galleria). She makes me drive in Houston because the drivers are more aggressive than at home and I am able to deal with them better…also, I am not afraid to honk at idiot drivers!!!
She was in the parking lot waiting for me and she told me she heard the cheers of the crowd when the game ended (that was across the street and the windows were shut in the car). WOW!!!
We had a very pleasant dinner at my favorite restaurant in Houston…Kenny and Ziggy’s – a New York Delicatessen restaurant, We didn’t go there on way to our cruise or on the home from the cruise but it was discussed many times. I had Matzah Ball Soup and Matzah Brie and a bagel…this Jewish kids gives it 2 thumbs up!!
Before the game started, I finally got to meet the one and only Texas Bob (who is a proud Katy fan). Super awesome for me and nice dude and man, I would love to do a podcast with him where we chat about High School football…maybe in February I can make that happen. Texas Bob has a Texas Football Stadium Guide 2014 and Hall of Fame book published and some of my Alamo stadium renovations are featured in it.
Enough pre-game talk, how ’bout I get to the game between the Steele Knights and the Katy Tigers!!
In my preview BLOG on Monday for this game, I expected Steele to play a perfect game and defeat Katy.
The Steele Knights trailed Katy by a score of 17 to 13 in the 4th quarter with less than 3 minutes remaining in the game. Steele had the ball and had 82 yards in front of them. All throughout the game and even this drive, I was quietly cheering for Steele and for this drive, I mouthed game winning drive!! Three plays later, the Knights scored a touchdown and omg, the touchdown catch by Antoine Wesley was absolutely unbelievable. I got a picture of it from the replay!!
Steele now led 20 to 17 with under 2 minutes left…gosh, I could smell Arlington and I know I wasn’t alone!!! Katy had less than 2 minutes to either tie with a field goal or win with a touchdown. This is gonna be a great finish!!! Katy nailed a 35 yard field goal as time expired to sent the game into OVERTIME!!! WOW!!!
In overtime, Katy kicked a field goal but it was negated because a Steele player ran into the kicker and Katy capitalized by scoring a touchdown. Katy led 27 to 20. It came down to a 4th down play for the Steele Knights and the pass into the end-zone was incomplete…game over!!!
Final score in overtime was Katy 27 and Steele 20. Katy will play Cedar Hill in the state championship game next Saturday. A Steele win would’ve been awesome, but it was still cool for me to see a great game (which could end up being my game of the year…a Week 10 game between Taft and Warren is the only other game I am considering). Steele and Katy are (in my opinion) 2 of the best football powerhouse’s in the state of Texas and will continue to be for a very long time.
At halftime, we got a print-out of stats but since I am so good at what I do, Bobby Stautzenberger and Jay Riley used mine because they trust mine more!!! Bobby and Jay host a weekly show every Sunday at Hooters called SA Football Weekly. I am planning on hanging out with them in January. Well, it will give me something to write about and I can share some photographs of Bobby and Jay and of course the Hooter’s girls!!
As I was tallying up the final numbers, my dry erase marker was losing it’s ink so I had to quickly switch to a new marker.
The Katy Tigers ran 65 plays for 345 yards. Rodney Anderson, the running back, had 36 carries for 216 yards and 1 touchdown. The majority of the yards came in the 2nd half and he also scored the touchdown in overtime. He is really good folks and will be playing college football at Oklahoma. Garrett Doiron, the quarterback, was 8 of 16 for 112 yards with 3 interceptions and 2 touchdowns. Most of his yards came in the first half. Tony Mullins had 3 receptions for 57 yards and 1 touchdown. They had 3 turnovers and 86 penalty yards and that doesn’t happen often to this Katy team.
The Steele Knights ran 53 plays for 309 yards. Running the ball, the Knights struggled only to gain 88 yards. Yeah, not typical of the Steele running game.
LG Williams was 14 of 24 for 221 yards and 1 touchdown. He also had 14 carries for 47 yards. He finishes his senior year with 2,011 passing yards and 820 rushing yards and 36 total touchdowns. He will be playing at Texas State University. Jaylen Harris, another senior, had 5 receptions for 50 yards and negative rushing yards (which was very a first for him). I am not sure where Jaylen will be playing but where ever it may be, I wish him the best.
Bryson Denley had 8 carries for 24 yards and 1 touchdown, Travell Lumpkin had 4 carries for 19 yards, and Xavier Martin had 1 carry for 15 yards. Antoine Wesley had 7 receptions for 134 yards and 1 touchdown. Lumpkin had a 10 yard reception and Martin had a 27 yard reception. Denley and Wesley are juniors and Lumpkin and Martin are sophomores.
Man, the Steele Knights were so close to winning…tough way to end but I know Steele will be back next year (they got a bunch of talent returning on offense and defense).
I got one more High School Football game and that is the SA Sports All Star Football game on January 3rd at The Alamodome (it will be on CW35). That game will be a great way to officially end the 2014 High School Football season for me.
