Rising Senior Emma Leath received one final piece of tremendous 👏 news this week when she was voted to the Second Team All-State for Class 3 Softball.

Leath tossed 21 complete games for Head Coach Rick Nester, finishing 17-4 after allowing more than two runs 🏃‍♂️ in a single game just one time. Leath also broke the 500 career Strike Out mark on the road at Radford.

The captured moment had all of the makings of a good Knock Knock joke – Coach Tompkins has been coaching for a long time. How long, you ask ?

So long that nobody is exactly sure on the number of years ! Coach is off to retirement now following a highly successful season as the Lead Assistant Coach to Alexis Dalton’s Junior Varsity program.

The Ceremony was a part of the Softball programs end of the year gathering held Wednesday night in Hillsville.

The gentle Giant will be missed going forward!

Rick along with his Son and Daughter-in-Law from the end of the JV Basketball 🏀 season at Floyd County.

Coach Nester was interested in making the experience of playing Softball for him more enjoyable this season. His desire to enhance the atmosphere lined up perfectly with my desire to show that positivity can make any event more enjoyable for everyone involved.

For years Coach Nester had the reputation for being a hard nosed, no nonsense type of Coach but he was beginning to soften up ever so slightly as long as didn’t take away from the actual game itself.

For Nester to turn over the majority of his Game Day operations to a person he had known for less than a year was a Brave step to take to say the least and after our 21 game season ended in the Regional Semi-final (at the hands of the eventual State Champion Northside) I was able to look back and feel great about the end result.

The team received Game Day coverage for all 21 contests, 20 that I wrote and the 21st by the man 👨 that was willing to print the first twenty, Alan Worrell. Every word from start to finish put the team in a positive light and every Night 🌙 that we played Softball at Cavalier Park we did our best to make the game into an experience for everyone in attendance.

We made the most of the Greatest tool 🔧 in Softball which is the Ceremonial First Pitch. Each of the 8 Seniors and their families shared in this plus one night 🌙the Cavalier Mascot and finally we wrapped it up by inviting Elijah Smith and Corrie Delp to do the honors 🎖 before the Track and Field State Tournament.

Each home game also included the Omega Foul Ball Contest which Brandi’s Dad 👨 gladly sponsored. This allowed us to have crowd participation throughout the evening, again adding a Minor League ballpark feel to the contests.

DJ Debbie, a dedicated Mother 👩 and School 🏫 teacher helped us try and make the Junior Varsity games a little more fun when they played ahead of the Varsity.

We held a Ceremony to celebrate the JV team after they won 🏆 the District Championship and another Ceremony to Salute the Parents as a way to make sure they felt they were appreciated for their dedication to both their Daughters and their team.

While it was somewhat disappointing that the season ended one game shy of the State Tournament to most, I have to look back and smile about the efforts this group oof young Ladies put forth each and every time they took the field.

Tonight is the Final official activity for the season when Coach gathers his team for their end of the Season festivities which made it the perfect time to say a huge Thank You to a veteran Coach for seeking me out with the goal of making the Park a place to be !

The Campus of Western Carolina University provides a great backdrop for breaking down the hopes of Oneofus.care in regards to the Carroll County Sports Report.

The Pot of Gold at the end of the Rainbow 🌈 is Education. First, to try and raise the bar at the High School and second, find more ways to encourage as many of our Students to attend College as possible.

The Goal was to create curriculum at CCHS that would open doors 🚪 to future Sports Writers, Sportscaster, Photographer, Web Designers, Marketers among other things.

The site would become a workshop for a teacher or teachers in a classroom setting in hopes of reaching a few students that might otherwise sneak through graduation without having an opportunity to dip their toes in the water. While High School 🏫 was 40+ years ago for me I fell into that group of Students – ones who earned a degree without ever having a conversation about anything of relevance.

Mr. Jeff Burner teaches High School 🏫 in Quicksburg, Virginia and a few years ago begin creating classes that he teaches at his School. I am a huge fan / supporter of Jeff, to the point of naming him the Oneofus.care 2022 Person of the Year a while back. I was even fortunate enough to help Jeff with one of his Class Assignments where we were instructing three young students the proper way to do the PA for a Junior Varsity Football game.

Podcasts, Radio shows, Coaches Shows and stats for the leading tackler of the 7th and 8th grade Football team were among the list of things that I could assist the teacher(s) with as we searched out the next Marty Smith of ESPN.

Everyone in the County would benefit from being able to check out the site on a daily basis, knowing two things – Everything would be Positive and All Athletes would be treated equally.

Sound would become available for the fans that watch the High School Network…. the list could go on forever but after two years of trying to chase a dream of possibly helping others find a calling in life sooner rather than later, its probably time to concede that sometimes a Vision is just a Vision……

Volleyball 🏐 Camp is just around the corner and Basketball 🏀 Camp has been scheduled as well. Know that our Cavalier Student Athletes stay hard at it for the better part of the year nowadays!