Wheelersburg at Gallipolis (2-17-10) Makeup

[jottings]

Thoughts?

After more than 30 consecutive years of playing each other at home and on the road, Wheelersburg is dropping the Blue Devils from their cage schedule.

Reason given was "it's too far to travel, especially on a school night." The game was originally scheduled Saturday, Feb. 5. Makeup was scheduled Feb. 17. It will be a twinbill, JVs and varsity. No freshman game.

Also, River Valley will not play the GAHS freshmen at River Valley Saturday, Feb. 20. The Raiders have moved some frosh players to reserves and varsity and don't have enought left to play the freshman game.

[alabama mike]

Wednesday's game will all depend on the weather conditions. We have 3-4 inches of fresh snow on the ground this morning. Hopefully, the game will get to be played this week.

Burg has two regular season games to play this week, Tuesday and Friday nights. We also have a makeup game with Valley which is a league game.

Burg enjoys playing GAHS and I hate to see this series come to an end as well. Playing on a Friday or Sat. night does make better sense because of the roads you have to take to get to both places. Gonna miss seeing my buddies jottings and gahs4ever.

[jottings]

Sorry about that Alabama Mike, but a man has gotta work during these tough economic times. (Mike can’t make Wednesday’s game here because he has to work. He’s usually on the score book for The Burg).

I looked up the season series between the two schools this afternoon. With the exception of 1977-78 and 1978-79, the Pirates and Devils have met 30 consecutive years on the hardwood.

WHS has won 22 and lost 11 in the series, and own five straight wins over GAHS. Last Blue Devil victory was down there during the 2003-04 campaign when Gallia Academy won, 72-47.

The schools first met during the 1973-74 campaign when Mike Hughes crew manhandled the SEOAL champion Devils down there, 62-40. That, by the way, was the only game that Oz has ever been ejected in his 41-year career here.

Here’s the all-time series record between the two schools:

YEAR GAHS WHS
1973-74 40 62
1974-75 44 52
1975-76 44 56
1976-77 36 42
1977-78 No game
1978-79 No game
1979-80 41 36
1980-81 51 48
1981-82 53 59
1982-83 44 39
1983-84 66 69 (ot)
1984-85 70 57
1985-86 65 53
1986-87 78 63
1987-88 43 50
1988-89 41 46
1989-90 44 63
1990-91 72 73 (ot)
1991-92 46 58
1992-93 71 60
1993-94 65 54
1994-95 42 52
1995-96 59 83
1996-97 60 61
1997-98 66 73
1998-99 52 73
1999-20 56 51
2000-01 29 53
2001-02 56 50
2002-03 61 45
2003-04 72 47
2004-05 43 69
2005-06 39 55
2006-07 30 70
2007-08 36 53
2008-09 26 31
2009-10 ? ?

[drrabbit]

If I remember correctly the 1997-98 was a multiple overtime game at Gallipolis. It went very late due to an injury to a cheerleader before the game and then either double or triple overtime. It finished up after 11 pm as I recall and I didn't get home until after midnight.

The 94-95 game was an interesting game of strategy and personality. But I must admit that even though it was a home game, I listened to it on the radio. My grandmother was dying and I spent the evening with her but had hoped to stop by and catch the fourth quarter. That game was over by 8:30 because according to the radio Wheelersburg held the ball at midcourt for the entire third quarter. Each team had one possession in the period.

[jottings]

Wheelersburg and Gallipolis have had pretty good hardwood records during the past 30 years.

Wheelersburg is 550-173 since the 1979-80 campaign. Gallia Academy 401-277

Wheelersburg has beaten GAHS 18 times and lost 12 during that span. Wheelersburg has had at least four coaches (Mike Hughes, Mike Lovenguth, John Eaton, and Tom Barrick) the past three decades while GAHS has had one, Jim Osborne.

Gallipolis has had 22 winning seasons and eight losing seasons the past 30 years while WHS has had 26 winning seasons and four losing seasons.

Here’s the Pirates and Blue Devils season records from 1979-80 to 2009-10:

Year GAHS WHS
1979-80 13-8 18-6
1980-81 15-7 18-3
1981-82 15-7 25-2
1982-83 14-7 20-3
1983-84 16-7 21-4
1984-85 17-4 6-15
1985-86 12-9 8-13
1986-87 19-3 16-5
1987-88 17-6 24-1
1988-89 8-14 22-4
1989-90 8-13 19-5
1990-91 13-9 10-11
1991-92 15-7 16-10
1992-93 16-7 10-11
1993-94 16-7 18-4
1994-95 7-14 23-4
1995-96 5-16 22-2
1996-97 15-8 19-5
1997-98 11-10 18-6
1998-99 12-9 17-5
1999-20 18-4 20-5
2000-01 9-13 22-2
2001-02 20-4 21-3
2002-03 20-4 15-7
2003-04 16-7 13-9
2004-05 9-14 19-4
2005-06 11-10 23-3
2006-07 13-9 23-3
2007-08 8-14 21-3
2008-09 7-15 16-6
2009-10 6-11 7-9

[drrabbit]

Thoughts?

Reason given was "it's too far to travel, especially on a school night."

