Varsity Kansas - The Blog

by joanna

This is not just a football site; it’s a site for all high school sports. I know that it might seem like a football/basketball site, but that’s because there’s no doubt that there are more comments coming on football.

Did you check out Friday’s soccer previews? Jonathan Long had City League soccer notes, area soccer notes, a story on McPherson soccer, and a story on Kapaun. We also had a story today on Goddard girls tennis, and Carroll girls tennis.

But this is for soccer fans. I didn’t grow up playing the sport, but I knew about 15 years ago that it would be one of my kids’ first sport. My stepdaughter played, and now I have two boys playing. (While one scored a handful of goals this morning, the younger one, in his first try at soccer, wasn’t sure at all that he wanted to be out there. Interesting.)

So which teams will be the teams to watch in soccer? Which athletes will stand out? Which athletes will go on and play at the next level and really do something?

Let’s hear all about them.

by joanna

I was thinking about this because of the number of times I’ve written about Hutchinson so far. I’m not about to ignore the best team in the state, but it got me thinking about who deserves more hype.

I think the teams that get love on the blog by myself and you readers are Hutchinson, East, Andale and Garden Plain. Does Carroll need more? What about Northwest? How about Derby (although there’s a pretty strong contingent here)? Goddard? Andover Central?

Let me here it. By the way, feel free to let us all know why a team needs to be talked about more.

by joanna

Rockhurst will play Blue Springs (Mo.) South on Sunday at 11 a.m. (can you imagine a Kansas game played on Sunday? That would probably only happen if two western Kansas teams got flooded out and had to play in Salina only because locusts had destroyed the fields around.)

Anyway, the game is going to be broadcast on ESPN, so hardcore Hutch fans can check out their season-opening opponent.

Check out a story on Blue Springs here.

Here’s also a link to the Star’s story on Rockhurst quarterback Nathan Scheelhaase.

by joanna

As always, I’m looking for ways to keep you, our dear readers, coming back. This just came to me — I want you to name the best running back. This can be a type of post that we can continue with other positions, but I thought I’d make the first one easy.

Now, there are several ways that you need to answer this question.

1. The best running back ever at any level

2. The best high school running back in Kansas this season (feel free to write more than one, otherwise we’ll just get a whole bunch of Bryce Browns)

3. The best high school running back in Kansas in history.

4. The best running back you have seen in person

(more…)

by joanna

As if the Hutchinson at Rockhurst (Mo.) game Sept. 5 needed anything else added to it, they are both ranked in the top 100 high schools by Rivals.

Seriously, there’s nothing this game needs to be hyped any more, yet here’s one more thing. Oh well, we can handle it.

Anyone planning on attending that game? If not, where will you be on opening night?

By: J. Long

Don’t be surprised if you don’t see No. 5 in the backfield for East this season. Instead of rocking that, Bryce Brown will rock the No. 11 jersey this year. The change came as a tribute to his older brother Arthur who will wear that number at Miami this season. The switch to 1-1 is a year premature actually. Bryce was going to wear No. 32 this season, the number Arthur wore at East, but the Aces ordered new uniforms and don’t have a number 32. They both plan to wear No. 11 at Miami, which is legal because one is on offense and one is on defense.

If you missed it in the paper this morning, here’s the story of the 9-year-old that is so much better than his peers in a baseball league in New Haven, Conn., that they won’t let him pitch. This was hilarious to me. Especially the part where he gets on the mound in a game and the other team just packs it up and leaves. Really. Is that what you want to tell your kids as a coach. If you don’t think you can compete, just pack your stuff and go home. Actually it reminds me of a similar situation that happened to one of my little league teams. When I was playing in a 11-and-12 league my team, the Reds, were the class of the league. The first game of the season we beat the Padres by some outlandish amount. We beat them so bad, at the next practice we were given new schedules that had asterisks by the game where we were supposed to play the Padres. The asterisks were to represent the games forfeited to the Reds by the Padres. We never let them live that down.

Down goes Costa. Oregon QB Nate Costa will miss 8-10 weeks due to a knee injury. Justin Roper has been assigned starting duties for this Saturday, however, expect to see Chris Harper get some PT as well.

Here’s a new website for you high school fans to visit, only after you leave this site first of course. http://espnrise.com

by joanna

How about our Kansans?

I watched SportsCenter this morning while I ran and saw the highlights of Mike Pelfrey throwing his second complete game for the Mets. Pelfrey played at Heights and Wichita State.

Then there was San Diego’s Darren Sproles scoring a touchdown and running for 100-plus yards. He played at Olathe North and Kansas State.

by joanna

We’ve already had five football previews in the paper — today we had Rose Hill and Kapaun, Sunday we had Derby, Circle and El Dorado. Who were you or are you excited to see?

And I know that there are multiple storylines with every program, what have we missed with the previews we’ve run or what is a can’t-miss story with a program.

By the way, this doesn’t have to be just football, either. Feel free to tell us which team you’re dying to see in which sport — and you know how I am — give me a why you are dying to see this team or individual.

I’m especially looking forward to our next two features, which are Bryce Brown on Wednesday by Jonathan Long. I’ll have a Jaydan Bird feature on Sunday.

Let me hear from you. (P.S. I’m giving you all a great chance to pump up your kid or favorite. Don’t let me down.)

By: J. Long

Remember this commercial?

Well I found out on Saturday, that I am NOT Tiger Woods.

In a painfully-humiliating way I found out that not only am I not Tiger, I’m not even Charles Barkley.

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been keeping a couple of golf clubs for one of my friends who moved down to Atlanta. I’ve always heard how addictive golf can be so I stayed away from it.

My philosophy: Mini golf pro, actual golf no.

After looking at these golf clubs for so long, I decided that I’d go to the driving range and take a couple of swings for the first time ever. Yep, the first time EVER. Before I went to the range, I asked Bob Lutz for some advice. He suggested that I get a lesson first. A lesson. What?! Surely I wouldn’t need a lesson just to go out and smash some golf balls.

I should of took that lesson.

I probably would have had a better chance hitting knuckleballs blindfolded than I was having on my first couple attempts at the driving range.

The first five balls I hit, I was able to retrieve from the grass without any threat of getting hit by another golfer’s ball. Luckily, I positioned myself so far away from the other golfers that none of them saw my horrendous experience. One guy did come in the midst of me hitting nothing but air and gave me a few helpful hints.

And while none of the other 10 or so golfers saw me, there were a couple of people watching the Bumper Boats (I was at All-Star Sports) that I’m positive got a good couple of chuckles at my expense.

Eventually, I did hit about three shots that sounded good. They didn’t go that far, but they sounded pretty solid. After a somewhat frustrating experience I left and it was good that I bounced when I did. As I was walking out a kid (couldn’t have been more than six) was walking towards the driving range with a bag of about three clubs.

I don’t think my ego would have been able to take that.

by joanna

I should have had this post up on Saturday, but got caught up in the joys of yard work. I could have done it last night, but I was too worried about getting to bed early so I could catch Team USA’s gold medal game at 1:30 a.m. Yep, we set the alarm and woke up to watch it. I watched the first half, my husband watched the whole game.

Onto football.

The first of our previews ran today — Derby was on the cover, then we had Circle and El Dorado inside the section.

I personally love this time of year. Everyone is positive, there’s so much hope. It doesn’t matter whether you follow high school, college or the pros. No matter who you are, you are optimistic. That’s good stuff.

We’ll be having previews of other sports starting this week, too. So stay tuned. I know some of you are getting antsy to see your favorite sports, feel free to drop me a line and we’ll get a topic up — but I need you conversating. I did the much-asked for volleyball post and got nothing.