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Wiregrass Working Hard To Get Over The Hump

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By EDDIE DANIELS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 13, 2008

WESLEY CHAPEL - A little more than two football fields away from the Wiregrass Ranch football practice field, the school's marquee was aglow with red letters.

On this day, it was highly appropriate for the digital markings to match the sensation of the thick air that afternoon - red hot. The marquee's reading announced: 93 degrees.

Despite being enveloped in the broil, the Bulls practiced with a high intensity, a sure sign of an attempt to break free from last season's reputation for being pushed around the football field.

"This time last year when I told them about the step from junior varsity to varsity, I don't think a lot of them really believed me," Wiregrass coach Ricky Thomas said. "Once we opened the season and started getting manhandled, by the end of the season they knew there was only one way. We had to get bigger, we had to get stronger, we had to get faster. The kids made the commitment to do that. They're determined to change that 1-9 record."

That experience is fresh in Paris Wolfe's mind. The team was pummeled by Ridgewood, 48-0, a game in which Byronell Arline racked up 159 yards in the first two quarters. Two weeks later, Gulf roughed them up, 45-7. Against Lake Weir, the team dropped four potential scoring passes.

Additionally, the Bulls were outscored 364-116, an experience ushering Wolfe and his teammates into the weight room.

"All the games, you would look at the scores and they ended up 48-0 or something like that, none of the scores really got that far until the third quarter," said Wolfe, a senior running back. "We just need to learn how to finish games. We're within the teams we're playing against we just have to learn how to finish games. That comes with doing the workouts, actually finishing stuff in the weight room, running, going all out all the time."

Wiregrass' aims at success will be attempted against a poignant backdrop. On April 4, Thomas' mother, Ida Lee Thomas, died due to heart failure at the age of 88. Coach Thomas, raised by his single mother, confined himself to his house for two days dealing with the grief.

In the days following, he received encouraging words from his wife and family as well as from his coaching staff and players.

"My mom used to tell me all the time, a true champion doesn't stay on his back. A true champion gets off his back to continue to fight," said Thomas, who will wear black this season in memory of his mother. "That's what I've got to do. I've always preached to my players you have to do this, you have to do that. You have to be strong, you have to get it done. So now it's time for me, as a head football coach, even though my heart is still heavy, I've talked the talk, now I have to walk the walk."

It's a common phrase, but Thomas believes this group has taken on his demeanor - gentleman off the field and a fire-breathing competitor on it. It's a conversion reverting back to last season's tribulations.

"At the end of the season, we knew how it felt, we knew what it was like to go 1-9," said junior lineman Casey Hess, the team's first All-Sunshine Athletic Conference selection. "It all starts in the weight room. Everything in this sport starts with the weights, so everyone got that in their head and we knew we wanted to win this year, so we've all been working."

Nothing like a bull with attitude.

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