BlueDevil58

The coaching in the Tri-Cities area is subpar for the most part. It's a lot of good ol' boys hiring other good ol' boys to be coach based on who their relatives are or what they did as high school players 20 or 30 years ago. They're still at least 10 years behind the rest of the state in terms of throwing the football and probably 20 in terms of defending the pass. They just try to run over each other with big linemen. Because of that, all one of them has to do is come out and sling it around a bunch while stopping the run and they're going to look like world beaters... but when they hit a Knoxville team that knows what they're doing, they get stomped. It happens like clockwork every year in the first 2 rounds. Then they blame it on "talent" (aka "lack of fast black players"). That doesn't help, but that's just their excuse. It's not held back Maryville... Crockett was easily the best team from that area besides Greeneville, though. I give them credit for that. 23-12 wasn't a blowout like a lot of people predicted. Chandley really is a great coach and should probably be named Coach of the Year for what he did in putting out that dumpster fire and getting that once-pitiful team this far.

Called it again. I said the Crockett defense would be solid and keep it from getting out of hand, but that DC had no chance in this one. I've also pointed out all along how overrated their offense and passing attack was and pointed out that they didn't stand a chance against a decent Knoxville-area team. Never doubt me!

Crockett is going to be handled fairly easily by Central. Central just has too much talent and Knoxville area teams learned long ago that they had to also play pass defense if they wanted to compete. The DC defense is good so the score might not get too out of hand, but Crocket has zero chance. When most of the state's top teams are in Region 2, especially the top 5A and 6A teams, and that's our opponents for the first three rounds, it's tough to get past them. Typically, the team that wins the third round game against a Tri-Cities team is the one that goes on to play for and win state. It's slightly outside the area you mentioned, but Elizabethton made it to the 4th round in 2009, 2010, and 2012, finishing 3rd. Greeneville's dominance is common knowledge.

Harig and Brown are both good coaches. Their record at places other than West shows that. It seems like somebody behind the scenes with a lot of pull didn't like the veer and wanted to hire a coach to run a more "modern" offense. Unfortunately, HS coaches are under a lot of pressure by parents, boosters, and administrators to deliver a "product" that looks like what those people see the colleges run on TV. Style over substance. They have a bunch of really stupid assumptions about that offense somehow being magical and making kids play better or get scholarships. If a coach runs an old-school offense nowadays, even if it's very successful (as Cummings was), he'll get run off or fired at the first opportunity. I know of extremely successful veer coaches in other states (like Maryville-level successful) who put up with the same stuff. I wish Cummings the best of luck in Cleveland and I wish West luck in the future with Brown at the helm. They can still reload and be champions again.

You mean the ex coach with the sub .500 career record who was suspended along with 1/3 of his starters? Your team barely beat Halls' JV team in a home playoff game.

Mental advantage goes to Tennessee High here, though I think DC is the more talented team. Both are well coached. THS's defense is pretty good and they defend the pass better than most NET teams. They'll also run the ball and kill the clock to keep DC's offense off the field. Meanwhile, DC's defense will come ready to play just like they have all season. They'll be looking to jump out on THS early and make the "hog the ball" strategy a moot point. This game will simply come down to which team makes the fewest mistakes. I'd go with Tennessee High if I had to bet money, but not by much. It'll be another tight one unless DC goes off early and jumps out to a quick 2+ score lead.

This. The best thing that a young athlete can do is play multiple sports and develop overall athletic ability and coordination. Playing basketball is great for footwork, overall coordination, and lateral quickness, which is vital for linemen. Soccer does the same and also trains endurance and straight line speed. Wrestling is good because it builds an innate understanding of leverage and emphasizes functional strength. Baseball is good because it improves hand-eye coordination (important for linemen, too, when they're punching and trying to shed blocks). Track is great for linemen because they can participate in field events like shot-put and discus, which builds overall explosive strength and balance. Etc. The advantages for skill position players should be obvious. The key is they still need to eat to grow and be in the weight room lifting on a solid program. If they're not doing that because they're playing another sport and the coach is opposed to them stopping by the weight room a couple of days a week to get their big lifts in, they aren't going to get any stronger and that's a problem. If the wrestling coach takes those linemen and demands they cut a lot of weight to wrestle in a lower class (something I think should be outlawed for safety reasons), they also won't build the kind of muscle and strength they need. The push to specialize in sports at earlier and earlier ages is hurting football more than any other sport. Kids will play on basketball traveling teams, baseball traveling teams, or do club wrestling all year long and they "don't have time" for football because they're trying to focus on those other sports to get scholarships. The funny thing is that football gives out more scholarships than the other sports combined, and only a very select few with a certain frame stand a chance of getting those, anyway. Besides, it's not like you have travel teams playing football year round, anyway. "Specializing" on football just means you're going to lift and train 12 months out of the year, which any kid can do while playing multiple other sports, too. Good football coaches want their kids playing other sports as long as the coaches of those sports are respectful about sharing their athletes. In my experience, it's always the basketball, baseball, and maybe wrestling coaches who refuse to return the favor.

