Herbert Blanding has set up a charter fan bus for the White Knoll game. Anyone interested please contact him at 481-8254 or 968-7391 for more information and to reserve your seat.
Cost: $18 per person Departing: Sept 19,2008 at 5:30 Departure location: SHS Back Lot
The Sumter High School girls cross country team won a 5-team meet on Tuesday at Sumter High that featured four of the six teams from Region VI-4A, along with Wilson. The Lady Gamecocks collected 32 points, West Florence finished second with 44, South Florence was third with 72, Hartsville was fourth with 80 and Wilson placed fifth with 131.
The SHS boys finished in third with 60 points behind winner Hartsville, which had 42, and West Florence at 56. South Florence finished fourth with 88 and Wilson was fifth with 128.
Individually, Sumter's Clarricia Golden was the overall winner, finishing in a time of 20 minutes, 45 seconds in the 5,000 meter race. Freshman Molly McCarthy was third overall at 22:03, Kathryn Allen was seventh at 24:09, Sarah Smith was eighth and Rebecca Fudger 13th.
"l wasn't sure what West Florence had, but I looked at the Coaches' Classic results and knew we were going to be competitive with them," said girls team head coach Diane Raabe. "I was pretty happy with the outcome.
"It was only our second meet," she added. "The weather has not been playing well with our schedule — two Saturday meets were cancelled because of the hurricanes, and last week we were supposed to be at Coastal (Carolina University), but that got cancelled because it rained all week and the course was too wet. So we're behind schedule, meet-wise, but we're pretty much on schedule. Usually this is our fourth or fifth meet by now, so it's kind of hard go judge, really."
Raabe said replacing Candace Sapp and Abbie Ormond, who both are at Clemson, has been difficult, particularly since the number of team members is down.
"Candace is running well at Clemson, and Abbie's on the rowing team, so that's cool," Raabe said. "Losing two of my top runners hurts, but Clarricia has stepped up, and Molly — Molly's young, only a freshman, so I've still got a young team. I don't have numbers this year, so I was kind of frantic about that. Now I worry about whether I'm going to have enough for race day.
"My first year, we had seven on the team and ended up with five, but since then, we've had up to 25 people on the team. This year, I don't know, kids don't want to come out, they don't want to run — I had a hard time recruiting them.
McCarthy was the Lady Gamecocks' No.2 runner last season, behind Sapp, and has remained there with the emergence of Golden. The two push each other constantly, however, Raabe said.
"Molly and Clarricia, every day in practice, are pushing each other, so that's good," said Raabe. "Sarah and Kathryn are pushing each other and when Rebecca's there, her and Celeste and Courtney King, who is sick today, they're all together. That's a good thing that they're not so spread out."
Quinn Wenger was third overall for the Sumter boys, finishing in 19:04. South Florence's Matt Humphries won in 17:20.
Sumter's other three returnees from last year — Daniel Jackson, Peter Hackett and Matt Riggins — finished in that order for the team on Tuesday. First-year runner Grant Field was fifth among Sumter runners.
Sumter High School couldn't have asked for a much better start for its football game on Friday against Spartanburg at Memorial Stadium and the ending was nearly legendary.
Sumter scored on its first play from scrimmage and led 14-0, but watched as the Vikings scored 16 unanswered points over the last 26 ½ minutes to escape with a 16-14 win.
Sumter had a chance to win with 16 seconds left, but placekicker Ross Watson was wide left on a 22-yard field goal from the left hash.
"I don't know if it was so much as we got complacent," SHS head coach Paul Sorrells said when asked why his team coughed up the big lead. "We felt coming in that this was going to be the best defense we had faced. I was very concerned about them all week. We've got to decide what kind of football team we want to be. Do we want to be a good team or do we want to be mediocre? I think we let one slip through our fingers.
"Ross has done a great job for us and it never comes down to a kick like that," he added. "We had plenty of opportunities beforehand. I wish he would have hit it for his own sake, but he'll hit the next one. That might give him what he needs to hit one in the state championship game."
