Final thoughts from Pearland-Kempner

My first visit to The Rig was everything I thought it would be. What a great facility for football. I think I had the greatest seat in the house, and it wasn’t even in the press box. Channel 13 took up most of the seats for its television broadcast on digital sub-channel 13.2, much to the chagrin of the Pearland staff and the rest of the media! In any case, I ended up sitting next to the press box out in the open on a beautifully breezy low-humidity evening.

(The view was spectacular … you could see every major landmark for 20 miles, including downtown Houston, Transco Tower and the 2,000-foot blinking radio/TV towers in Fort Bend County.)

To the game ... Pearland was far more dominant than even I expected. Maybe the second half against Madison last week was a clue, but the Oilers came out Thursday night and KO'd Kempner pretty early. I didn't think it was in the first quarter, when quarterback Sam Allen among others told me they saw Kempner getting tired, but by then all the momentum was clearly Pearland's.

Besides the offensive line's spectacular performance - I can remember at least seven or eight big-yardage plays where the rusher was completely untouched - the Oilers' no-huddle offense was run to a 'T.'

“We’ll learn it – the coaches as well as the players – but we feel like for us to win this is what we have to do,” coach Tony Heath said. “We don’t have a big offensive line so we have to get set and reduce what sets and packages the defense can run against us. Like I said, it’s something … we’re buying into it. At this point, we’re buying into it.”

I don’t know how much of the result can attributed to Pearland having one game under its belt while Kempner was opening its season, but the players thought that was a big factor.

“It definitely did … first-game jitters and all that,” said Pearland running back Josh Gonzalez, who had three touchdowns in his five carries. “It definitely had an impact.”

Other stuff:
* Cy Falls is 0-2 after tonight's loss to Westfield. Even so, the game with North Shore next week at the Berry Center should be a blast.

* How about Seven Lakes?! They piled up 51 points on Fort Bend Dulles tonight, winning by 37. Chad's story isn't in yet but I can't wait to see how the Spartans won. Congrats to them. Who'd have figured Morton Ranch and Seven Lakes would have a better record than Katy so far??