Catholic's not what they used to be. Fulton wins.

The DCHS/THS game was very tight and I feel like Tennessee High has the mental advantage going into the rematch. Tennessee High plays better pass defense than most teams in NET. That's what it takes to have a chance against Crockett. They also run the ball well and play ball control, which can grind down the clock and keep the Crockett offense off the field. I'd look for this game to be within a score or two going into the 4th unless Larkins pops off with a couple of long TDs early. At this point, Crockett is undefeated and coming off their first ever playoff win, which came in OT over a depleted (and, honestly, not very good) Halls team that was rode 2 hours on a bus without their coach and 1/4 of their starters. DC was still very sloppy against Halls and almost beat themselves. Chandley will have the defense ready to go and Larkins will hit some big passes. The question for Crockett is if the kids are hungry for more or if they're satisfied with 11 wins. That's the biggest stumbling block for a team trying to move up the ladder. Tennessee High will be ready for the Semis. They've been hungry for a playoff run for a while. As for Boone vs. Central... Central got beat by Tennessee High, which is very similar to Boone in many respects (smash mouth ground games, tough front lines on both sides, conservative passing attacks). Boone has a better running back than Tennessee High had, but Tennessee High plays better pass defense. I feel like Central has the edge vs. Boone because they can throw the ball pretty well and Boone, like most NET teams, doesn't play pass defense... but stranger things have happened. If it rains or Central has an off night throwing the ball and turns into a smash mouth, ground and pound game Boone can take it. I remember when both Washington County teams were mediocre, at best, back when Crockett was Sullivan Central or Volunteer-level bad and Boone was lucky to win 5 or 6 games. The times have changed! Now there is a very real chance there could be a Musket Bowl rematch in the Quarterfinals, with the winner being a game away from state. Wouldn't that be awesome!?!?!

Called it. I said Crockett would win, but it wouldn't be a cakewalk for them due to the matchup of a Knoxville area defense against DC's "Knoxville area" offense. Congrats to DC on the hard fought win at home against a badly depleted Halls team. They get a rematch with Tennessee High next week.

I've seen them plenty. I'm not going to pick apart the skills of HS kids who are playing their hearts out. I'll just say that it's easy to rack up big passing yards when defenses are sitting in the same coverage and letting receivers run wide open all night, which is how football is played in NET. NET football is all about ground and pound. Nobody in NET besides Greenville plays pass defense well.because they simply don't have to. A decent Knoxville secondary and pass rush could give Crockett some trouble.

He'd coached at Science Hill for a years prior to a 1 year stint in SC. When he got hired at Crockett a lot of SH players and kids from the feeder system suddenly came to Crockett when they used to avoid it . "Recruiting" is probably too strong a word and implies something illegal and shady, but there were definite ties there that brought a lot of that new influx of talent to Crockett.

Crockett's passing game isn't as good as it looks. None of the NET schools can throw or defend the pass worth a crap, so Crockett gets to beat up on some absolutely terrible pass defenses that barely know how to cover. Halls and the other Knoxville area teams run a very similar style of offense and see it every week, so they're very used to defending it .With so many people suspended for Halls, it's likely that Crockett will cruise to a victory, but it's probably not going to be the cakewalk everyone thinks.

The 8th graders will get their first taste of playoff football to start the 3rd quarter. A typical Coalfield practice will be harder for them than this game.

If they had made it a death penalty for forfeiting a playoff game they should have never been put into at 1-9, then Unaka would have just never fielded a team again. The players quit on the coach and no one there cares about football. There was talk of an all sport playoff ban, but that didn't happen because it would have been punishing kids who had nothing to do with about a dozen football players' decision to quit. Unaka is sometimes good in basketball and girls' sports.

They're on their 4th coach in less than a year. They promoted the DC after last season. He abruptly resigned in April because the players' attitude and work ethic was crap. Then they hired some guy out of Kentucky. He had the job for a week, met with the team once, then said "NOPE!" and quit. I don't believe the guy coaching the team now has any football experience as a player or a coach and the team all wants to play basketball now and likely won't be back next year. Somehow, this team still managed to blow out Unaka, which tells you a lot about how bad Unaka is.

