Just as our Oscoda Owls have a football game waaaaaaay down in Ohio tonight, Johnny thought he'd share his experience and maybe give you some kind of idea what might take place (besides an Owls win!).
First off, the team had to leave for Sherwood (Fairview HS about an hour west and a little south of the Toledo area) probably earlier than just a straight trip there because of the logistics. A bus for the players and coaches, a bus for the equipment, 2 spirit busses (Which Johnny didn't understand why they just didn't leave at like 2 or 3 pm) and around 9am off the whole carnival went, the whole team in new "Brandon Pride" shirts. Southbound and down.
When you get about 30 high school boys and young men together, hi-jinx will occur even with adult supervision. Bawdy limericks and poems, the odd can of beer passed around secretly, it seemed the longer the drive the more intense the nonsense became. Some slept if they could, some were annoyed and some kept up the pranking that is until the bus pulled into a Ponderosa so the hungry men of Ortonville went into the Ponderosa and ate all the foodz. Seriously, as Johnny recalls they started running out of certain things which made everything take longer to get us out of the restaurant, back on the bus, and over to meet our new 'friends' at Fairview HS.
There are few sounds as recognizable as a school bus air brake being let out on one of the 1970's school busses that lasted forever. As two busses parked outside Fairview High School, and the air brakes went off, a swarm of Fairview students all ran to the windows to look out at the newly arrived 'foreigners' from another state as if they had three eyes or two heads. Their curiosity quickly turned to rage as while the Fairview principal, staff and football coaches were welcoming the Brandon coaching staff and commenting what a great day this is and what a wonderful event this will be most of Johnny's teammates were flipping the bird and making faces at the Fairview students looking back. Who were these high school football equivalents of the Charlestown Chiefs from Slapshot? Look at those bus brigands. Shameful.
Coaches in general don't always tell their teams the whole truth. Sure, the NY Jets coach can tell them they're going to win with a third string QB in New England Sunday but deep down he knows that's not happening. The level of not telling the team the whole truth hit a new level of WTF when mid-afternoon as the Brandon squad had a walk-through on the Fairview field. "Hey coach, look down there in the end zone. Those are banners. State CHAMPIONSHIP banners." Yes dear readers, Fairview had won a couple state titles recently and this was now instantly dawning upon a team that had won three games in two seasons. Somehow this factoid was left out of the pre-game preparations.
Johnny distinctly remembers members of the team as game time grew closer making Michigan vs. Ohio State references. Maybe they drew strength from this.
Fairview had a lot of fans that night. A lot. Brandon games most nights attendance could be counted in about 2 minutes. Somehow, and this will remain a mystery until the end of days, someone from the Brandon team may have brushed against the Fairview giant two story totem pole (They had an Indian motif -- Johnny just Googled, they are the Apaches) and it got knocked over as the team ran onto the field. Johnny would think something that big and smashy might have been better anchored. Brandon played their best game that night in forever. Maybe it was guys thinking they were playing in the Michigan vs. OSU game after all. The little team from up north was trading blows with a far better and much bigger team. Guys who shied away from contact in practice since August were making hard tackles, running backs were breaking them. That Brandon pride was whooping and hollering at halftime as the team ran by the horizontal totem pole to the locker room as they trailed only 20-16. The second half was telling however as the better team with better players did beat Brandon (best estimate) about 37-22.
What does Johnny remember most about the long bus ride back home? Listening to one player who tore up his knee wince and yelp every time the bus took a bump hard which was all the way home.
No pranks, no cans of beer on the way back, just a really fun game and a great story.
Go Owls!
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