By Staff
Tomorrow is the last day of the year, and soon the blueberries will come down at the Blueberry Drop downtown and we will usher in the new year of 2010.
Man how the year has flown by so quickly.
The 2009 year of sports saw many great things happen in the Brewton area.
For instance, we saw two state championship teams in the T.R. Miller Lady Tiger basketball team and the T.R. Miller boys track team.
T.R. Miller’s girls cross country team took their second straight runner up trophy this year and T.R. Miller’s girls track team took a runner-up trophy as well.
We had all three of our Babe Ruth teams advance to the state tournament. Two Brewton Little League teams and one East Brewton team advanced to the state tournament.
One of our Babe Ruth teams was one game away from winning the state tournament as the Brewton 14s fell in state finals 11-7 to South Huntsville.
Brewton advanced to the finals with a 3-2 win in nine innings over Sylacauga.
With the end of the year now upon us and a new one about to be wished in, here are my awards for the 2009 sports season.
Here we go!
Best clutch player
I give this award to T.R. Miller Tiger Terez Lane for his performance at the state finals for the T.R. Miller track team.
Lane placed first in the 110-meter hurdles, triple jump and high jump and capped off his 4-for-4 week with a first place finish in the long jump.
Lane was also on the Tiger team that won the 400-meter. Lane racked up 40 first place points on his own as the 2009 T.R. Miller boys track team joined the list of five other Tiger track teams as they became the sixth Tiger team to win a state championship in track and field. The win was the first for T.R. Miller since winning the state championship in 2006 in the 3A division.
T.R. Miller has now won four state championships in 3A and two in 4A since 1991.
Best coaching job
While the area has many great coaches, one coaching job is sticking out to me and that goes to T.R. Miller Lady Tiger basketball coach Ron Jackson.
Jackson led his Lady Tiger team to the school’s fourth state championship and their first since 2002.
As of the end of the season last year, at best count, Jackson was 483-62 as a girls coach.
Right now the girls are 8-2 as of writing the column to make his record 491-64.
But what makes Jackson get the best coaching job award was the halftime adjustment as the Lady Tigers trailed 16-7 at the end of the first quarter and 30-21 at the half.
But after the half, the Lady Tigers responded by scoring the first nine points of the quarter to tie the game at 30-30 and eventually outscore Madison Academy 15-4 in the quarter and held on for a 53-50 win to claim the class 3A girls state championship.
The win improved and finished the season for the Lady Tigers at 26-2 as they finished the season on a 19-game win streak.
Best comeback
I give this award to the T.R. Miller Lady Tiger basketball team.
Like mentioned above, trailing at the half, T.R. Miller outscored Madison Academy 15-4 in the third quarter, then the Lady Tigers claimed a 36-34 lead after a Kesha Peterson 3-pointer with two seconds left heading into the final quarter of play.
With the two-point lead, and only eight minutes from a state championship, the Lady Tigers took a 42-34 lead and held Madison Academy scoreless until the 3:32 mark in the fourth quarter.
T.R. Miller then built a five-point lead with 28 seconds to play after two free throws from Nakiya Smith that made the Lady Tiger lead 51-46.
Madison quickly cut the lead to 51-48 with 21 seconds left to play and then got a steal on a T.R. Miller in-bound play to cut the lead to 51-50 with 18 seconds left.
Madison Academy then quickly fouled T.R. Miller, who missed both free throws but grabbed the rebound with 15 seconds to play.
From there, Catherine Green connected for two free throws to put T.R. Miller up 53-50 with nine seconds to play and the desperation 3-pointer at the end fell short for Madison Academy as T.R. Miller claimed the three-point state championship win.
Best moment award
I give this award to the East Brewton 11- and 12-year-old All Star team as they came out of the losers bracket and defeated Opp 4-1 to claim the district title championship in East Brewton.
What makes the moment the best was because it was the first ever championship for the program.
Rob Jones had two homeruns in the game and all of East Brewton’s runs in the game.
After Opp cut the lead to 3-1 in the bottom of the fifth inning, Jones connected for another homerun to make the East Brewton lead 4-1 in the top of the sixth and allow East Brewton to get the win.
Jones finished the night 2-for-2 with four RBIs and one homerun.
Tyler Joyner went the complete game six innings and allowed one run on two hits, walked none, and struck out 10.
The two hits came in the final two innings of play.
The final Opp batter flied out to Robin Swift in centerfield and gave East Brewton their first championship. Players and coach Danny Parker celebrated with a dog pile in the middle of the field.
East Brewton advanced to the state tournament in Huntsville.
Congratulations to all of these teams and individuals.
While these awards are not real awards, I thought this was a great way to cap off the year.
The year 2009 has been a good one to me and I hope it has been the same for you.
While there were some not so good times, the good outweighed the bad by far.
Some things to look to in the 2010 season: T.R. Miller’s football team will clinch their 600th all-time win with their first win of the 2010 season.
It will be the most wins of any team in the state.
As earlier mentioned in this column, Lady Tiger head basketball coach is close to notching his 500th win as a girls basketball coach.
With his boys teams wins, Jackson is probably over the milestone, but as of this article, Jackson needs nine more wins.
His Lady Tigers were set to play in the Clarke County tournament beginning Monday and concluding today.
The Lady Tigers lost Monday in a rare defeat so Jackson could clinch the 500th win on Saturday, Jan. 23 on the road in an area game against Choctaw County if they win out in the tournament and not lose (if all our math is correct in this!).
I know there was a lot that happened in this 2009 sports season, so I was bound to forget something.
I want to wish everyone a Happy New Year an here’s to a great 2010 overall and a great 2010 in the world of sports for The Brewton Standard area teams.
Best of luck to all teams in their games during the new season and lets make it even better than the 2009 sports season.
Until we meet again here or out in the world of sports, God bless.