To quote Normy from Cheers:
“OK. Which…is it?”
We have ourselves–what?–at least four different reports for Alex Thomas’ rushing yards in the NVL title game.
First, from Steve Gesseck on WATR: 280 yards, from what I remember him saying.
From the Connecticut Post’s Emmett Spillane:
Thomas and his offensive line bludgeoned the Crusaders 33 times for 297 yards and four touchdowns to lift Ansonia to a 27-13 victory and the NVL title at stormy Wolcott High School.
From the Waterbury Republican-American’s Mark Jaffee:
How good was Thomas’ 258-yard, 31-carry performance in front of an estimated 2,200 fans?
From New Haven Register’s Mike Pucci:
The contest was clearly decided up front, not only on defense but the Ansonia offensive line paved the way for junior running back Alex Thomas to rush for 162 yards on 22 carries and four touchdowns.
Woah.
These are all way off. Can we get a ruling from someone else?
Now, I’ll be the first to stand up and say that, even when I’m not under deadline pressure, I screw up statistics all the time. Just ask Masuk (I make more mistakes with that group than I’d care to count… from names… to receiving yards… to scores of past games). Sorry. I’m just not good at math, especially in a pinch. That’s why I became a writer and not a rocket scientist.
Ah, cruel irony. Remember, kids, your teachers are right. You ARE going to need this stuff later in life.
Anyway, With no official scorer at high school games, and at least 800 different interpretations of the actual scoring rules, it’s darn-near impossible to have two reporters at the same game produce even remotely identical stats.
And, finally, most reporters stand on the sidelines. It was raining pretty hard out there. Ever try to write in the rain? Not fun.
So, somebody goofed somewhere. We’ll have to just split the difference between the top three reports and throw out the one below 200. To that end, Thomas rushed 32 times and had about 280 yards rushing.
This is not in dispute: He had four touchdowns, Ansonia is your NVL champ.
I actually had 270 on 33 carries for Thomas. The only difference with Emmitt’s was the first drive, he called it six for 88 yards but I had the drive as 63 yards.
Interesting. How can the first drive be so vastly different?
Not sure, but we have a DVD of the broadcast that would verify that.