CasualObserver70

Just got back from watching an outstanding game. Thought for a second that Gilmer was about to pull the most improbable rabbit out of it's hat imaginable. But Carthage was the better team and really deserved to win. BTW, the pass play by Carthage that was intercepted in the end zone wasn't a bad call. The ball was slightly overthrown, and Gilmer's DB made an unbelievable play. But don't bash the coach. If the play works, the game is over right there. Gilmer's offense (like many spread offenses) wants to create mismatches. They want a team to play a nickel package or drop their linebackers really deep so they can run the ball. Then, if a team adjusts by putting 8 in the box, they will throw and tear a team apart. But Carthage was able to effectively stop the run with their front four. Gilmer played better in the 3rd & 4th quarters because the abandoned the run and just passed almost exclusively. But Carthage had a good defense. Really big front four and a lot of speed at linebacker and secondary. On offense, Carthage was a beast. Dwight Smith is the best running back I've seen this year. But their backup running back was awfully good also. And their quarterback was able to hit his receivers enough to move the chains. #13 for Carthage (didn't get his name) was an excellent receiver. Carthage converted several big plays by throwing the slant to him. Carthage ran the ball all night long against Gilmer. In retrospect, the play of the game might have been the interception w/ 5 minutes to go before half. Gilmer had finally gotten something going on offense when the int. occurred. Carthage drove the ball the length of the field and kicked a field goal. Carthage one by three. I really think this is the best team Gilmer has played all year. They were certainly better than WOS. I think they were also better than Kilgore. (I know, Kilgore beat both of these teams, but I think by the end of the season both teams could have beaten Kilgore). They were certainly the better team tonight, and they deserved to win. I would love for them to win state, because I'd like to think Gilmer lost to the state champs 3 years in a row. I'd also like to see someone other than Liberty Hill win. Gilmer has had a great season, and they have nothing to be ashamed about. I will holler for Longview, Maud, Daingerfield, and Carthage throughout the rest of the playoffs, and hopefully, they can bring some hardware back to East Texas. BTW, both teams were very classy. Sportsmanship was shown on both sides of the ball.

Regardless of the outcome on Friday night, during the week The Tiger nation will outsmack any teams homers on this thread. "I know ____________ are homers, but they do a good job on the radio of calling the game." "Yes, we lost. Congrats to ______________, they beat us fair and square. But we really should have one the game if......" "Where's the link?"

POLL: Who's the better team, ____________________________ vs 83 Daingerfield Tigers

Wow, it's going to be hard to keep up with this post. Let me comment quickly on a couple of issues. First, coach Traylor. I remember a couple of years ago, Gilmer had just lost to Liberty Eyleau, and Coach Traylor was sitting at our church Christmas party. He was talking about Curtis Brown enrolling in UT. You could quickly tell as he talked the he was deeply invested in this young man's life. He was of course devastated by the loss (just the week before), but he was more excited about seeing a young person take positive steps in his life to enroll in college. Jeff is passionate, and he loves his kids. He is always willing to take the fall for them when they fail, and I have never seen him blame a student. He works them hard and expects a lot out of them. His passion carries onto the field, and sometimes he goes beserk when he sees a bad call. Sometimes he crosses the line, and even he would admit that. But I'd rather have a head coach that is that passionate but still cares about kids than one who didn't. As AOB stated, he certainly sees coaching as a calling and not a job. Second, Upshur County relationships. You guys better stop naming who you're related to, or you're going to discover you married your 4th cousin! Heck, everyone in Upshur County is related to each other in some way. I'm kind of scared of who I should allow my daughter to marry, because it may be my 2nd cousin's great aunt's sister's son. Now to the game. Of course I'm gonna root for Gilmer. I won't predict a score, but I do laugh at those who are picking Carthage or Gilmer to win by over 40. Please! These two teams are too good for this game to be a blowout unless something crazy happens like an injury. I will say this: WOS had the ball for 8 minutes to start the 1st quarter and drove the field. The end result: a field goal. Gilmer had the ball 2 1/2 minutes and was leading 7-3. Gilmer has always employed a bend but don't break defense. Carthage could even outgain Gilmer and probably lose the game. Don't know how this one will go, but it will be a doozy. Now where's that Tinker's dang Hex?

It's obvious that several things are going to need to occur very quickly on this post. First, Buckeye 62 needs to get in here immediately with his Tinker's Dang Hex. Next, Tiger nation needs to get over hear and start adding to the smack. As to the game, I haven't seen Carthage play, so I can't comment on them. I can tell by looking at film that they are big. But Gilmer has played teams bigger than them all year. Luis Castro is a 185 lb defensive end, for crying out loud (and that may be adding weight to him). But Gilmer has speed, quickness, and gang tackles. Defensively, most every game I've seen them play has been a testiment to their intensity. But Carthage is probably the best offense they've seen all year. (Kilgore might have been better, I'm not sure). It's really funny. Gilmer plays one of the best games they've played all year against one of the toughest teams they've faced all year, and their reward is to play a better team. Such is the playoffs. Either team should beat the region IV represetnative and go to the championship game. Good luck to both teams, but if Carthage things they can hang with the smack of AOB, Jhawks, Tinkers Dang, and the Tiger nation, they got another thing coming.

