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JCmtstmt ©cttljj djmmutl FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2006 The Home Journal s SANDLOT ON DECK High school Softball Today ■ Northside at Brookwood Invitational (through Saturday), times and teams to be deter mined Saturday ■ Northside at Brookwood Invitational (through Saturday), times and teams to be deter mined High school Cross country Saturday ■ Northside and Warner Robins at Mercer Invitational, time to be determined High school Football Today ■ Perry at Henry County, 7:30 p.m. ■ Houston County at Warner Robins, 7:30 p.m. IN BRIEF WR Rec to begin basketball registration The Warner Robins Recreation Department will begin basketball registration Oct. 21. It will be held from 8 a.m.-1 p.m. at the department’s office- off Watson Blvd. Fees are as follows: $25 for city residents, SSO for county residents and SBS for out of county residents. Participants must be at least 5 by Dec. 31 in order to partici pate in the basketball program. Registration will continue until filled, during regular business hours, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday- Friday. Booster clubs to hold 4 quarters for cancer Warner Robins and Houston County's booster clubs will be heading a fund-raising effort sponsored by the Rally Foundation called 4 quarters 4 cancer at today's game. All money collected will go directly to funding research to cure and prevent childhood cancer. Perry’s boys track team to sell Fair tickets The Perry High School boys track team will be holding a fund-raiser. The group will be selling a three-day student pass (ages 11-18) for the Georgia Nationa Fair. The tickets are for gate admission and cost $lO (a savings of $8). The pass is good for Oct. IQ -12. Tickets can be purchased at the Perry High School front office. The last day to buy will be today. Money raised will help buy uniforms and equipment for the team. Contact Cassandra Dixon at 988-6299 for more. Houston County YMCA to hold spruce-up day The Houston County YMCA has set a spruce-up day for Saturday. During that time will get together to update the inte rior of the building. The time will be from 7:30 a.m.-2 p.m. and the organization is looking for 50 volunteers to help out. A continental breakfast will also be provided. The facility is located on the corner of Moody Road and State Road 96. Call 922-2566 for more infor mation. Museum to host Georgia Invitational golf tourney The 17th Annual Museum of Aviation Foundation Georgia Invitational Golf Tournament will be held Thursday-Friday at the Pine Oaks Golf Club at Robins Air Force Base. The total value of prizes and giveaways is more than $30,000.* Golfers receive a commemora tive golf shirt, a Thursday night traditional “Plantation Supper,’’ luncheon buffets and a barbe cue awards dinner. The single player fee is $250. Sponsors and players can sign up by calling the Museum of Aviation at 478-923-6600 or by emailing june.lowe@museumofaviation. org or marylynn.harrison@mus eumofaviation.org. Warner Robins versus Houston Count) For Demons game has turned into ‘a nice rivalry’ By MATTHEW BROWN Journal Sports Writer Warner Robins vs. Northside has for years carried the label of the “city championship” game for high school football. In the 19905, along came Houston County High School. The Bears have had their share of winning sea sons and playoff appearances, but always seem to come up short when paired up with the two long-time established programs nicknamed the Demons and the Eagles. Houston County already took its stab at the Northside Eagles in week No. 1 of the 2006 season and came up short yet again. However, with a three-game winning streak, the Bears may be feeling as good as ever about finally knocking off a county foe. Warner Robins High and Houston County each enter Region 1-AAAAA competition this weekend against each other at McConnell-Talbert Stadium. For the last two seasons, this was an opening week non region showdown with too-close-for comfort results. One of those was a tied score in 2004, the same year the Demons went on to win the Class AAAA state championship in the rookie season for head coach Bryan Way. “It’s developing into a nice rival ry,” said Way, whose team just stopped a little two-game skid with a rout of Beach High at home. “A lot of our kids went to middle school with their kids, and probably in a For Bears it’s more momentum in a tough region By MATTHEW BROWN Journal Sports Writer No football team in Region 1- AAAAA may be carrying more momentum into the first weekend of region competition than the Houston County High Bears. In a feat that might be as unheard of as beating the Miami Hurricanes in the Orange Bowl, Houston County went to the Big Orange Jungle, the home stadium of Parkview High School, and staged a come-from behind victory over the powerful Panthers.