Thursday, Sept. 18
By STEVE PORTER
They are seemingly a vanishing breed, appearing only infrequently on the local landscape. They are the unbeatens, the undefeated ones.
Winning every prep football game is more of a chore than anything else.
It might be easier to bring back the buffalo. Or wish for the return of a dinosaur.
Does that explain why there are just two unbeaten teams out of 18 in The Telegraph area? Only Edwardsville of the Southwestern Conference and Staunton of the South Central Conference East remain unblemished heading into the end of the first month of play in the nine-week season.
Meanwhile, there are five winless teams and four of them are battling among themselves tonight. Jersey is at CM and Roxana goes to East Alton-Wood River in battles of 0-3 squads. It’s incomprehensible to think that the Panthers, Eagles, Oilers and Shells are a combined 0-12 thus far.
But that’s the state of River Bend-style football. A booster shot is needed. Call the Medicine Man. What’s up, doc?
It wasn’t much different last year. Marquette Catholic finished 6-4, while Alton, EA-WR, CM, Roxana and Jersey, among others, experienced losing seasons.
I hope we’re not headed for more of the same, but I fear winning is going to become more difficult than losing. And winning them all, even through three weeks of the 2008 season, is darn near impossible.
It’ll take at least a 5-4 record — or conference/division championship — to get a team into the IHSA playoffs. You can be certain there will be an ample amount of teams nervously sitting on the bubble the final few weeks of the season.
It’s the state of the grid union around here. And it’s not pretty.

Thursday, Sept. 4, 2008

By STEVE PORTER
High school football got going last week and the nine-week regular season should be an intriguing one.
There’s also plenty of interest in prep soccer, volleyball, tennis, golf, cross country and field hockey.
Cross country is different since both boys and girls run together in the fall. Soccer, tennis, golf and volleyball have separate seasons. Yes, there’s boys volleyball. It’s a spring sport.
Cross country showcases its first big meet of the season Saturday at Granite City. Edwardsville is playing host to a major of major meets this month on the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville campus.
Alton is holding not one, but two volleyball tournaments within the next two weeks. There’s one this weekend and another on Sept. 12-13.
Edwardsville, led by Telegraph Player of the Year Kayla Fitterer and Megan Sharpe, should be a load. Fitterer is bound for the University of Alabama.
The Tigers’ boys golf team is already flexing its muscles. It should be tops in the area.
In soccer, look for Collinsville, Edwardsville and Granite City to vie for the Southwestern Conference title.
Tennis will feature a number of quality individuals, including Alton’s Allison Callahan and Roxana’s Brooke Tweedy. Expect Belleville West and Edwardsville to battle for SWC honors.
Now, you don’t need to listen to me to discover the best of the best.
Go see them yourself. You will be glad you did.
And as they say in the dining world:
Enjoy!