At Galen Blackmore Field in El Dorado, you could hear a pin drop for about three hours on Sunday afternoon.
Coincidentally, that was about the same time the No. 3 Grizzlies were getting the scare of their lives from Garden City.
And I was as surprised as anybody. I thought, with the way both teams were playing going into this one, that Butler would roll away. I even made my picks early in the week that Butler would win by 28, but they won by 5 … although I did pick Hutch to win. Credit Buster quarterback Eugene Smith, head
EUGENE SMITH
coach Lucas Aslin and defensive coordinator Jacob Cox for making this a game. Smith was really something to behold. I covered him last year during his freshman season when he won a three-way quarterback battle for the starting spot, and it was interesting to see him make the transition back to football after playing baseball at Pensacola Junior College for a year. You could tell how frustrated Aslin was after the game … not only over what looked like a blown call on a two-point conversion that would have let them kick a field goal to tie the game at the end, but realizing that he wouldn’t have Smith next year. Aslin has a heck of a task in front of him this off season in replacing both
Smith and All-American wide receiver/punter/kicker/punt returner Cameron Kenney, who is Auburn-bound. Recruiting for Jayhawk Conference schools is always a grind, but this year, with Hutch on the way up, it’s going to get even tougher. Imagine the competition you face for kids just in your own state. Seven other jucos. Four DIIs. 13 NAIA schools. Doesn’t sound like much fun to me. Just the sheer numbers you deal with … jeez. Although Butler doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.
Speaking of Butler, there was some ongoing talk about a new stadium project in El Dorado at the game. They were making announcements about trying to pick a site. Can anybody fill me in on where this stands right now? Because Blackmore has got to go. The number of things wrong with playing at this place … ugh. Can you imagine what the Grizzlies will be like once they get a stadium that suits their needs?
-TA