[charlie22]

The last time Covington Catholic made a game of it with the Birds was in 2006. They went on to win state and left the Birds with a very bitter taste in their mouth. The win at DCMS during the regular season was devastating and to make matters worse, the fans left a calling card by damaging the bleachers in their celebratory rant. Highlands went on to pay back and boy have they ever.....Now, 4 years later the emotions seemed to have subsided and the beat cov cath t's are now being used to wash cars.....Is this the end of a beautiful relationship in northern kentucky. I have to say, Yes.

Hard to say if it is the end. CovCath supposedly has a talented frosh class (as do the Birds). We'll know shortly how talented both frosh teams are, as I think they play each other this coming week. When the Birds seniors, juniors and sophomores were frosh, the games with CovCath were all very close, which indicates to me that CovCath should have some pretty good athletes on this year's squad. Now don't get me wrong; frosh games only show so much, but it does show something (in my opinion, they primarily show the raw athletic talent on both teams). When the seniors on the 06 Birds team were frosh, they lost to CovCath. The frosh on CovCath's team went on to win state as seniors and beat the Birds twice (man, it was painful to type that). When the seniors on last year's Birds team were frosh they slaughtered CovCath and SK played them very, very close. We know how good the SK seniors were last year and we saw another not so good CovCath team. So I think frosh results can be somewhat of an indicator. If that is accurate, given the close frosh games the last three years, CovCath should start improving dramatically soon.

So, it wouldn't surprise me if CovCath, starting this year perhaps and definitely next year, puts teams on the field that have much better athleticism than they have since 06. Varsity coaching becomes a very big factor of course, and I think that Highlands has one of the best coaching staffs in the state, so it won't surprise me if the Birds keep winning. I just think the games will be much closer than what we've gotten used to. CovCath has done some things to improve their program. Last year they brought in a new and better (to some degree) coaching staff; the football community at CovCath seems to once again be behind the coaches (brilliant move to get Lynn Ray back involved) and CovCath has started it's own 7th/8th grade program.

So it might be just a tad premature to say the rivalry has ended. If CovCath doesn't start becoming a lot more competitive this year or next, I might be inclined to agree with you though.