[tradition]

Again, please recognize that with all the changes in QB and RB the one constant has been the awesome play of the Highlands O-Line. They can make anyone look good.:Clap:

[lifelongbellfan50]

Congrats Highlands!!

[pigskin]

Again, please recognize that with all the changes in QB and RB the one constant has been the awesome play of the Highlands O-Line. They can make anyone look good.:Clap:

I agree, with Schlosser, Grubbs, Combs, Hahn, Meyers and Welz I think a good friend of mine(x-o lineman) could run through some of the holes made by the o line. The only problem would be the turf monster would jump up and trip him before he got to far.:notworthy

[whackem'n'stackem']

Again, please recognize that with all the changes in QB and RB the one constant has been the awesome play of the Highlands O-Line. They can make anyone look good.:Clap:

Sure, but this has nothing to do with what me and double stack are responding too. We are simply giving perspective on the difference between the 2 games. I don't think anyone is questioning the O line of Highlands....

[qryche11]

Highlands defense definitely stuff Elliot on Friday night. I think Elliot definitely seems like a loose cannon out there and certainly needs to grow up. If I am a D-1 college coach I am looking closely at not just his awesome running ability but also his attitude on the field. Nobody wants to sacrifice their program by taking a bad apple. I am only basing my assessment off of what I have read on other message boards about the first meeting with Highlands and what I saw on Friday night. I have also spoken to someone who knows Elliot's pee wee coach and they have commented that he has always had this attitude. Im not saying you have to be Mr. Nice guy out on the field but show some class and dont make yourself look bad. I think he has awesome running back instincts though and is very strong.

Tyler Fennell and the offensive line were the heroes on Friday night. Oh, and the stout defense.

[Stardust]

Highlands defense definitely stuff Elliot on Friday night. I think Elliot definitely seems like a loose cannon out there and certainly needs to grow up. If I am a D-1 college coach I am looking closely at not just his awesome running ability but also his attitude on the field. Nobody wants to sacrifice their program by taking a bad apple. I am only basing my assessment off of what I have read on other message boards about the first meeting with Highlands and what I saw on Friday night. I have also spoken to someone who knows Elliot's pee wee coach and they have commented that he has always had this attitude. Im not saying you have to be Mr. Nice guy out on the field but show some class and dont make yourself look bad. I think he has awesome running back instincts though and is very strong.

Tyler Fennell and the offensive line were the heroes on Friday night. Oh, and the stout defense.

What! Are you serious? Do you think college coaches seriously care about the charecter? Wow, I guess the stories that we hear EVERY week about the idiots that PLAY college athletics are from the charecter that they developed once they GOT to college?????? Not a chance. There is maybe 1% of all college coaches that seriously look at charecter as being the overall deciding factor on a stud! If they player is only going to be a marginal asset to the team, then yes, but studs, c'mon!

[qryche11]

What! Are you serious? Do you think college coaches seriously care about the charecter? Wow, I guess the stories that we hear EVERY week about the idiots that PLAY college athletics are from the charecter that they developed once they GOT to college?????? Not a chance. There is maybe 1% of all college coaches that seriously look at charecter as being the overall deciding factor on a stud! If they player is only going to be a marginal asset to the team, then yes, but studs, c'mon!

Disagree and I didnt say it was the overall deciding factor. If programs want to recruit bad apples let em but look at what it did to UC when Huggins turned a blind eye. You get a dose of Nancy Zimpher.

I personally think it hurts the kid and that is my opinion. If it doesnt then great for the kid and hope he has a nice college education and football career. However, you take that kind of attitude into the business world after colllege or into a relationship then you are in for a rude awakening.

[whackem'n'stackem']

Sorry but this kid is not D1 material.....

[NCC41]

What! Are you serious? Do you think college coaches seriously care about the charecter? Wow, I guess the stories that we hear EVERY week about the idiots that PLAY college athletics are from the charecter that they developed once they GOT to college?????? Not a chance. There is maybe 1% of all college coaches that seriously look at charecter as being the overall deciding factor on a stud! If they player is only going to be a marginal asset to the team, then yes, but studs, c'mon!

Especially when their character effects the game. Elliott cleary shoved Towles when he was out of bounds, which I believe eventually resulted in a field goal.

[Can you dig it?]

What! Are you serious? Do you think college coaches seriously care about the charecter? Wow, I guess the stories that we hear EVERY week about the idiots that PLAY college athletics are from the charecter that they developed once they GOT to college?????? Not a chance. There is maybe 1% of all college coaches that seriously look at charecter as being the overall deciding factor on a stud! If they player is only going to be a marginal asset to the team, then yes, but studs, c'mon!