Excellent game by the Buckeyes. They played as well as I have seen them play all year. Some people love to rant and rave about Coach Traylor. It's laughable, really, when he's one of the winningest coaches in 3A. But today's game showed exactly what kind of Mad Scientist he is. Gilmer's 1st two TD's were trick plays. Gilmer executed extremely well, and the coaches called a great game. I thought the 4th quarter showed the importance of Gilmer's depth. WOS had several players going both ways, and by the end of the game, they were a step slower than Gilmer. Gilmer didn't sack the WOS quarterback a lot, but they put extreme pressure on him in the 4th quarter, and that kept them from being able to move the ball. Exciting game to watch. I know the Gilmer Carthage arguement will be wild and crazy, but this one is worth savoring for a while. BTW, Gilmer has exceeded all expectations for this year with making it to the regional finals.

Talked to some of the coaches yesterday, and they thought WOS had the best defense they had seen since Atlanta in '03. That's high praise indeed. This game goes back once again to the defense. I just can't see Gilmer lighting up the scoreboard against WOS. If they win, it will be a low scoring affair. But Gilmer's defense (with the exception of the 2nd half against Mexia) has been excellent all year long. Can the defense keep Gilmer in the game, and will the offense break enough big plays to win? I have no problem with a Gilmer homer poster predicting WOS to win. I just hope that all the Gilmer players expect Gilmer to win. I definitely agree that the team that scores the most points will win. Such wisdom will soon make this board irrelevant.

Only once did Gilmer play this year when I though they would lose, and that was to Kilgore. I'm not sure they will lose to WO-S, but this will be a very tight game. WO-S has the type of team that can beat Gilmer: a team with a lot of speed on Defense. I don't think Gilmer will score a lot of points on WO-S. There best chance of winning is for the Defense to play lights out, and have a 21-7 type score. Go Buckeyes.

Hats off to Slikk, Kevnasty, Franksnbeans, and the rest of Tiger Nation. Any post 59 pages long is worth of praise. Hats of to Daingerfield too. Looks like the Tigers may have a state championship in their sights.

Wade had 347 yards rushing in only 3 quarters. He has 170 yards rushing after 2 plays! Quite unstoppable. Any time NB lined up in an unbalanced line and ran to the strong side, Community didn't have an answer. They were always outnumberd at the point of attack. And Wade could make the 1st person miss (and on one run in the 3rd quarter, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th person miss) all game. Don't know anything about Kaufman, but NB is obviously a quality team. Would love to see them face Celina in Regional Final.

I hear a lot about how Gilmer chokes in the playoffs. This almost became a classic choke. From the beginning of last week, this looked like a trap game. There's a 15 page thread on Gilmer / Carthage, there's West Orange Stark looming as the next opponent, and there's most everyone assuming Gilmer rolls over Mexia. Then Gilmer goes up 28-7 at half, and the team falls asleep. Certainly Gilmer almost got themselves into a bad mess. Not taking anything away from Mexia. They certainly played an outstanding game, and Gentry ran hard all night. Thought the play calling went ultra conservative in the 2nd half. Gilmer comes out and has 2 passes dropped that could have been touchdowns or first downs, and then they completely go away from the pass. They won't be able to run on West Orange Stark. If they can't pass (or in this case catch) the ball, they won't win next week. If the defense plays as poorly, they won't win next week. But hopefully this is the hiccup game of the playoffs. Hopefully, they'll play better next week. Lufkin looks like a nice place to be come Saturday at 2:30.

Right now, there is more activity on the Carthage - Gilmer post (a game that might never happen) than the Gilmer - Mexia post. I know that's what fans do, but I sure hope the players don't. I'm really sure the coaches won't. Gilmer plays Mexia Friday night, a team good enough to make it to the 2nd round of the playoffs. That's enough to make this a challenging game.

And the number one reason Daingerfield doesn't want to play White Oak? Daingerfield doesn't want to be playing basketball.

West Rusk has had a great year and is obviously a great team, but I don't see them beating Daingerfield. Dfield by a least two TDs.