Trailing 16-14 with under two minutes left in the game, Sumter found itself on defense and without any timeouts left. On a second down run designed to run out the clock by Spartanburg quarterback Cornelius Jones, Sumter stripped the ball and recovered the fumble at its own 17-yard line.
After Sumter quarterback Stephen Curtis scrambled for six yards on first down, he found running back Roderick McDowell, who was lined up as a wide receiver, on a streak down the middle of the field for a 60-yard gain to set the Gamecocks up at the Vikings' 23-yard line. After completing a pass to Danneil Duncan for eight yards, Curtis scrambled for 13 yards and a first down down to the Vikings 8.
Sorrells called for a run by Romaine Prince to the left and the junior running back got out of bounds at the 6 to stop the clock with 22 seconds left. Sorrells elected to send Watson out then.
"You sit there and second-guess everything in the world," said Sorrells. "We're in field goal range, so the last thing you want to do is let that clock run out and not even get a shot at it. The run to the left was to get more yardage and stop the clock. There's all different ways to look at it.
"If you make the kick, then you say you did it right," he added. "I'm not sure we shouldn't have taken another shot (to the end zone) with a throw. The one thing I wasn't going to do was let that clock run out."
Sumter had the ball inside the Vikings' 10-yard line twice in the fourth quarter, but came away with zero points. Both chances were set up by big plays from McDowell — the aforementioned reception and a 43-yard run earlier in the stanza.
GOOSE CREEK – Sumter High's Mr. Excitement was also Mr. Automatic in the second half Thursday against Stratford.
Clemson commitment Roderick McDowell rushed for 228 yards and three scores over the final two quarters, including touchdown runs of 55 and 26 in the fourth quarter as the Gamecocks overcame Stratford 42-35 in a game played a night early because of Tropical Storm Hanna's expected interference with the weather tonight in the Lowcountry.
"He's a special young man," Sumter coach Paul Sorrells said. "You already begin to wonder what you're going to do without him. What y'all saw tonight is sort of how he is every Friday night."
He had 172 yards last week in a 48-32 win over Crestwood and has over 400 yards on the season with his 241 yards against Stratford. He also scored on a 44-yard swing pass in the first half and had over 70 yards in returns in the game.
After McDowell's 26-yarder with 5:35 left gave Sumter its final margin of victory, Stratford moved to Sumter's 32 on a defensive pass interference, but senior Kevin Sinkler's interception gave it back to McDowell and the Gamecocks with 2:01 left.
McDowell carried it five times for 42 yards and Sumter ran out the clock on another explosive night for its offense.
The win improved the Gamecocks to 2-0 and gave the offense 90 points in the first two games of the season. Stratford, meanwhile, has started a season 0-2 for the first time since 1995, when it began 0-5.
"We made a tremendous improvement from last week (a 21-19 loss to Orangeburg-Wilkinson) to this week," Stratford coach Ray Stackley said. "We just have to still get better."
With McDowell only rushing for 13 yards in the first half, the score was tied 14-14 at the break. Sorrells was not impressed and let his guys know.
"Really the talk at halftime was that 'guys, I believe that's the worse half of football I've ever seen one of our teams play,"' said Sorrells, whose team meets Spartanburg next week. "We told them 'you have to make the decision about what's going to happen in the second half.'"
McDowell's first run of the third quarter — after Stratford took a 21-14 lead on Marcus Scott's 5-yard run - was a 41-yard scamper off the right side. He finished the drive later with a 29-yard run to knot the score again with 9:58 left in the third quarter.
The Sumter High School varsity football team travels to take on Stratford tonight in a game moved up a day because of the threat of inclement weather associated with Tropical Storm Hanna. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.
Sumter head coach Paul Sorrells, whose team is 1-0 after posting a 48-32 win over cross-county rival Crestwood last week in its opener, said moving the game up wouldn't make much of a difference.