:please:If the player in question can not only get the yards, but cost the team in yardage from stupid penalties, yeah, I think the coaches would care. That act gets old pretty fast.

[Stardust]

:please:If the player in question can not only get the yards, but cost the team in yardage from stupid penalties, yeah, I think the coaches would care. That act gets old pretty fast.

Didn't say I would want this kind of player on my team, but there a 1,000's of them. College coaches obviously don't put much credence in the players charecter, because they recruit them (actually fight to get them) every day.

[sstack]

Again, please recognize that with all the changes in QB and RB the one constant has been the awesome play of the Highlands O-Line. They can make anyone look good.:Clap:

Amen!!

[Schmilla88]

Sorry but this kid is not D1 material.....

If you are refering to Elliot, he is only a sophmore. I think its to early to tell and i know he is not D1 material right now, but alot can change in two years.

[charlie22]

If you are refering to Elliot, he is only a sophmore. I think its to early to tell and i know he is not D1 material right now, but alot can change in two years.

Very true. And those two years might not only approve his level of play, but also his maturity on the field. Let's face it Highlands fans, there are some kids on Highlands team (I won't name names) that just a couple of years ago displayed the same type of behavior that Elliot has displayed. Fortunately, with Dale's guidance and the "assistance" of some of the seniors, those Highlands kids have modified their on field behavior. Let's hope that the same holds true with Elliot. It's really tough on a very young kid for the coaches to pump up and encourage his "pound it" running style and then at the same time to expect him to not play "very aggressively". I think as he gets older and more mature, he'll tone his, at times, over the top behavior down to a more acceptable level.

I didn't buy into the hype of some that he is one of the best running backs in the state this year. He's not. But he is one of the best sophomore running backs I've seen in quite a while. If the kid keeps working (and I'm told that such will not be an issue) he could turn into one of the top running backs in the state in the future, maybe as soon as next year. Hopefully he will emotionally mature right along with his improvement as a running back.

[charlie22]

give me a break! Did you attend this game? Bardo was used very little, and when he was used he made huge plays. This team hurts more from not having Bardo run the team, than missing Collingsworth at RB. By the way, I am not saying Collingsworth is no good, he is a great player!

I'm not necessarily directing this post just to you, but obviously the best qb on the team was Bardo before he got hurt and obviously the best rb on the team was Collinsworth before he got hurt. That's why they were picked as the starters over the back ups. There's no arguing against that point. But Towles and Fennell have filled in extremely well and both are doing a great job. Highlands fans need to continue to support them and not nit pick their performances. As good as Bardo and Collinsworth are, Bardo make some mistakes as the starter as did Collinsworth, so it's kind of unrealistic to think that Towles and Fennell won't.

whackem, I was at the game and Towles did not look nervous at all to me. He way over threw Buten on one long pass to get rid of the ball. Smart move. The wind affected some of his passes, as it did with Hempel who is Ryle's very accomplished and talented qb. My strong belief is that it would have affected Bardo's passes if he had been healthy and playing qb. But Towles threw some really nice passes that he should be credited for. Several were bullets: one to Welz, one to Drennen and one to Buten as I recall. Towles, while he may not have Bardo's speed, ran the ball very well when asked to do so. Most importantly with the surrounding talent on the offense, he didn't do any thing that hurt the team. Rather, he played within himself; made some very nice plays; and didn't let the pressure of playing against a very good team get to him, in a game that I'm sure he knew would result in comparisons with how Highlands played against Ryle the first time this year when Bardo was the qb. That demonstrated a lot of maturity and confidence to me.

Fennell played a great game at running back. He runs hard and low, and has better moves than he's often given credit for. What a great luxury to have such a talented back up at the running back position. He's the wrong guy to play qb in the wildcat by the way. He's short, has short arms and small hands. When your center has been snapping the shot gun snap all season long to guys 6'4" and you ask him to lose the muscle memory learned in all those snaps and snap it to Fennell who is 5'10" or so, you are placing the center and Fennell in positions that it's hard for them to be successful. Dale realized it and later put Bardo at the qb position in the wildcat.

Birds O line again opened up some really nice holes. Frankly, the Raiders could not defend the counter. Hahn and Schlosser did a great job trapping and then left it up to Fennell to pick up the yards. Wide receivers did a very good job blocking. At times in the past they've had a problem with their blocking, but they have been doing a much, much better job of it as of late. Keep it up.

I thought the Birds defense again played another very nice game, particularly stopping Elliot. First game this year he's been held under 100 yds rushing. Tough to single out just a few players on a defense that played very well as a unit, but I thought Rosenhagen, Dierig and Roller again had extremely strong games.

