Sounds that take me back to my days covering high school sports
It’s not impossible.
But I’ll guess it’s unlikely you’ve spent much time in Big Chimney, W.Va., or Smithton, Mo.
If you’ve hung around long enough to have a cold one in either of these charming little burghs, well, how did you miss me?
OK, let me be factually correct here…
We probably couldn’t get a beer in Smithton (population 570), but there’s a diner where they might rustle you up a milkshake.
That’s where this story starts.
My partner Melissa is off visiting her family — there are dozens and dozens, and almost all live in or around Smithton, in the hog-raising country of central Missouri.
One of Melissa’s nieces is a cheerleader at Smithton High, and there’s been considerable excitement as the Tigers’ boys basketball team made it all the way to their district finals.
In fact. Melissa phoned me from the gym, and the sounds in the background took me back to places and times that were some of the best of my life.
THERE ARE far more memories of prep sports bouncing around in my head that we could possibly cover today.
I promise we’ll do this again.
But just for context…
I got into this business at the Topeka Capital-Journal, and for my very first assignment, I was sent on the one-hour drive over to suburban Kansas City for what was assumed to be just another weekday track meet.
That’s why the rookie was shuffled off to the event in the first place.
Oh, there were some Topeka-area runners involved, but hardly anything for which they were holding space on the front page.
However…
I hadn’t been there 45 minutes when a kid broke the NATIONAL record for the javelin throw.
The point, I guess (no pun intended), is that I’ve hardly ever been bored while covering high school sports.
I have several tales I’m dying to share, but we have to start someplace besides one heave of a javelin.
A NIGHT that still makes me laugh, though, involved Hoover High in West Virginia.
Now, I mentioned the village of Big Chimney, but that was cheating just a bit.
See, Highway 119 is the first interstate exit north of Charleston, the state capital where I worked. It runs northeast, kind of squeezed up alongside the Elk River.
And before you make fun, I loved living there.
I still have a ballcap with the famous opening lyrics from “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” that John Denver song that starts: “Almost heaven, West Virginia.”
If only the newspaper could have afforded a decent wage…
Anyhow, the first cluster of houses on that route along the river was the town of Mink Shoals, where I lived. And yes, thanks, we DID have our own post office.
A mile or two farther up the highway was the high school, in a slightly larger community called Elkview — just past Big Chimney.
Just so you know, I have assigned this story for life to Big Chimney, because that’s where you find Rollin Smoke BBQ — and “The Smoke” was part of every visit I made to Hoover High.
Big Chimney was also the site of my neighborhood laundromat, in case you’re vaguely interested.
We didn’t have many washers and dryers in Mink Shoals, and the teenagers at that place would wash, dry and fold your stuff to perfection for five bucks.
But let’s get to the game…
That same highway I’ve mentioned hugs the river most of the way, so all these places have very little space on the water side of Route 119.
Thus, the parking lot at Hoover High was not alongside the school, but beyond it on the north end, where there was enough room to lay some concrete.
HOOVER had an all-everything quarterback who could have played college ball if he had the grades — a common problem in Appalachia, but that’s another issue altogether.
The kid was about 6-3, he could run and throw, and he was usually responsible for all Hoover’s points in one way or another.
So on this one Friday night, Hoover got into a shootout with DuPont High, where Randy Moss scored about a million touchdowns the previous year.
Moss was gone, but DuPont was still really good, and matched Hoover’s star point for point.
Ultimately, the game came down to Hoover trailing by four points, ball around midfield, time for one last play.
You can picture it…
Predictably, the stud quarterback ran around, back and forth, for what seemed like forever.
Eventually, everyone present seemed to notice that a little Hoover receiver — a boy about 5-foot-5 who rarely played — was wide, wide open behind the entire DuPont secondary.
We’re talking 20 yards open.
Finally, after what must have been second and third thoughts, the QB heaved the ball toward the north end zone.
THE PASS hung in the air for ages.
You could tell the kid saw it, that he knew he was all alone…and that he was starting to really, really think about it.
And totally consider what was happening — like this was his whole life.
Shoot, maybe all up and down Route 119, it would be.
Finally...
The ball came down, the boy bobbled it for a second as the crowd gasped, then he hugged it to his chest and raced the last 10 or so yards to the end zone.
The place went nuts.
I was already on the sideline, so I waded through the mob on the field and found the hero of the night.
He was a mop-haired little guy, and he was so thrilled it’s impossible to describe.
I asked him: “What were you thinking, when you knew you were all alone and that pass was up in the sky?
Now, it’s not entirely fair to ask a 17-year-old to ponder the universe while he’s still gasping about two minutes after some dramatic event…but I do it, anyway, because that’s how you get a REAL reaction.
He grinned.
“Well, um,” he replied, “bein’ truthful…
“I thought that if I dropped it, I was just gonna run up through them gates, run through them cars in the lot, and throw myself in the river before my daddy could find me.”
I patted him on the shoulder pads, and left him to his adoring fans…
And later, in the wee hours, I walked across the gravel road in front of my apartment, sat on a bank throwing rocks into the Elk River, and wondered if I’d ever hear a more honest answer in my whole life.
I’m not sure I have.
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Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns for The Press appear on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He also contributes the “Zags Tracker” package on Gonzaga basketball each Tuesday.
Steve’s various tales from several decades in sports — “Moments, Memories and Madness” — run on Sundays.