Happy December 1 everyone and seasons greetings to all our sports readers out there.
Here's what's on my mind.
• A big congratulations to Don Clark with the City of Siloam Springs for winning the 2021 Picks of the Week Contest.
Don finished with a record of 85-40, a full eight games in front of the second place spot, which ended up in a tie with Joe Butler of Ability Tree and myself at 77-48. Sarah Losh of Jimmy Allen Insurance was right behind Joe and I at 76-49, and Lindsey Taylor at the Chamber of Commerce was 67-58.
I would like to personally thank each of our "celebrity" pickers for helping us out this football season. We had a lot of fun getting after each other on our text thread, and despite our best intentions, none of us were able to catch Don!
Oh well, maybe next year right?
• Basketball season is upon us!
John Brown's basketball teams have been going for more than a month now, while the high school and junior high teams got started mid-November or so.
John Brown's men have a lot of potential and are 7-2 overall and 2-0 in Sooner Athletic Conference play heading into this week's trip to Texas.
The JBU women are 4-5 overall and 1-1 in league play, but they could easily be about 6-3 right now. The women lost in double overtime to Evangel very early in the season and then they got robbed of a victory at Langston a couple of weeks ago. Langston hit a game-winning three-pointer at the buzzer, but the basket shouldn't have counted as time had expired before the shot was released. Both teams are back at home on Dec. 11 against Ecclesia (women, 2:05 p.m.) and Central Baptist (men, 4:05 p.m.).
• How bout the high school teams? The Siloam Springs girls are 4-0 heading into Friday's game at Huntsville. The Lady Panthers seem to have picked up where they left off last year with a 15-win season. Coach Tim Rippy had a solid group of kids that have potential to be dangerous down the stretch.
Meanwhile the boys dropped their first two games of the season against Bentonville West and Springdale Har-Ber, both large classification schools. Siloam Springs' boys were scheduled to host Rogers Heritage on Tuesday. Results were not available at presstime.
The Panthers have a lot of good pieces in place and just need ballgames to get ready for a tough 5A-West Conference slate at the start of the new year. Josh Stewart will be one of the best players in the league.
• On a personal note I'd like to thank Mark and Brooke Ross and Julie Chandler for their help with photos during football season. It takes an army of people to help put the Herald-Leader and Siloam Sunday together every week and these folks certainly made my job a whole lot easier.
-- 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.