The enrollment is supposed to be around 1500, so it'll be right at the cutoff for 5A or 6A. With the way the enrollments worked out last time, it would be one of the smaller 6A schools. No one has any idea who'll coach them. All 3 schools that will be consolidated into it have gotten new coaches within the past 2 years and the word on the street is that they'll look to an outsider. The facilities will be shiny and new, but the pay in Sullivan County's not the best so I wouldn't expect a huge name. This will probably be the first head coaching job for a young up and comer or they'll hire a retiree from a successful SWVa school to keep the seat warm for a few years. Whoever is hired is going to have a hard time bringing in his own assistant coaches as Sullivan County cuts positions to save money. I don't expect a lot of success out of the gate because of the competition in 6A (Dobyns-Bennett, Science Hill, Maryville, Morristown West, Farragut, and Hardin Valley will probably be conference games!) and because consolidated schools like this are hard to build overnight due to no alumni network, booster club, tradition, or school spirit. The football programs in all 3 of the schools it's replacing are bleeding numbers and support from where they were at just a few years ago and they don't have any outstanding talent. I do think the school will attract some athletes who would have gone to Dobyns-Bennett and Tennessee High, though. One thing that's not being discussed is that this will effect East, too, as about 200-300 kids from Central get rezoned for East and possibly bump them up a classification in the next redistricting.

It really just depends. Keeping the OC there when they fired him 1 game into a tenure as interim just seems like a mistake. The guy about started a riot with the way he handled the post-game, even though he didn't say anything that bad. It was just tone deaf and the Director of Schools personally fired him over it the next day. He's clearly a good OC with an impressive background who was put in a terrible position, but if I were him I wouldn't even want to stay. Chandley is confident and I hear nothing but good things about him, but he's very young and only has 2 years of coaching experience, so in terms of coaching he's not much more experienced than GS was, though he seems a lot more professional already. It looks like his staff will be even less experienced than he is. I wish Chandley the best and DC has some talent coming back, but it's a long road ahead. Still, their schedule is fairly weak and they might even be able to get some breaks and win the conference next year. Things are just that unpredictable.

I think that Lowe got promised some things when he took that job that never materialized. TKA had a couple of benefactors who were putting a lot of money into the facilities and athletics programs there and there was talk of them becoming another CAK within a few years. Now that Powell has got their house in order again, he's going back to a much better place than he left.

You can find this information online pretty easily. Knox County pay is average for teaching and coaching supplements, but there are a lot of systems right around Knoxville that pay more and/or have fewer administrative headaches. It's been that way for a while. Usually a system that pays teachers high has a lot of micromanaging (like Kingsport and Maryville) but teachers and coaches put up with it because the money's good, while a system with low or average pay gives teachers more freedom (like Campbell County or Claiborne County), so people stay because they like the environment. Knox County has a bad mix of a lot of micromanaging with average pay and it runs people off. The resources that the Knox County schools have to work with are pretty mediocre, too.

I think it's going to really hurt both Morristown Schools and Jeff County, but also just about everyone else within 50 miles (Sevier Co., Cocke County, the Hawkins and Greene county schools, etc.). This school is going to be huge (1200 kids--a 5A school!) and have maybe the nicest facilities in the state, plus they'll be competing in D2 so they can openly recruit and offer financial aid. NET schools aren't used to dealing with that type of pressure from privates recruiting their athletes away.

They already have an established elementary school in the area and have plans to build an entire system of elementary and middle schools that feed into LCA. As a D2 school, they're going to recruit athletes hard. This school is serious about being a dominant program and has the money and administration to back that up. The size of the school is also going to be a big deal--the plan is for it to be 1200 kids, making it a 5A school in football. This is going to be a game changer in NET. Morristown West and Morristown East are a little bit down already and they'll definitely lose athletes to this school. Jeff County, Cocke County, and the Greene County schools (which already lose athletes to Greeneville) are going to be put under a lot of pressure as well when they get a stud in their system. Personally, I think any school within an hour's drive of Exit 4 is going to feel the pinch of having some star athletes recruited away. That includes the Hawkins County schools, Greeneville, Grainger County, and maybe even Dobyns-Bennett. My only question is if there is the kind of demand for this sort of expensive private schooling in our area. As it stands now, unless some type of voucher program goes through the state (and I doubt the school operators would be spending $70 million if that wasn't about to happen), there just aren't thousands of families in the NET area who can afford to pay $10k or more in tuition. That's why private schools east of Knoxville tend to be small and so broke they struggle just to keep their doors open from year to year.

If the student lives in Washington County, it costs them $1650 a year to go to SH. If they live outside the county, it's $2150 a year. They get a 50% discount if their parent works for the city or the school system. For Dobyns-Bennett, it's a little bit less, but they have a bunch of "exemptions" that students can apply for, like "documented justifications related to the child's specific education experience" (i.e. "I'm a talented athlete who wants to play football at D-B.").

Sounds like a great hire for them! Congrats Coach Chandley and good luck!

Rumor has it that they've found their man and will announce it soon. I don't know who it is. I've heard everything from Josh Edens (alum and HC at North Greene) to a guy with prior Head Coach experience in another state, to the Gaines guy who's been running the offseason weights for them since January. The search went pretty quickly once it was actually opened up.