nljagsfan

Congrats to both these young men for getting the opportunity to move onto the next level! They are 2 outstanding players and deserve all the accolades they get!

It was really pretty cool to see both Chris and Ashley sign their LOI's at the same time. They are two excellent young people who get to move on to the next level and get a free college education in the process! Chris' rehab from his knee surgery is going exceptionally well and he will get to start running again very soon. Ashley just had knee surgery as well from a torn miniscus, and has begun her rehab this past Tuesday. It was heartwarming to see that Coach Brooks and his staff stuck by their offer to Chris, even after blowing out his knee early in the 2005 season, and they are getting a fine young student athlete for their excellent recruiting class.

Tusculum College! Congrats to Ashley who accepted a full ride scholarship to play soccer for D2 Tusculum College in Tennessee! Ashley was a 4-time all state soccer player for the North Laurel Jaguars. Ashley concluded her high school career as one of the state's premier scorers, scoring 150 goals (4th all time in KHSAA history), 3 of her 4 varsity seasons are ranked in the top 25 for season scoring (high of 41), and was named All State in each of her 4 years at North Laurel High. In a joint ceremony held at the North Laurel library on Wednesday morning, Ashley signed her LOI to Tusculum, sitting beside Chris Cessna, who signed his LOI to play football for the University of Kentucky. Both were surrounded by family, friends and teammates for this exciting occasion. Congratulations to Ashley on getting the opportunity to play at the next level! :thumb: On a side note, Jaguar's AD Brian Coutras did an excellent job in organizing this joint signing.

Congratulations to Chris Cessna who made it official this morning by signing his national LOI to play football for the University of Kentucky Wildcats! In a joint signing ceremony organized by AD Brian Coutras at North Laurel High School this morning, Chris and 4-time all state soccer player Ashley Bradford (signed LOI to Tusculum College), have made their intentions official. Congrats Chris and we look forward to seeing you as a Wildcat! :thumb:

Ryan Brandenburg at North Laurel is an animal. Size, strength, nasty attitude, nose for the football. All the qualities you love to have in a linebacker. I am told that he is working his butt off in the weight room right now and I expect him to have a gianormous season in 2006.

:thumb: You beat me to it. The poster was way off base on this one.

Randy Leger did not 'get the ax'. Your facts are way off base here. In Laurel County you cannot be a head coach and an administrator. Randy became the assistant principal at SL middle school after he resigned. He could have stayed if he wanted to, but chose to go in another direction.

Hard to say right now. The biggest loss would have been Cessna, but since they lost him early in the season, they had to learn how to play without him and all those close losses he really could have been the difference maker had he been healthy. They also lost kids to injury for varied amounts of time, some for the entire season, and that forced several younger kids to have experience trial by fire. The silver lining was that Brandenburg had to move to ILB a year before the coaches planned on making that move in 2006. He stepped up big with 70 solo tackles during his sophomore campaign. Some of the other losses which will hurt will be Sizemore (RB/LB) leading rusher and 2nd leading tackler, Boroviak (OL/DL/P) especially on special teams with some phenomenal punting in 2005, George (OL/DL), Brock (CB) and Joey McKnight (TE/DE). But other than that, the Jags bring back most of 2005's team and several key contributors. Asher who came up huge the final few weeks, Maggard who just keeps making plays, Brandenburg who is an animal on defense, Hartney © suffered a torn MCL in the Lincoln game and he is getting healthy, Adams and Robinson who really stepped up (Adams on both sides of the ball and Robinson as a WR with speed), Stuber who led the Jags in offensive yardage should be back at QB/CB, but could be moved if the coaches feel he can better help the team in another position, Steven White, Zak Eversole, Trevor Pennington and others really stepped up big also as frosh/frosh/soph (respectively) and will really be key contributors this season. Rumor has it also that Bryan Hughes (RB/LB) and Dylan Hampton (OL/DL) have returned to the Jags squad for 2006. They will both be key returners. I am hearing that the entire coaching staff will return which will be huge in moving into year 2 of the David Abbott. I have also been told that the offseason weight training is going extremely well and that the numbers are growing. This team lost less than many in the district and I expect they will be back in the playoffs in 2006. The O coordinator really started to get his legs under him towards the end and this will give him momentum and confidence in his play calling as well as has increased knowledge of what the returning players are capable of doing. North just needs to learn how to put together an entire game, which they didn't do in 2005. They would have excellent halves/quarters/drives, but couldn't sustain the momentum except in the very emotional win over Madison Central. I think the district will break down like this. 1. GRC (lost a load of seniors, but more underclassmen contributed in 2005 making them a seasoned bunch in 2006 and I think they will get the #1 seed for the playoffs, but may have 1 loss in doing so) 2. Madison Central (may lose a few district games with all their losses to graduation and having their district invincibility put to the test in 2005, but with Coach Turner and staff returning, they will still be the team to beat) 3-6. SL, NL, Whitley, and Lincoln in a dog fight for the final 2 playoff spots 7. Montgomery (still a couple of years away under new coach Dan Gooch who showed improvement, but didn't realize how far down the program was when he took the job)

You are absolutely correct. Sorry if I contributed to this in any way. The player in question IS a great kid. It says a lot about him that he stuck with the program and was a real team player. I did not know that the SL QB's are told that, and this explains a lot. I guess I am just not used to seeing many HS QB's slide or get out of bounds.

I have heard this rumor as well, however, if he were gonna make a move, it would have already been done. He is still a student athlete at South Laurel and I expect that he will stay there. He is also a very good baseball catcher and will be playing hardball for the Cards. I think this one is just a rumor. It would be too hard to get eligible plus to learn a new system when he has run the SL system since 6th grade (6 years) and there are virtually no similarities between the two systems. One of the problems that he had with the SL system is that they also like a mobile QB (Warren, Lee, Riley, etc) and Bowling, while not a big threat to run, is more mobile. Both O'Neal and Bowling like to 'slide' as opposed to lowering the shoulder and the NL coaches want their QB to deliver the blow. I don't think it would be a good fit, and I don't see it happening this late in the game. Just my opinion.

1. Burke (if Lex Cath gets to the carpet, even as runner up). His numbers are insane right now. 45 TD's and 2 INT's! 2. Johnson (best all around player in the state by all accounts) 3. Fidler (if #1 and #2 don't perform well in the playoffs and he dazzles) 4. Everyone else

To ask the same girls to play slow pitch and fast pitch games in the same season is very difficult. It is hard enough to hit a good fast pitch hurler, much less if you have been facing slow pitch. The defense is also much different as the ball comes off the bat much quicker. This will be tough to do. I say when you make the switch, go all the way so the girls can adapt to a different game.

Absolutely. The Tigers were supposed to be way down this year after losing so many seniors. Coach Steppe really deserves an 'attaboy'!

Incredible turnaround! He should definitely be a candidate!

The Massey index. It is updated every week depending on how a team's opponents fare that week. Early season not all that great, but by midseason, is is pretty accurate! The Bulldogs SOS did get a little stronger moving from around #213 to #210. Find a team, click on that team, and you can see this seasons results and anticipated results. They are listed by actual power ranking, but the SOS rank is on each team's individual page. Current ratings link http://www.masseyratings.com/rate.php?lg=hsf&sub=KY#sum