"We're going to go on with our Wednesday practice like we usually do," Sorrells said on Wednesday. "About all that means is that Thursday, we'll have about a 45-minute walkthrough in just shirts and shorts, go through special teams and things. We'll get most of that done today.
"A lot of teams play on Thursday anyway, teams that share stadiums or something like that," he added. "It's a whole lot better to play (tonight), because if we don't, the scenario would probably be that we play Monday, and if you play Monday, you've got to turn right around and play again on Friday. That's what we don't want."
Stratford is smarting after a 21-19 overtime loss to Orangeburg-Wilkinson in its opener last week. Sorrells said that he wasn't especially happy about that.
"Stratford is a very well-coached football team," Sorrells said. "(Stratford head) coach Ray Stackley and his crew do a great job. They lost the other night, and maybe they don't have the team that they've had in the past, but I still would have picked them to win over Orangeburg. They lost in overtime, and a lot of times you don't want to play somebody when they're on the rebound like that.
"We've just got to go make sure that we play sound defense, that we execute on offense and worry about ourselves more than Stratford," he added. "We know they're well-coached, and when you get a game plan against Stratford, you know that they're going to be sound and that they're pretty much going to do the kinds of things that they're supposed to be doing. You sort of know what to plan for, and you've just got to beat them. Beat them physically."
The Gamecocks were able to power past a game Crestwood squad last week in their opener, grabbing an early lead and then keeping the offensive pressure on to the end. Quarterback Stephen Curtis connected with wide receiver Travis Fredimon for three touchdown passes, including scoring strikes of 51 and 60 yards, that kept the Knights at arm's length.
"We've got a pretty good quarterback, and we've got some good receivers," Sorrells said. "The key there will always be if we can protect them, and if our offensive line will protect, I think we can complete passes on anybody as long as we've got time to throw it."
Running back Roderick McDowell's first 22 carries netted him 98 yards, but his 23rd pushed his total on the night to 170 when he broke free for a 72-yard TD run that put the game away.
"That's the thing about Roderick," Sorrells said. "You keep giving it to him, and sooner or later, he's going to break one. It's hard to bottle him up all night long."
The Sumter High School varsity football team kicked off its 2008 campaign on Friday, hosting cross-county rival Crestwood at Memorial Stadium in what shaped up as a track meet.
The Gamecocks grabbed a 14-0 lead quickly in the first quarter and held off the elusive Knights for a 48-32 win in the opener for both teams. Sumter travels to Stratford next week, while Crestwood hosts Blythewood at District 2 Memorial Stadium.
"Every year, it seems like we say the same thing," said Sumter head coach Paul Sorrells. "Crestwood does a great job with that Wing-T (offense), and every year there's a new play that we haven't seen before. The double-dive quarterback keeper, one of the new plays that we haven't seen, put a lot of pressure on our corners. They've got to play pass, and then they've got to come up and play that, too — they did a very good job on that, even though there were a couple of plays that were tough.
"It was a good game for us," he added. "We made some mistakes, and Crestwood made some mistakes. Mistakes made on both sides, but we did what we had to do to win and, like I told my guys, it's always a battle in this first one against Crestwood. It's good that we can come out and win, and I'm proud of our guys for hanging in there and hanging tough."
Sumter senior running back Roderick McDowell finished with 170 yards rushing and two touchdowns on 23 carries, a number bolstered by a back-breaking 72-yard run late in the fourth quarter that sealed the game. Shawn Armstrong added 55 yards on seven carries and Stephen Curtis had nine carries for 19 yards.
Travis Fredimon caught three passes for 120 yards and three touchdowns, including scoring strikes of 51 and 60 yards that helped the Gamecocks keep Crestwood at arm's length despite two costly turnovers that led to Knight scores.
As a team, Sumter amassed 409 yards of total offense, including 220 on the ground and 193 on 9-of-14 passing by Curtis. Ross Watson was 6-of-7 on point-after kicks, having one blocked.