Wheelersburg DOES take their academics way more seriously than their sports. Their reputation in that area goes well back into the 1800's and they were considered a 'model' school for the state about 1910 with a constant stream of administrators visiting from all over the state to get ideas for their school systems. College teachers still regularly give positive feedback on the quality of the student that they get when they get a Wheelersburg graduate enrolled in their classes.

Wheelersburg tries to schedule schools greater than 45 minutes away on Saturdays whenever possible or at least Fridays so that the kids get a chance to study through the week. And they do this in all the sports--tennis, track, baseball, football, soccer, golf, softball, swimming, cross country and volleyball. Thank goodness tournament games are a single game (no JV) and does not take up as much of the evening.

I suspect that this year with the weather postponements, rescheduling proved more difficult than any of us realize for them to be travelling to Gallipolis on a Wednesday.

[drrabbit]

Their policy depends on travel conditions by a reasonable time. They played tonight.

[SportsFiend]

This one has been rescheduled for tomorrow 2/18/10.

[Mad-Dogg]

Dr Rabbit..we have met more than once and Ive found you to be a very gracious lady, and of course your reputation when it comes to HS sports and the excellent pictures you take of athletes not just from Wheelersburg are very much appreciated.

I understand where you are coming from concerning athletics; especially when prioritized with academics and of course our kids are student/athletes and not the other way around.

At GAHS the emphasis has always been on academics as well, and if you ever attend one of our fall/winter/spring sports functions you would see that well over 90% of our athletes are honor roll/NHS/3.0+ students.

Believe me when I say I know how difficult it is to schedule games on school nights. In the SEOAL, all our league games are tripleheaders with the freshmen starting at 5, and for GAHS, Jackson is the only league trip less than an hour away. When you have to get 14 league games in in 2 1/2 months I think you can see how difficult it is to get all league games on Friday/Saturday nights and when we recently got back from Logan at nearly midnight, even I was tired and I didnt have to get up and go to school the next day.

I wish we were small enough that we could become a member of a primarily one county league like the SVC, SOC, or TVC but with most of our SEOAL schools being DIII and larger and there not being very many schools of that size in rural SE Ohio, it forces us to drive a little farther to play schools our own size.

Again, I regret when long term friedly rivalries are terminated; regardless of the reason. Just in this past century in football we have lost Coal Grove, Meigs, Point Pleasant and seen other long time SEOAL members leave for more convenient situations like Athens and Marietta. Thankfully Portsmouth and Chillicothe stepped up and I believe we will remain viable with six schools after Ironton leaves this year and Marietta next.

Im going to miss the annual GAHS-WHS non league games, and in fact wish it were possible to play the Pirates yearly in football as well.

i agree. i'd love to see burg and gallia academy get another series goin in football. i enjoyed watchin the two games in 2004 and 2005. each team won at home. burg won 35-12 in 2004 and gallia academy won 37-30 in 2005

[91blue14]

wheelersburg should continue. i like seeing them play

[drrabbit]

I wish we could continue playing too but I know that this year's reschedules were particularly difficult. Coach Barrick was forced to miss his daughter's senior night basketball game in order to take the 'lesser of the evil options' so to speak. That is tough. And with Gallipolis having to play so many league games on the weekends due to those long trips from that... But I suspect that the series will be renewed in the not too distant future--possibly as an earlier season game or during the holidays.

As you know by now, I did not make the trip to Gallipolis. I had to chose and the first scheduled game and the home game were the two deciding factors--that and it was senior night for the girls. But I am sorry that I missed the tour of the new campus!

The girls won tonight 69-59. The last I heard on the boys was that Gallipolis led 34-30 at the end of three quarters. Any updates or finals would be greatly appreciated.

[Burg_Grad_77]

Any final score on this game yet?

[jottings]

Wheelersburg 45 Gallipolis 43

Bendolph sank three of four free throws during the final 26.7 seconds of play. GAHS had a chance to win or tie the game with 10.6 seconds left, but lost the ball out of bounds with about three or four seconds left.

[drrabbit]

Thanks! How did the JV do?

[jottings]

Gallipolis won the JV game 38-36 with 3 seconds remaining.

[BigOrangeOne]

Maybe this snow will stick around and Wheelersburg will have an excuse not to make it up at all; especially on a school night.

Since we only play each other once a year that means they only have to make the 45 mile drive once EVERY OTHER YEAR. Methinks that is taking the "too far" excuse a little too far.

I just hope the district and regional tournament (if Burg is lucky enough to make it that far) doesnt schedule them for the late game; especially on a school night.

LOW BLOWS OLD MAN, especially since according to Jottings...."WHS has won 22 and lost 11 in the series, and own five straight wins over GAHS.".... (You can now make that 23-11 with SIX straight wins over gahs ). Methinks the only reason they may be looking for an EXCUSE to stop playing you is because they are a little tired of consistantly KICKING YOUR BUTT !!

[Burg_Grad_77]

Congrats to the Pirates on the big win.

[TheMalteseFalcon]

GAHS is the hard luck team of the year as just this past week we added yet another three losses to our disappointing season; all by 2 points and one of those in OT.

"Hard luck" ?? Is that ALWAYS your excuse for losing, or just for this year?
A little skill might improve on that hard luck.