VALDOSTA —
If you think the Grayson Rams won the Class AAAAA state football championship last December you’re wrong. The Rams won the title when the weather was warmer. Much warmer.
For the Rams to have won the state championship last season it took hard work throughout the summer months — June, July and August. Those are when championships are won.
And now, the next seven state football champions (one for each classification in the GHSA and two in Class A) are currently working towards becoming state champions for this season. By time December rolls around, the tasks that will stand in the way of state titles and elimination from the playoffs will seem minor compared to summer workouts in blistering heat, 7-on-7 passing tournaments and lineman camps that make your entire body hurt. These are the times when state championships are won.
Ask any head football coach and they will tell you that the work put forward during these critical three months are more important than the Tuesday practice the week of the Winnersville Classic; granted that practice is usually covered more than a players bench press or 40-yard dash run in the summer.
Summer football workouts are where teams come together and leaders grab the reigns of a team and make it their own. From pushing the younger players through workouts, whether weight lifting or running up that dirt hill behind the baseball stadium — which still gives me the chills when I go back to visit — state champions are crowned now and leaders are made.
By time the Tuesday of Winnersville week rolls around, you either know you can get the job done or you can’t.
During summer workouts, individuals learn how much they have left in the “tank” and how far they can push their body. Just when the athlete thinks they don’t have anything left, Summer workouts introduce a whole new level that an athlete may have never experienced before.
Right now, groups of individuals are becoming a solid, unified team poised to make to a run towards a state title. This three-month stretch that makes up summer workouts and training camp are where quarterbacks and receivers find rhythms and when new players master the playbook and mesh in new surroundings.
The next seven Georgia state football champions are currently working towards one ultimate goal of a claiming a state championship. A goal of claiming high school mortality on the football field.
The only question I have over the next two months is ‘who is working the hardest?’ Is it the Lowndes Vikings? How about their crosstown rival Valdosta Wildcats or their new in-region rival Camden County? Or is the next state champion hard at work in the Atlanta area?
I guess we will find out who the hardest working football teams in the state of Georgia truly are come December, when seven football teams from around the state rise to the challenge and become legends of Friday nights.
During the summer months, Ed’s column will appear monthly in a Monday edition of the Times. His weekly column will return in Mid-August, along with the ‘Friday Night Fever’ column. Ed can be reached on Twitter at @Ed_Hooper.
Local Sports
Column: Championships aren’t won in December
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Win or go home
The Valdosta State softball team faces Armstrong Atlantic University in an elimination game for the 2013 Division II Softball Championship Tournament today at noon.
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HOOPER: An early look at the 2013 football season
I haven’t written a column in quite some time, largely because there has been so much going on and we haven’t always had the space, nor have I felt up to it after writing so many other stories.
But today, I am writing this column and taking up the inches in the daily sports section and giving a little love to the upcoming football season. -
Blazers fall to Molloy in eight innings
With only one out remaining and trailing by three, the Molloy Lions strung together four hits to plate three runs in the seventh followed by another run in the eighth inning to defeat Valdosta State’s softball team 5-4 in the first round of the 2013 Division II Softball National Championship Tournament on Thursday in Salem, Va.
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Albritton, Johnson earn All-America honors
Valdosta State softball players Courtney Albritton and Morgan Johnson gathered multiple All-America honors late Wednesday night.
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Golfers take course for Wounded Warriors
Local patrons participated in the Wounded Warrior Project Golf Tournament at Stone Creek Golf Club in Valdosta on Thursday.
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Valwood football hosting 4-man scramble golf tourney
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VHS football cheerleaders to host Junior Cheer Camp
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Gillespie, McPherson pleased with spring practices
Valdosta’s Rance Gillespie and Lowndes’ Randy McPherson both think their football teams got better during the recent 10 days of spring practice.
Then again, both coaches know their teams have a ways to go before the start of the football season. -
Signing day at VHS
It was signing day galore at Valdosta High School Wednesday.
Six student-athletes signed national letter of intents to compete at the next level, while two VHS athletes both signed academic scholarships to Division I universities. -
Powell signs with Shorter
Robert Powell, a member of the basketball team on South Georgia State College’s Waycross Campus, has signed a letter of intent to continue his basketball career at Shorter University in Rome.
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