The brothers Wilson had a big game for the Knights, carrying the load and accounting for 240 of the Knights' 334 rushing yards and four TDs. Terrence Wilson, the starting running back, had 119 yards and two scores on 27 carries and starting quarterback Treginald Wilson had 121 yards and two TDs on nine carries. Treginald Wilson was 1-of-9 passing for 59 yards and two interceptions.
Crestwood grabbed the momentum toward the end of the first half after a fake punt went for 40 yards and set up the Knights at the Sumter 9-yard line. Two plays later, Terrence Wilson went in from three yards out and Tyrone Albert dove in for the 2-point conversion to cut the Sumter lead to 27-20.
The momentum carried over into the second half, as the Knights got a good return of the second-half kickoff by Michael Portee and a personal foul penalty against Sumter set Crestwood up at the Sumter 25. Wilson carried for five yards on first down, before fullback Dominique Stripling took off up the middle for a 20-yard touchdown run. The point-after kick was no good, but the Knights trailed by just one at 27-26 only 30 seconds into the second half.
Sumter went three-and-out on its next possession, but held Crestwood, which went for another fake punt from its own 38. Sumter stuffed Terrence Wilson after a short gain, however, and set up shop at the Knights' 40.
Curtis hit Armstrong for a 28-yard reception on second down, and McDowell came through with a pair of big runs, the second a 6-yard scamper for a touchdown. Watson's kick pushed the lead back out to 34-26 midway through the third.
"Our kids ain't gonna quit. They don't quit, I don't care what the deal is," said Crestwood head coach Keith Crolley. "We fell down 14-0, but our kids responded and came back and played hard. It's just one of those things.
"You can do one of two things when things don't go right," he added. "You can step up and be a man about it, or you can roll up and fold it up. I thought our kids stood up and continued to play hard the whole game."
Sumter held the Knights again and proceeded to put together one of its most impressive drives of the night. The Gamecocks drove from their own 43 to paydirt, picking up a big 22-yard run by Armstrong, and an 11-yard reception and a pair of runs by Danniel Duncan, who scored from two yards out. Watson's PAT kick was good, and Sumter clung to a 41-26 lead.
Crestwood finally picked up its first pass completion of the evening, but it was a doozy, a 59-yard completion from Treginald Wilson to Isaiah Young that set the Knights up at the Sumter 16. Terrence Wilson went in from three yards out to make it 41-32. The 2-point try failed.
The scoreboard at Memorial Stadium may go into overload today when Sumter High School plays host to crosstown rival Crestwood beginning at 7:30 p.m. in the season-opening football game for both schools.
Both teams were strong offensive teams last season when the Gamecocks went 10-3 and reached the second round of the 4A Division I state playoffs while Crestwood was 11-3 and played for the 3A lower state title. Each team has several key offensive performers returning this year.
The Knights, of course, operate out of the run-dominated Wing-T offense that head coach Keith Crolley brought with him when he took over the program 11 years ago.
Crestwood rushed for 5,012 yards last season led by returning running back Terrence Wilson. He rushed foir 1,326 yards and 12 touchdowns on 156 attempts. His brother, quarterback Treginald Wilson, rushed for 722 yards and 13 TDs on 89 attempts.
SHS head coach Paul Sorrells said it is always difficult to prepare for the Wing-T, which incorporates a lot of misdirection and cuts mixed in with a lot of pulling offensive linemen. However, he thinks
there may be no better time than the present to go up against it.
"There's no good time to do it, but if you've got to do that maybe it's the best to start with it," Sorrells said. "We were able to go against it against Lakewood in the (Sumter High/Sertoma Club) jamboree, so I guess this is a good jumping-off point.
In the second game, Sumter got on the board without much delay after Lakewood picked up a first down but was forced to punt and the Gamecocks took over at the SHS 36-yard line.
On the first play from scrimmage, Stephen Curtis found Travis Fredimon on a play-action pass down to the Lakewood 24-yard line. Roderick McDowell took the handoff on the next play and scooted up the middle for a touchdown run and Ross Watson's PAT made it 7-0 with 7:44 left in the first quarter.
