[sstack]

Personally I think you are being a little unfair to JC. Keep in mind that unlike Highlands, JC is not located in an urban area with a lot of high schools in a 20 minute drive area and there are still few schools in Eastern Ky (admittedly more than 5 years ago) that emphasize the pass. So in order for JC to find programs with a strong established passing game, it would mean lots of travel I would think. Some JC fan could give us some input on the proximity of strong passing teams to JC. In an era where most schools (I don't know about JC) are having big pressure placed to cut the transportation budget, placing out of area teams on the schedule is frowned upon. It's one of the reasons why Highlands has only one "far" game on the schedule this year (Manual) and why Highlands agreed to play Beechwood (a 1A team I'll point out).

You can make the counter argument that Highlands looked weak attempting to stop the strong running games of JC and Whitley and that was caused by the failure of Highlands to schedule more strong running teams (although I'll admit that Colerain fell into that category this year, but that was the only option/veer team we faced until the playoffs and based on JC and Whitley's success running the ball, Colerain wasn't enough to prepare us adequately for those two teams).

Each offensive system has it's strengths and weaknesses. One can ponder over the winter whether the outcome of the JC game would have been different had we played the game in poor weather conditions that would have made passing very difficult. IF the outcome had been different, we may be responding to posts by the JC faithful wondering why Highlands didn't put more teams that run the option/veer on their regular season schedule to better prepare us for the JC matchup.

Having said that, I do agree with you that not having many strong passing teams on JC's schedule hurt them in their preparation for Highlands and I wish Highlands would put a team like Belfry on their regular season schedule to help them prepare for teams like JC and Whitley. But because of budget issues, I don't think you are going to see that happen.

I agree with most of what you said. It is easier for HHS to play quality teams that are closer. However, HHS seems to travel almost ever year to Louisville, Lexington, Hopkinsville,ect. And as for travel cost, it probably costs HHS more for travel each year due to they do not have buses and have to rent buses even for games 20 mins away. As far as this years schedule, I do not think most people are to excited about it. I have heard nobody that is happy about playing Beechwood, We play each year IN preseason and it is not a close game(they have been blowouts). We will have to reschedule the Holmes game, so maybe they will replace that game with a good opponent.
As far as your commet about HHS not ready for the running game, that is where I disagreewith you and have to laugh. YOu should be giving your team more credit. The reason JC ran so well was they had a good line and were excellent at hiding the ball. HHS line was small and played bend but don't break defense all year. I think we both agree, Can't wait till football starts back up!