One other point: so much attention gets focused on the seniors this year (and perhaps rightly so. They didn't lose a game as frosh and since they joined the varsity as sophomores, they've only lost one game at the varsity level over the last 3 years), but kids in the other classes have made huge contributions to this year's team and without them, we wouldn't be so successful. Hahn and Meyer on the O line; Streeter at a running back; Towles filling in for Bardo; Bruns, Seidl and Abner in the defensive secondary; Quillen, Nienaber, Huddleston and Sullivan at the linebacking spots. At a school our size, you have to have talented seniors that provide strong leadership, but you also have to have the talented kids in the junior and sophomore classes step up and play great football. They've done that in spades. Keep it up. :Thumbs:

[pigskin]

I'm not necessarily directing this post just to you, but obviously the best qb on the team was Bardo before he got hurt and obviously the best rb on the team was Collinsworth before he got hurt. That's why they were picked as the starters over the back ups. There's no arguing against that point. But Towles and Fennell have filled in extremely well and both are doing a great job. Highlands fans need to continue to support them and not nit pick their performances. As good as Bardo and Collinsworth are, Bardo make some mistakes as the starter as did Collinsworth, so it's kind of unrealistic to think that Towles and Fennell won't.

whackem, I was at the game and Towles did not look nervous at all to me. He way over threw Buten on one long pass to get rid of the ball. Smart move. The wind affected some of his passes, as it did with Hempel who is Ryle's very accomplished and talented qb. My strong belief is that it would have affected Bardo's passes if he had been healthy and playing qb. But Towles threw some really nice passes that he should be credited for. Several were bullets: one to Welz, one to Drennen and one to Buten as I recall. Towles, while he may not have Bardo's speed, ran the ball very well when asked to do so. Most importantly with the surrounding talent on the offense, he didn't do any thing that hurt the team. Rather, he played within himself; made some very nice plays; and didn't let the pressure of playing against a very good team get to him, in a game that I'm sure he knew would result in comparisons with how Highlands played against Ryle the first time this year when Bardo was the qb. That demonstrated a lot of maturity and confidence to me.

Fennell played a great game at running back. He runs hard and low, and has better moves than he's often given credit for. What a great luxury to have such a talented back up at the running back position. He's the wrong guy to play qb in the wildcat by the way. He's short, has short arms and small hands. When your center has been snapping the shot gun snap all season long to guys 6'4" and you ask him to lose the muscle memory learned in all those snaps and snap it to Fennell who is 5'10" or so, you are placing the center and Fennell in positions that it's hard for them to be successful. Dale realized it and later put Bardo at the qb position in the wildcat.

Birds O line again opened up some really nice holes. Frankly, the Raiders could not defend the counter. Hahn and Schlosser did a great job trapping and then left it up to Fennell to pick up the yards. Wide receivers did a very good job blocking. At times in the past they've had a problem with their blocking, but they have been doing a much, much better job of it as of late. Keep it up.

I thought the Birds defense again played another very nice game, particularly stopping Elliot. First game this year he's been held under 100 yds rushing. Tough to single out just a few players on a defense that played very well as a unit, but I thought Rosenhagen, Dierig and Roller again had extremely strong games.

One other point: so much attention gets focused on the seniors this year (and perhaps rightly so. They didn't lose a game as frosh and since they joined the varsity as sophomores, they've only lost one game at the varsity level over the last 3 years), but kids in the other classes have made huge contributions to this year's team and without them, we wouldn't be so successful. Hahn and Meyer on the O line; Streeter at a running back; Towles filling in for Bardo; Bruns, Seidl and Abner in the defensive secondary; Quillen, Nienaber, Huddleston and Sullivan at the linebacking spots. At a school our size, you have to have talented seniors that provide strong leadership, but you also have to have the talented kids in the junior and sophomore classes step up and play great football. They've done that in spades. Keep it up. :Thumbs:

Very well said, I couldn't have said it any better!!! This team consists of more than seniors but the senior leadership does help. I have been very impressed with the underclassmen stepping in and doing a great job.:Thumbs:

[Can you dig it?]

But he is one of the best sophomore running backs I've seen in quite a while.

No question about that. I just wonder if he has the kind of team structure at Ryle that would allow for someone to bust his chops and get him thinking about limiting the stupid plays. I saw him three times this year, and it didn't look like anyone came close to getting through to him if they did indeed try.

[whackem'n'stackem']

Towles is a very good QB. I am a big supporter of this new offense too. He was pressured by Ryle more than any other defense and he forced a couple throws b/c of it. I offer nothing but constructive criticism. Towles is a special athlete to come in and do what he's done for this Bluebird team. I honestly think they have no chance w/o him. And also, anyone who knows anything about the Bluebirds this year would not dare draw comparisons to the first game between these two teams. You guys need to quit mentioning Bardo and Towles in the same sentence. It's unfair.