I've been away from the office for nearly the last two weeks. Most of the first week was spent at the annual Arkansas Press Association Convention in Hot Springs. The second week was spent in northeast Mississippi at the wife's folks' house.
All in all it was a good trip, but the entire Thomas clan was happy to be back and get back into the swing of things.
So with Monday being the first day back in the office, I figured I had some catching up to do. Here's what's on my mind.
• The Siloam Springs School District hired a new baseball coach at the board meeting last Thursday. Alan Hardcastle takes over as the head coach, and athletic director Kevin Downing believes he'll be a good fit for the program.
After visiting with Hardcastle here at the office on Monday, I think he will be too.
Hardcastle loves football, but deep down he's a baseball guy. And he's an Atlanta Braves fan, so I like him already.
His resume speaks for itself. He got to cut his coaching teeth under some of the best in the business in Northwest Arkansas in football and baseball.
And in Florida, they eat, drink and sleep football and baseball year round.
With this being the third head coach in three years, the baseball program needs some stability and here's hoping Hardcastle will be the guy to give it that.
• Speaking of baseball, James Butts Baseball Complex here in Siloam Springs will be the sight of the 15-year-old Southwest Region Babe Ruth Tournament this weekend. Teams from all over the Southwest Region -- which includes Arkansas (North and South), Texas (East, West and South), Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and New Mexico -- will be here playing baseball.
Siloam Springs, of course, will be the host team as well as the North Arkansas state champion after winning the state tournament two weekends ago in Harrison.
A preview of this weekend's tournament, including capsules on every one of the Siloam Springs players can be found on page 10B.
Personally, these regional tournaments are always fun to cover. You get a wide range of teams coming in from all over the place and it's good baseball.
• Moving over to girls basketball, here's an update on the Lady Panthers' team camp at Harding University from coach Tim Rippy and another update on the Northwest Arkansas Eagles from Von Eshnaur.
The Lady Panthers went 12-1 and beat Pulaski Academy in the championship by six points, according to Rippy. The Lady Panthers also had a win against Paragould, he said.
"We saw a lot of growth in handling close ball games, and we executed end-of-game situations really well," Rippy said. "It was a great experience for our kids as we got to face all kinds of different defenses and use a variety of lineups to attack the different defenses."
Abby Cox and Taylor Gay handled point guard duties, Rippy said, and both improved throughout the camp and made good decisions in crunch time.
Rippy said Bailee Owens shot the ball consistently throughout camp, while Baily Cameron and Mayse Pippin were valuable inside and out. Haley Stewart was also strong on the inside, he said.
Mostly the same group of girls, this time wearing NWA Eagles jerseys, went 2-2 at a tournament in San Antonio. The Eagles won their opening round game but lost their second game in overtime. They played an older team out of Australia and then beat a team out of Houston in their final game.
"It was a good weekend," Eshnaur said. "We saw a little bit of everything -- half court traps, full court pressure and man pressure. We made some good strides in running our motion offense and were able to cut back on some of our turnovers."
-- Graham Thomas is the managing editor for the Herald-Leader. He can be reached at [email protected]. The opinions expressed are those of the author.
Sports on 07/23/2014