- The Bears wasted no time upon returning home from this win, not to celebrate, but to prepare for the Warner Robins High Demons. This is the third of three big inter m 7 I HPnK jPHR A" ■Attt-'im £ jj : ' . The Bears warm up for their game against Berkmar Sept. 15. Local pitchers finish third in Dallas tourney By DON MONCRIEF Journal Sports Editor Dallas proved to be just a bit too big for three mem bers of the Perry Horseshoe Pitcher’s Club. That would be Dallas, Georgia, not Texas (but you probably figured that). The trio, Mary Ann Gibbs, Dane Clark and Chuck Poole, competed this past weekend in the Dallas Fall Fling. All Sports jj Jr Jff m TcjjiPi yariT « Jr ~niiM — Jr m. gs Jf H 1 I 0 li I Mr m mg H jpft| 1 4 ;W AKnMiv . 'fw *4 l Jw J , Mrll B | » Zto ■1 ■! f 7 SJWKfk- MM \ 'll The Demons warm up prior to their game against Beach this past Friday. lot of cases are pretty good friends. During the game it’s a very heated rivalry, not so much after the game and the rest of the year. It’s a little county rivalry crowds that files into McConnell-Talbert Stadium year after year, and this year it’s the Houston-Warner Robins matchup that carries the greatest implica tions. According to Bears head coach Doug Johnson, who was hired to build the program at Houston County High after his years of assis tant experience at both Warner Robins and Northside, the games between the Demons and the Bears usually end up fairly close. In fact, Houston is the only team Warner Robins didn’t beat (the game was a tie) during its state championship run in 2004. “I think it’s a good rivalry for us and them,” said Johnson-. “We end three came in third. Gibbs pitched in the A Class and finished the day with a record of 3-2. She just missed second on ringer percentages. Hers was 48.40 while the competitor finish ing ahead of her had one of 53.60. Gibbs connected for 121 ringers out of 250 horse shoes thrown. Clark pitched in the B Class and also had a record of 3-2. different than the Northside rivalry in terms of, I guess, animosity. “It’s always been a close game the last six or seven years, as long as up sharing middle schools, so a lot of the kids know each other. So I think it means a lot more to (the kids) because some of them are still good friends. That makes it more of a rivalry, too. “I think when you start talking about programs around the state, it’s one of the top-notch programs. When you mention (Warner Robins), everyone knows, in sports in gener al, it’s a real top-notch program. “We have used a lot of stuff I learned there. I have change some stuff, but there’s a lot of stuff we still do from way back when I was at Warner Robins, and I worked with coach (Conrad) Nix (at Northside) for three years. He taught me a lot of football. I still use a lot of stuff He had a ringer percentage - no need for a tie-breaker here as the two competitors above him finished 5-0 and 4-1, respectively - of 35.71. He connected for 85 ringers out of 238 shoes thrown. Poole pitched in the C Class and finished with a - you guessed it - record of 3- 2. His ringer percentage was 33.48. He had 77 ringers out of 230 thrown. ENI Gary Harmon Lady Bears volley squad rolls to two more wins Special to the Journal « Houston County’s volleyball team traveled to Perry High School Tuesday and continued its winning ways. The Lady Bears beat LaGrange High School two games to none, with scores of 25-6 and 25-8. And then they defeated the Lady Panthers by the same amount - 2-0 - with scores of 25-15 and 25-17. As far as the first match, Houston County head coach Tony Jones said the Lady Bears played well and See WINS, page iB SECTION B I can remember. They have a good football team, and it’s a very impor tant game. We have to be ready See DEMONS, page iB from there, too.” Houston County (3-1) will go into Friday’s clash having done one game better overall than the 2-2 Demons. The win against Parkview was the third in a row for the Bears. Warner Robins started the season with an upset of its own against Parkview in the Georgia Dome, but lost two in row with only seven points com bined. “Coach (Bryan) Way had a tough schedule,” said Johnson. “Central Gwinnett is a really good football team. He played Northside second, which a very top-notch team. He’s only had one team that I thought, Beach, was a team they felt pretty sure they would beat. We both felt like we had one team we had a chance to beat and everybody else was going to be 50-50.” A “50-50” team, Johnson said, is one you can beat if you play well, but won’t if you don’t play well. In 1-AAAAA, that will be the case each week until November. He said some regions have those “breath ers” mixed in with the tough teams, and as a coach you try to space out the hard games to where you didn’t have them on consecutive week ends. “You are going to be susceptible to injuries,” said Johnson. “If you play the easy teams, you can use your starters a little bit, then get them out to protect them from injury. But if you play tight ball games every week, you have to play everybody the whole ball game. The hitting is really hard. It takes you a day or two to get over that.” The coach said Houston was feel ing the bruises after the Parkview game to the point that one of his running backs, Eric O’Neal, was not taking any hits in practice this week. It’s just for the sake of rest, the coach said, and he along See BEARS, page iB ENI/Gary Harmon