The Sweep

I'm sure it's happened before sometime over the eight years I've been fortunate to be the SID here at ETBU, but for some reason the feat this time seems to have a little more punch to it.

Maybe it's because the fall sports season started a bit slowly for our athletic teams. Through the first couple of weeks of the fall season, the Lady Tiger volleyball team was the only team to record a win and they were kind of bouncing up and around the .500 mark through the first three weeks or so. Both soccer teams, combined, started the year with three ties and a couple of losses apiece, and football also went winless in non-conference games.

Let me say that I am like a lot of SIDs in that my mood pretty much mirrors that of the success and/or failure of our teams when it comes to winning and losing. Really, the losing. I hate to lose. My wife and I can't play board games anymore because she finds some weird way to always win and then I have to mope around for days, going back over what I could have done differently to perhaps pull out a victory...

But I digress. The point is that when our teams struggle, I struggle. Call me a homer if you like, but my job is a lot more fun when we have success. That makes weekends like this past one very, very fun.

Our four fall sports teams -- football, volleyball, and both men's and women's soccer -- came away victorious on Saturday. Like I said at the beginning, I'm sure at some point over the years the sweep has happened before, but this one feels a bit sweeter for some reason.

For one thing, it's a great thing to see a bunch of hard working young ladies on our soccer team finally get rewarded with a victory, as well as giving one to our new coach, Paul Grant. I've known Paul for less than two months, but he is the right man for this job. Our Lady Tiger soccer program is in good hands, trust me, and they are headed in the right direction. So, it's always nice to see good guys (and gals) with a smile on their face, and winning puts the smile there quicker than anything.

The win for Coach Alonzo's bunch has a different feel. The Tigers have overcome a slow start offensively and have been rolling up the goals the last three games. Thirteen, to be exact. Consider that they scored four goals in the first five games, and yes, you have to say the Tigers have found something they like. Saturday's thrilling 4-3 win over McMurry was good in a lot of ways: a) it gets us over the .500 mark on the season, which always makes you feel good, b) it's a third straight conference win and has us in striking distance of first place in the standings, and c) we had to work extremely hard to get it. Easy wins are nice for fans, because we don't have to worry about much during the course of a game. But wins like Saturday are good for teams because you learn a lot about yourself in the process when you have to come from behind and score when the heat is being turned up.

The football team has turned around its season in just the span of a couple of weeks. That 0-2 start is forgotten, and the Tigers are reaping the actual benefits of playing a Top 25 non-conference opponent as well as a decent D-II opponent. Even though those games were losses, and big ones at that, ETBU has grown on the football field. The first two conference wins haven't been remotely perfect, but wins don't have to be, do they?

I can tell you just from the experience of traveling to Alpine several times over the years, whether by land or by air, that it's perhaps the most difficult road trip for any of our teams. It's 12 or so hours away by charter bus, which is a challenge in and of itself. Then you finally get way out there and realize the air just isn't there for your lungs, with the high elevation in the West Texas mountains. And oh, by the way, once you get there you actually have to play a game against a team that is used to the conditions and thrives in them.

Saturday's 41-28 win over Sul Ross wasn't perfect, no. But it was the fourth straight game in which the Tigers improved from the previous week. Case in point -- through the first three games, ETBU just hadn't been very good in short-yardage situations offensively. Getting to the goal line was an adventure. But you keep stressing and working and practicing, and boom! Corey George puts touchdowns on the board in record numbers in short yardage around the goal line. The defense pretty much shut down a high-octane Lobo offense through most of the final three quarters, aided by some pressure on the quarterback and turnovers.

As for volleyball -- bring your heart medication with you to Lady Tiger games! The goal for ETBU is rather obvious this season: the Lady Tigers want to win the ASC East and host the conference tournament for the first time since 2001. If that happens, we all will truly appreciate the road it took to get there.

The Lady Tigers played 10 games of volleyball this weekend over the course of two matches. In case you're wondering, that's the limit. In both matches -- at UMHB on Friday and UTD on Saturday -- ETBU was down 0-2 and staring disappointment straight in the face. But the Lady Tigers didn't blink, and staged back-to-back thrilling rallies to steal a pair of huge road wins against conference foes. The wins have the Lady Tigers all alone in first place in the East, and in full control of determining whether or not ETBU hosts the conference tourney in late October.

And get this -- ETBU is now 20-3 overall against the ASC since the start of the 2006 season. They will face defending conference champion Hardin-Simmons Friday at the first of two crossover tournaments in the next few weeks, so it will again be a big test. But one thing Coach Mashe and her players have shown is that 0-2 isn't a big enough deficit for this team to overcome.

And oh by the way, ETBU's cross country teams ran in a big meet out in Abilene this weekend and competed very well. Cross country is really a sport in which the athlete competes against himself or herself, and the men's team posted their best individual times when compared against their previous meet. The women's team was facing some very stiff competition out on the course, but also had solid, improved times.

Who knows when this kind of success will happen again. But for now, it's good to look back with some pride on the past weekend for our teams. The most important thing, however, and the most exciting, is what it could mean for the future.