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BAILEY'S TAKE
ON PIRATE SPORTS
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From the Anchor Desk
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
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By Brian Bailey |
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Season in "single
elimination" phase
By
Brian Bailey
©2007 Bonesville.net
All rights reserved.
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For the East Carolina football
coach, one loss to North Carolina State was bad enough.
But as Skip Holtz looked at
his team the Sunday after the loss to State, he knew that if he wasn’t
careful, the Wolfpack would beat the Pirates again.
Holtz knew that if his team
didn’t bounce back at practice last week, N.C. State would have essentially
had a part in back to back ECU losses.
Instead, the Pirates played
their most complete game of the year, blasting UAB for Homecoming 41-6. The
only thing that went wrong was at the start, when the “Pirate” hung the
skull and crossbones upside down. ECU Grounds Director Joey Perry came to
the rescue, and the rout was on.
Add in Central Florida's win
over Southern Miss on Sunday night in Hattiesburg, and the Pirates have all
of their goals within reach.
ECU now needs wins at Memphis,
at Marshall, and then a victory over Tulane at home, in order to host the
Conference USA championship.
What a difference a week truly
does make!
“It’s a single elimination
tournament,” said Holtz at his weekly news conference on Monday. “I knew we
couldn’t win the league championship this past Saturday, but I did know that
we could have essentially lost it.”
East Carolina was in a similar
situation to win the C-USA East Division title last year, but stumbled down
the stretch in losing to Rice.
Holtz hopes that loss helps
keep players focused this year.
“We had the prize in hand last
year, but we didn’t finish the job,” Holtz added. “Again, we must stay
humble and hungry.”
I watched Memphis and Marshall
earlier this year on television and thought at the time that both of those
teams were a little better then their individual records indicated.
The Tigers like to throw the
football, and that’s been a big concern for this Pirate team all season
long. Saturday night’s win over UAB, though, showed promise for the
secondary.
These next three games offer a
tremendous opportunity for East Carolina.
Coach Holtz is right. The
Pirates can’t win a berth in the league title game this week, but they
certainly can lose it.
It’s hard to believe that
November is here. Thankfully, the Pirates are right in the race for a C-USA
title.
Great skyline
I thought this was funny from
the game on Saturday night.
I was standing in the corner
of the end zone in the third quarter with ECU Associate Athletics Director
Gary Overton. We both commented on how beautiful the sky looked over the
stadium.
About that time, my former
mother-in-law, who still loves me to this day, called. She was watching the
game on television in Virginia, and wanted to make sure that I saw the sky.
I decided to take a picture on
my cell phone and make it my new wallpaper.
Later that night, a group of
guys called me over to their table to talk about the big win. One of them
opened his phone, and there was the sky above the stadium.
I told him that I did the same
thing. One by one, the entire table showed off their own pictures of the
beautiful sky.
Just think, all of these guys
sitting around a table talking football, and the main topic of conversation
was the sky in the third quarter.
But, it was a beautiful sky!
BB
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04/21/2008 07:02:51 PM |
