Otis4411 & West Craven folks traveling to South Granville

[tarheelg]

Hello from South Granville; hearing through the grapevine that you have quite an athlete in RB Jonquez Green, saw on a post you wrote 2 weeks ago that you were missing 13-14 players earlier this season; are any of them back yet? We have a couple of guys that have essentially missed the season, injured in Week 1 or Week 2 and have not dressed since August, not much depth but the guys out there sure have produced for us, I can only think of one guy that would be listed as a starter both ways, but almost everybody who gets a lot of playing time is in the two deep depth chart on both sides of the ball

Would love to chat before the game, I'll be there early this Friday, either in the press box for much of the time, but also possibly milling around near the field house/concession stand area and/or sidelines before the game

I see that google maps is recommending taking US 264 West to I 540 West to NC 50 North, I would NOT recommend that on a Friday afternoon....Instead, from US 264/64, I would take Exit 435 in Zebulon for NC 96 North, and the best way to go straight to the school from there is take 96 North all the way (beware, it turns a lot, just follow the signs) to NC 56 West, then the school is five miles ahead on the right

If you're looking to eat out before the game, there are some fast food places right there in Zebulon where you get off of 264, or there a lot more choices in Wake Forest; you could take 96 North from 264 to NC 98 West and it will take you into Wake Forest, from there, don't go back to 96, just get back on 98 West and take it to 50 North

The field is at the school on NC 56 (address is 701 Crescent Dr.) in Creedmoor...If you do drive up NC 50 North (from 540 or 98) and go through downtown Creedmoor, you would take a right to get on NC 56 East to get to the school, if you waited to eat out close to the school, there are some fast food places in the Butner/Creedmoor area about 4 miles from the school where 56 crosses Interstate 85, to get there, you would take a left on NC 56 West from NC 50 North

 

[rambbq]

tarheelg...When Reidsville played there several years...the people could not have been nicer...but I do remember the visiting side having limited seating....just curious if that has improved since then?? if not...I recommend WC fans getting there early to get a good seat because they are at a premium on the visiting side...Still trying to figure out how we stole that game from y'all that year.........................

 

[tarheelg]

For that Reidsville game, we heard to expect a big crowd and borrowed a bunch of visitor bleachers from other schools in the county.....as of last week's Washington game, it looked like we had moved all of the baseball bleachers to the visitor side to make sure we meet the state's requirement for minimum seating available at a playoff game, but still not a huge amount

It'll be hard to improve visitor seating as long as we are forced to have a baseball/football multiplex field; there's been talk of building one of them separate somewhere else since before I was here, have been multiple rumors and ideas about it, but something always falls through, the few visitor bleachers we have right now for football are right around what would be the dirt infield and what would be shallow left field for baseball

If West Craven doesn't bring more folks than Washington, they'll be fine, the Pam Pack brought the band who took up almost one whole section of the temporary bleachers and it still looked like there were plenty of empty seats over there

About that South Granville/Reidsville game in the 2nd Rd in 2011, Probably the most agonizing loss I've dealt with in football here in 13 years, definitely in the top five, I'll never forget the great pregame ceremony on Veterans Day with all veterans from both fan bases being invited to line up on the 50 yard line for the national anthem; seemed like about 2/3 of the Reidsville fans were on the field right then, about the game, I still don't know how we lost either...20-0 lead with the ball in mid 3rd quarter; whole game changed on one play....play action fake and QB gets blindsided before getting to look downfield, ball goes flying; tailor made scoop and score, no idea who made the hit, but just checked my records to see it was #75 Mike Lee who ran it all the way back with 4:25 to go in 3rd Qtr and make it 20-7. From there, we turned it over on downs on next series, stuffed on 4th & a long 1 or short 2 at Reidsville 43, then Rams go on 9 play, 57 yard drive to make it 20-14. Our next drive looked promising, then our star RB that had 136 yds in 1st half and finished with 186 lost a fumble. SG needed a big play on defense and got it with an INT of a Dominique Shoffner pass at our own 9 yard line, but from there, our offense could only manage one first down before having to punt again, then came that epic Reidsville drive, late 4th Qtr, converted two 4th downs along the way and scored to take the lead on extra point 21-20, exact score from a similar 2nd Rd game we lost to Northwood in overtime two years earlier, and in both cases involving a missed extra point. We did drive into Ram territory, somehow got off 10 plays in 1:07 of time on clock, but ran out of time, needed a miracle on last play but pass fell incomplete....lost a few seniors from that team but the core group stayed together two more years and lost 21-15 in 2nd Rd at South Columbus in 2012, and lost in 1st Rd at home in 2013, after having probably best regular season in school history at 9-2 (until 2017's 11-0) had the misfortune of drawing a talented, fast, deep Hertford Co. team, who probably should have been playing at home themselves, but they finished in a 3 way tie for 2nd in their conference and drew the short straw

 

[rambbq]

thanks for the recap...after your play by play I do remember it happening...just kept waiting for the shoe to drop and the comeback to be stalled but the Rams made the plays they had to make...........I know it was a heartbreak for your kids....but our kids and fans got their heart broken in the Eastern finals to Kinston later that year...losing on a hail mary as time expired.....geez...that hurt...we had that game................