"Our first team wasn't stopped much," said SHS head coach Paul Sorrells. "We did some subbing and that will always lead to sloppy play. It sort of became a flag fest, but I'm not sure that was all the kids. There was a lot of penalties and it was really hard to get any kind of momentum going."
After forcing a three-and-out, Sumter took over at its 22-yard line. Three plays later, McDowell was scampering down the sideline for a 53-yard TD run to make it 14-0.
"We didn't keep him in there long," said Sorrells. "He had not had a touchdown except for a kickoff return in the preseason. I told him they were coming, he just had to keep that excitement. He did a heck of a job tonight. He is a heck of a talent. We're going to enjoy watching him this year."
The Clemson committment finished the jamboree with 89 yards on three carries and two scores.
"Their offensive line really surprised me," Lakewood head coach Doc Lewis said of Sumter. "From what I've been hearing they were rebuilding that offensive line — they aren't rebuilding. We are just glad to get to play a team like that before the regular season."
Lakewood answered right back, as running back John Walker took an inside trap out of the Wing-T, broke up the middle and was clear of the Sumter defense before they realized it and rumbled 64-yards for a touchdown. Sumter's Timmy Rogers blocked the PAT, however, and Sumter held on to a 14-6 lead.
Lakewood ran for 150 yards on 30 carries.
"We did what we wanted to offensively," said Lewis. "We're not a pretty offense when we don't run much. When we get behind the yard sticks, it's hard on us. Once we got the jitters out of us, we moved the ball and got to what we like to do."
Sumter fullback Shawn Armstrong scored from a yard out to make it 21-6 after Watson's PAT with 9:20 left in the second period.
Walker found paydirt for the second time with a 1-yard plunge with 4:11 left, but Lakewood's conversion attempt failed.
"The big difference is that we brought 68 tonight and probably 31 have been with me for three years," said Lewis. "I've got 10 coaches over there that's been with me for three years and I brought Dwayne Howell over. When you got kids rolling over, that's what makes the difference and it is going to get better each year."
For most people, football season begins in August or September.Not true for our Sumter GAMECOCKS.The 2008 Sumter Football Season began in January with Strength and Conditioning classes and weight lifting sessions after school.We began our Summer Strength and Conditioning program on June 9th with over 160 student athletes.The Varsity Gamecock Football Players on the cover of this program had better than 94 % attendance with some who never missed a session.We had more than 90 players (grades 9-12) who had better than 90% attendance all summer long.This included strength training, conditioning, and speed training.These players worked extremely hard all summer to make this the best football season possible.
At the end of our summer, we have our annual IRON MAN COMPETITION as we test our players in several categories.The following is a picture of the TOP TEN and the results in each category.
There will be a parent meeting on July 31, 2008 at 6:00pm in the Sumter High Auditorium. During this meeting Participation Fees and forms will be collected. All athletes need to have a current physical by this meeting.
B-Team, JV, and Varsity will start practice on Aug 1 at 9:00 am and then again at 4:00 pm in the afternoon.
Item file photo Donna Bisom's almost 10-year tenure as the athletic director at Sumter High School came to an end on Monday. Bisom said the job was one she enjoyed from beginning to end.
When the work day ended on Monday, so too did Donna Bisom's official tenure as the athletic director at Sumter High School — and her day-after-events job as a custodian and groundskeeper for the school's athletic facilities as well.
"It was something that just came naturally to me," Bisom said of her being seen cleaning toilets and picking up trash mornings after many of the school's sporting events. "I've always encouraged the kids to clean up after themselves, so I decided to do it myself. When we had other people come to the school, I wanted them to wish their son or daughter was at Sumter High School."
Bisom had to step down from her post as her time in the Teacher and Employee Retention Program — a program that gives incentives to retirees to keep teaching — had expired. Ironically, Bisom came out of retirement to become the AD — on an interim basis — when Tom Lewis had to step down when the Joe Klein embezzlement scandal broke in 1999.
