I got to the game just as Carmel's place kicker looped one through the upights about 2 minutes into the 1st quarter, so, I don't know if, before or after the Pacific Grove marching band played the Star Spangled Banner, the PA guy held a moment of silence for the hundreds of people killed in several simultaneous acts of terrorism through-out Paris, France, yesterday. And as I finally found a seat in the packed stadium, maybe 1,000 Carmelites filling the visitor's bleachers, perhaps three times that number either squeezed into PG's stands or swarming about the concession area, I also thought of a likely quite and sadly empty stadium, tonight, in Saramento's Pacer Nation, where (unless there was an impromptu gathering in mourning), the Friday Night Lights were dimmed in that hallowed field of a passionate community's hopes and dreams in the wake of the murder and wounding of two of its Grant High School football playing sons. Indeed, in Pacific Grove for a decades-old end-of-season rivaly on a night when elsewhere echoes of horror and madness had barely begun to dissipate, with shock and loss the dark shrouds cloaking everything for the aggrieved during days and weeks to come.
I'm almost glad the ensuing 8 minutes or so that ticked off the 1st quarter clock was not so much a football game but more of a dull, plodding checkers match, with most of the action mid-field as each team couldn't seem to get anything going other than trading the ball on what seemed a series of four downs and out. Then, as part of a 50 yard drive, as Carmel's signal-caller Hickman (?) QB-sneaked one in followed by a 2 pt romp by Windham (?), that would turn out to be much of how Carmel either scored or got the ball headed in that direction the rest of the night. Suddenly, with the score Carmel 11-0, but with PG easily moving the ball 30 yards between the 35 yard stripes, the Breakers drive stalled, with Carmel launching a 65-yard drive that yielded 2 TDs, one called back following what would be the first of about a half-dozen holding penalties against Carmel through-out the game. (In fact, yellow flags were flying so much against the Padres it reminded me of walking through an Autumn storm of yellow leaves falling from cottonwood trees in Taos, NM.) With the score now 17-0 deep into the 2nd quarter, when Carmel got the ball back it scored again following a 58 run down the sidelines, then anohter QB keeper TD and PAT and the score by the end of the first half was Carmel 24, PG 0.
The only thing I can remember about the half-time show was this bizarre what looked like a pro-wrestling chicken-wing maneuver by Carmel's cheerleaders, probably the oddest thing I've ever seen at a public gathering. Well, I guess, like football coaches laying awake nights thinking up unusual plays to fool the opposition, cheerleader coaches probably lay awake nights thinking of cheerleading maneuvers that if they don't stun audiences in one way they stun them into speachlessness in another way.
It's always amazing that after halftime, how the team which got its butt kicked pretty good during the 1st half, comes out smokin' or doing something different, or both, which was the case with PG whose coach replaced his regular QB, Moore, with a wide-receiver, Grimes, who, 22 plays and about 14 carries later, scored 2 TDs, one before and one after Carmel kicked its 2nd FG of the game. As the 3rd quarter ended, with PG out-scoring Carmel 14-3, the Padres scored the game's final TD with 8:16 remaining in the 2nd half, the final score: Carmel 34, Pacific Grove 14.
The vic earned Carmel the right to possess and hoist and (like the Super Bowl's Lombardi jewel) run around the track with this funky-looking ancient gold-plated high-topped 1950's era football shoe fixed atop a plaque-covered trophy base, the plaque engraved with the names of the schools who won the final games over each decade, the plaque going to the school which at the end of each decade had won the most games that decade. According to this former PG football player named "Joe" (whom I asked) now in his mid-40s, with Carmel winning tonight's game, both teams (apparently) now tied for games won during the (apparently) 70-80 years or so of competition against one another, also (apparently) with all the total game scores added up, there being only about 10 points difference in all those years. (Top that Woods and Vacaville!!!) Yeh, a fun night of regular season-ending hsfootball in the CCS. But still, and on the drive home, the subdued and sobering sadness, and conern, for where the world as we know it is heading when in old and gay Pariee and back across the world in the Capitol of the most beautiful vibrant state in the Union, deadly games without apparent rules but with blood-soaked versus yellow flags are being played out in a dance most macabre. Muds
I'm almost glad the ensuing 8 minutes or so that ticked off the 1st quarter clock was not so much a football game but more of a dull, plodding checkers match, with most of the action mid-field as each team couldn't seem to get anything going other than trading the ball on what seemed a series of four downs and out. Then, as part of a 50 yard drive, as Carmel's signal-caller Hickman (?) QB-sneaked one in followed by a 2 pt romp by Windham (?), that would turn out to be much of how Carmel either scored or got the ball headed in that direction the rest of the night. Suddenly, with the score Carmel 11-0, but with PG easily moving the ball 30 yards between the 35 yard stripes, the Breakers drive stalled, with Carmel launching a 65-yard drive that yielded 2 TDs, one called back following what would be the first of about a half-dozen holding penalties against Carmel through-out the game. (In fact, yellow flags were flying so much against the Padres it reminded me of walking through an Autumn storm of yellow leaves falling from cottonwood trees in Taos, NM.) With the score now 17-0 deep into the 2nd quarter, when Carmel got the ball back it scored again following a 58 run down the sidelines, then anohter QB keeper TD and PAT and the score by the end of the first half was Carmel 24, PG 0.
The only thing I can remember about the half-time show was this bizarre what looked like a pro-wrestling chicken-wing maneuver by Carmel's cheerleaders, probably the oddest thing I've ever seen at a public gathering. Well, I guess, like football coaches laying awake nights thinking up unusual plays to fool the opposition, cheerleader coaches probably lay awake nights thinking of cheerleading maneuvers that if they don't stun audiences in one way they stun them into speachlessness in another way.
It's always amazing that after halftime, how the team which got its butt kicked pretty good during the 1st half, comes out smokin' or doing something different, or both, which was the case with PG whose coach replaced his regular QB, Moore, with a wide-receiver, Grimes, who, 22 plays and about 14 carries later, scored 2 TDs, one before and one after Carmel kicked its 2nd FG of the game. As the 3rd quarter ended, with PG out-scoring Carmel 14-3, the Padres scored the game's final TD with 8:16 remaining in the 2nd half, the final score: Carmel 34, Pacific Grove 14.
The vic earned Carmel the right to possess and hoist and (like the Super Bowl's Lombardi jewel) run around the track with this funky-looking ancient gold-plated high-topped 1950's era football shoe fixed atop a plaque-covered trophy base, the plaque engraved with the names of the schools who won the final games over each decade, the plaque going to the school which at the end of each decade had won the most games that decade. According to this former PG football player named "Joe" (whom I asked) now in his mid-40s, with Carmel winning tonight's game, both teams (apparently) now tied for games won during the (apparently) 70-80 years or so of competition against one another, also (apparently) with all the total game scores added up, there being only about 10 points difference in all those years. (Top that Woods and Vacaville!!!) Yeh, a fun night of regular season-ending hsfootball in the CCS. But still, and on the drive home, the subdued and sobering sadness, and conern, for where the world as we know it is heading when in old and gay Pariee and back across the world in the Capitol of the most beautiful vibrant state in the Union, deadly games without apparent rules but with blood-soaked versus yellow flags are being played out in a dance most macabre. Muds