I thought Gilmer really played well tonight. There is one area where they can still improve: The long ball. A couple of times, receivers slowed down or stopped and Stump overthrew them. And their were a couple of drops. I know that's nit picking when a team plays as well as Gilmer did tonight, but it's something they can work on for the future, and will need to work on if they keep going in the playoffs. Defense did an outstanding job tonight, and Godfrey was really on all night. Even with the wind blowing, he was very accurate. All of Gilmer's RBs played well tonight as well. I know everyone wants to talk about Gilmer - Carthage. I guess that's natural since the game was played in Carthage. But that's three weeks and four ifs away. If Gilmer wins next week, If Carthage wins next week, yada yada yada. I think Gilmer will be much more focused on Mexia than Carthage. BTW, Carthage has a really nice stadium. One of the best in 3A I've seen.

Between Kendall Wright and Robert Griffin Baylor has the two most exciting Freshman in the Big 12.

Region III in 3A has Navasota, West Orange Stark, Waco La Vega, Gilmer, Chapel Hill, & Carthage. Some went large school, some small school, but I think that's like 5 out of the top ten schools in 3A in the same region.

Okay, here we go again. The Diboll - Gilmer game gets mentioned, and the first thing everyone posts is about Diboll's offense. Now I'm not disrespecting Diboll's offense one bit, but if Diboll beats Gilmer, it won't be because of their offense. It will be because their defense stops Gilmer's offense. So someone please tell me about Diboll's defense. How good is it? How is their secondary? How much speed do they have on defense? How many players go both ways? I hope (and think) Gilmer will win. But the game will be decided by Diboll's defense, not their offense.

20-0 in the first quarter. Gilmer is running wild. Jeremy Jackson has 100+ yards already.

There are way too many if's in a scenario like that. If the playoffs prove anything, it's that a team that is supposed to win unexpectedly loses. Carthage, Gilmer, West Orange Stark, La Vega, all of them have to win, and upsets can happen. Best to just take it one game at a time. However, a quick look at 3A this year does make it clear that Region III is the toughest looking region out there.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Tatum the last team to beat Gilmer in district play? The game is in Tatum. Big rivalry game, with the unbeaten district streak on the line. Gilmer needs to get on track for the playoffs. If all these aren't reasons to be inspired and ready to play, I don't know what is. Gilmer / Tatum is a great rivalry, but with a ton of respect. This makes for a good game, even with Tatum being down this year.

Faulty logic is the doom of many an argument, and most Gladewater posters on here are suffering from faulty logic. Their logic runs this way: Gladewater's offense is awesome. Gladewater's offense is better than any offense Gilmer has played. Therefore, Gladewater will beat Gilmer. This is the core problem with that logic: Teams that beat Gilmer (and that doesn't happen very often) beat them because of their defense. Gladewater's offense may be great, but if their defense cannot shut down Gilmer's O, then the score will wind up 56-35 (or some other type margin). Every post on here has been about how good Gladewater's offense is. Forget the offense; how good is Gladewater's defense? This is a typical Gilmer game. Team comes in to play Gilmer. Gilmer scores on first possession, 7-0. Gilmer kicks off, other team drives 10 plays, 60 yards, stalls at Gilmer's 30. Gilmer scores in 3 plays, 14-0. Gilmer pooch kicks, team fumbles, four plays later it's 21-0. Suddenly, the other team's offense is irrelevant: they have to become 1 dimensional in an attempt to get back into the game. They start throwing more than they like, and they are intercepted. Run back all the way for a touchdown, 28-0. And the rout is on (just ask Chapel Hill). Now, if a team has a great defense, and their defense has the ability to shut down Gilmer's offense, and that team can therefore stay in their game plan for longer, then they have a chance of winning. But no post up here is bragging about Gladewater's defense, just their offense. I predict a Gilmer Win b/c I don't think Gladewater can win a track meet with Gilmer, and I don't think Gladewater's D can keep it from becoming a track meet.

This one will be ugly. Very Ugly. Too bad it's not played on Halloween, b/c it's gonna be scary.

Gilmer is holding some kids out. Not really injured, but sore. They don't want them agravating any mild injury. But I don't think it will matter. Gilmer still will win by 40.

The Spread is definitely the most popular of the offenses out there at this time. It has certainly become the "IT" offense. But I've seen programs win with the spread, wing T, wishbone, veer, etc. Certainly execution of the offense is more important than what type of offense is run. Teams that run the spread really well run it from 7th grade up, and teams that execute the wing T to perfection do the same thing. However, if you follow football from high school through the pros, nobody runs the spread or the wing T in the NFL. The reason is simple: the athletes on Defens in the NFL are too big and fast for either offense to work (By the way, UT showed that team speed on defense can stop a spread in the college level, just ask Missouri). It really is the reason I like high school football so much. You still see a variety of offenses, not the same old vanilla West Coast offense every week. The one advantage the spread has over the other offenses is that kids seem to like playing in it. It fits the fast paced, basketball on turf, run and throw mentality. It's high scoring and fun. And that tends to keep kids in the program (but winning does that too).