 

[tarheelg]

And then Kinston went to state finals and was up on West Stokes 22-0 in 1st Quarter, looked like the rest of the game would be a coronation, then lost 28-22 I think

 

[rambbq]

yeah...I would like to think we would've handled West Stokes...we had been in the conference with them just a couple of year before and they had never beaten us...

 

[tarheelg]

I'm still surprised with the way Reidsville wiped up the floor with Cummings in the 3rd Rd that year....lost in regular season then beat them by 20 or 30 on the road in the playoffs

 

[Otis4411]

TarHeelg I will be in the back of the endzone with the endzone camera. I don't run it but I sit with them. I'll have a red/black #3 Earnhardt coat on. Would love to talk it up.
I coached Greens dad in little league so I get a real kick out of watching his son run. I'm not sure if we are getting any kids back or not. We lost almost all of them early in our non conf schedule. I've never seen this many injuries to our team in my 58 years. I don't know what to expect. They have surprised me so much. The season has been a real enjoyment. Win or lose I'm proud of them for not giving up. I have a friend that was there last week with his son that plays at Washington. He talks like #7 is special also. I'm going to eat at Fargos in Zebulon and take 96. My buddy told me it was the best way to avoid the rush hour traffic. I hope to be there close to 6:30.

 

[tarheelg]

Yes, try to avoid 540 at rush hour....15 years ago it was great when it was the way to avoid the rush on 440 and 70 and 1 and other secondary roads in Raleigh but these days it's just another road that you want to avoid....best way to avoid traffic from Fargo Steakhouse will be to take 96 North out of Zebulon, through Youngsville to Wilton, where you turn left on NC 56 West and the school will be five miles ahead on the right, just after you pass Food Lion

 

[tarheelg]

About #7 Allajah Mitchell, yes he is a special athlete, is one of six or seven backs that might get carries for the Vikings every week, he was primarily a defensive end the last two years, who got a couple of carries early this season when a couple of other guys were injured; he only averages 7 carries a game, but a lot of times it works out like the Washington game....8 carries for 186 yards, 5 times they stuffed him at the line for no gain or 2 or 3 yards, but the other 3 carries, he broke out for 50 yards or more

And as a stat guy, I love the end zone camera by the way...the view from our press box is not very high so very often I can't see who makes tackles....and the camera view from the press box is no better than watching it live if it's a cluster of 8 bodies right around the line of scrimmage to see who to give tackles and assists to, but from the end zone camera, I can see almost everything and make sure the stats entered into maxpreps are accurate, so yes, #7 did really have 40 tackles for a loss last year, and yes he really does have 36.5 this year

 

[Otis4411]

The guy from Washington said he didn't know why you didn't give him the ball every play. lol

Talking about the endzone camera we started using a regular led tv at home games hooked to it. About 37" maybe. We have a retired coach that is getting on up there that will sit with us and he can watch it better. He played lb at Georgia when they didn't have a facemask.

 

[tarheelg]

Well, again, when you are a team lacking depth and forced to rotate in a bunch of guys playing both ways to be able to substitute at all, and want them to be effective on defense, you can't run them into the ground on offense and overwork them

 

[Otis4411]

Fargo's is closed. Out of bidness!! Is there a good steakhouse in Creedmore? I thought we discussed this in this thread but I'm missing it.

Applebys in Wake Forrest.

 

[Otis4411]

Congrats Tarheelg! South Granville is a well coached team. Great execution of their offense and defense. I told you if you came out and scored on us early and got a big play I felt it would get away from us. Just been a tough bad week. The injuries we had this year finally caught up with us. We just couldn't match up. Mitchell is special. Do I need to send him a Wolfpack shirt??

 

[tarheelg]

Thanks for walking over to find me in the press box; I was really impressed by some of the plays in the open field that Eagle tacklers made against Mitchell. There was a kickoff return, and three other plays in the game around the line of scrimmage where a defender had an angle or had him contained, and actually made a solo tackle, when all season long in a similar situation where we have seen him run right through a tackle, or just run around a guy that appeared to have him contained. Be careful sending shirts; probably some kind of a recruiting violation, but actually he already has one...along with multiple other teams. Glad you had a safe trip, and I didn't see your message about eating out until I got home after the game. Glad you found Wake Forest ok; really so many good places to eat right there off of 98, 1, 1A; I would have recommended Texas Roadhouse about 3/4 mile away from the Applebees, South Granville is in the 3rd Rd for the first time since 1975, (back when the 3rd Rd were the regional finals) the Vikings will be visiting a very good North Davidson team, I'm curious to hear more details from the ND crowd from their two games against Ledford