Bisom, who was a state-title-winning girls basketball coach and a physical education teacher in Sumter School District 17 for 30 years before her first retirement, enjoyed every minute of her 9½-year second tenure at SHS.
"I have been thrilled to do what I've been doing," said the 61-year-old Bisom. "I was brought in as a temporary employee to smooth out, to get the ship back on course at what was a bad time in the history of athletics at Sumter High School. I honestly expected to do just that.
"It's been a wonderful, wonderful 9½ years," she added. "It's been fulfilling and it's been a 24 (hours)-7 (days a week) job, and I've enjoyed every minute of it."
Sumter School District 17 Superintendent Dr. Zona Jefferson has chosen to hire longtime district employee David Wright as the interim athletic director for Sumter High School in the wake of being unable to find a fulltime replacement for Donna Bisom despite going through two separate interview processes.
"We have some other things we still have to take care of (in the process of hiring a fulltime AD)," Jefferson said on Wednesday when asked why the decision was made to go with Wright in an interim role. "This will give us an opportunity to continue our search."
Wright's appointment still has to be approved by the District 17 Board of Trustees. The next scheduled meeting is set for July 15. When asked if she expected any opposition from any of the board members, Jefferson said, "Not at this time."
Bisom's time as athletic director officially ends on Monday. Bisom came out of retirement in 1999 to take the reins as athletic director from Tom Lewis in the wake of the Joe Klein embezzlement scandal.
Chris Vandevander — a.k.a. Chris Mitchum — has been hired as the new varsity girls basketball coach at Sumter High School.
Vandevander, who was a star player for Sumter in the late 1980s and early '90s before going on to an outstanding collegiate career at Presbyterian College, has been the junior varsity coach for the past six years. She took that job at the same time Jeff Schaffer, who resigned the post in February to become the golf director at a Columbia golf course, took over the varsity program.
VANDEVANDER
"I'm just excited about this opportunity," said Vandevander, who graduated from SHS in 1992. "There is no where else I would rather coach than at Sumter High."
Vandevander, who coached at Alice Drive Middle School for three years before taking over the Sumter JV team, believes the fact that she has worked closely with Schaffer will make things easier as she and the players adjust to the new situation.
"The transition is going to be easier for both of us — me and the players," Vandevander said. "I've coached most of the girls who are returning. I think I've coached all but two of them who are returning on the varsity."
Sumter High athletic director Donna Bisom was Vandevander's head coach when she played for the Lady Gamecocks. Bisom said she was the right fit for the program.
"Chris is a home girl first of all, having played for Sumter High," Bisom said. "She was deadly from 3-point range. The fact that she's been working for us the past six years, that she knows the system, knows the kids, lives in the area and has a great reputation in the world of basketball makes her the best choice.
"How satisfying it is to be able to hire someone who played for you as a ninth-grader," Bisom added. "As I look back, Chris provided floor leadership, even as a freshman. She was always a student of the game, a coach on the court. She understood the timing of a timeout, the need for special plays that we worked on all the time and why we worked on fundamentals every single day."
The Lady Gamecocks were 98-56 under Schaffer, going 15-12 last season. While saying she hasn't had the opportunity to give it much thought, Vandevander doesn't expect too many changes in the program.
"Jeff's left the program in great shape," she said. "We started at the same time and he included me in a lot of decisions in the program and the direction in which it would go. I don't foresee a lot of changes."
While playing at Presbyterian, Vandevander was named to the All-South Atlantic Conference team her senior season and was the SAC Tournament Most Valuable Player as a junior to lead the Lady Blue Hose to their first ever SAC Tournament title. She holds the school record for most 3-point shots made in a career with 270 as well as the single season record of 83, set in 1995. (full story)
The Sumter High Varsity football continues to work hard this summer. They recently attended a 7 on 7 tournment at Clemson. The Gamecocks went undefeated in pool play and lost during the last seconds against Seneca in the quarterfinals. Sumter finished the day 7 and 1 and learned alot from this group. The Gamecocks will continue working hard in the weightroom and preparing for the upcoming season.
