THE BKUNSWfOtftftACON Thuvday. August 11. 1W4 D Inside this section: ? T.V. Listing, Pages 6-7 ? District Court Docket, 9 PRE-SEASQN FOOTBALL Trojans Battle Aycock Falcons Saturday YOGI HICKMAN, head football coach at West Brunswick, will gat a good look at his team Saturday at CJB. Aycock. SPORTING SCENE Cal Ripken's Streak Has Gone Long Enough Cat Ripken Jr. played his 2,000th consecutive Major League Baseball game last week, pulling him ever clos er to breaking the all-time record held by New York Yankees' great Lou Gehrig. More than 25,000 baseball fans in Minnesota showed their respect with a standing ovation as Ripken took the field for Game 2,000. It left Ripken just 130 games short of Gehrig's leg endary mark. With all due respect to the folks in Minnesota, I wouldn't even consid er applauding Ripken's streak. Here's a man who is doing everything he can to manufacture his own place in baseball history. Barring injury, the Baltimore Orioles' shortstop will break Gehrig's mark next season. And at this stage, I think it would have to be an injury of the life-threatening variety to keep Ripken out of the lineup. Ripken hat said in interviews that the consecutive-games streak and Gehrig's record don't mean that much to him, but I find that hard to believe. If the record didn't mean anything, Ripken would take a day off once in a while like every one of his teammates and every other baseball player. At age 33, I'm sure Ripken could use at least one break during a 162-game sea son. He hasn't missed a game since May 30, 1982, when he was a rookie third baseman with the Orioles. During the streak, Ripken has batted around .280, hit more than 300 home runs and collected over 1,150 RBI. His home run count is higher than any shortstop in history, and he owns the single-season record for fewest er rors at his position. Ripken is a great player with Hall of Fame credentials. But in my mind, the streak has tainted his career. When baseball fans think of Ripken they think of the streak, not his outstanding glove or his powerful bat. I think the streak has gone long enough. Marffc On The Rocks Former West Brunswick High School tennis coach and assistant athletic director Martie Gillis Anowood will be teaching this year at Rocky Mount High School. That's the good news for Martie. The bad news is that her husband, former Trojan assistant football coach David Arrowood, will be teaching and coaching at Rocky Mount's arch rival. Northern Nash. Things could get mighty interesting around the Arrowood household Nov. 4, when Rocky Mount and Northern Nash meet in the regular-season finale with the possibility of a playoff berth at stake. In need be, Martie could always come back to Shallotte that night for the West Brunswick-South Brunswick clash. In any event, I'll miss having Martie at West Not only was she a good tennis coach who truly cared about her athletes, she always went out of her way to accommodate the press and was an inexhaustible source of juicy gos sip. On? Mart' s Opinion Everett Lee of H olden Beach had a letter published in the July 25 issue of Sports Illustrated. It was one of six letters published in response to a recent article compar ing the National Basketball Association to the National Hockey League. SI portrayed the NHL as the "hotter" league. Lee's opinion: "If there's one thing hurting the NBA, it's that the play ers have become too big for the court. The defense can overwhelm the of fense because the court is too small for today's players." (f V SAVINGS OS ALL 1994 MODELS IN STOCK BY D6UG R UTTER With two weeks of practice under its belt the West Brunswick football team will travel to Pikeville on Saturday for a pre-season scrim mage against C.B. Ay cock High School. The contest starts at 7 p.m. at the Golden Falcons' stadium north of Goldsboro. It will be the first of two practice games for West Brunswick prior to its season opener Aug. 26 at South Brunswick. First-year head coach Yogi Hick man said he'll evaluate individual talent Saturday and see how the team is grasping his offensive sys tem, which is vasUy different than the one the Trojans ran the last two years. "We'll evaluate our players more than anything." Hickman said of the scrimmage. "As far as the outcome, that's for the birds. You work on gel ting better and that's what we're go ing to do." West's coaching staff may have gotten a sneak preview of Saturday night's contest on Monday, when se nior fullback James Morgan broke loose for SO yards on the first play of an intra-squad scrimmage. "You can see the kids are starting to believe in what we're teaching them," Hickman said. "Right now we're at a level where I'm glad we don't have a regular season football game, but we're ready to scrim mage." Since football practice started July 30, Hickman said most of the time has been devoted to teaching the new offense. The Trojans will use the same defense as last season. Hickman said about half of his of fensive schemes had been installed as of Monday. The kids have (kmc a real good job, especially the last four days. They're starting to get confidence in the I-formation," he said. Hickman said his main focus Saturday night will be offense, and most of the returning starters from last season will not see much action on defense. "Philosophically it never has - - ?. i iw> wmo? mr pouo mwi WEST BRUNSWICK RUNNING BACK Jimmy Vaught (19) cuts through the defense during a recent practice. made much of a difference to me if we give up one touchdown or six or eight," he said. "We're not going to stick a bunch of starters out there and make them play all night long." Hickman's concern about low turnout the first few days of practice has all but vanished. With the num ber of kids out now. West should be able to carry close to 30 on the var sity squad. "We had 47 in uniform this morn ing. That's varsity and JV," Hick man said. "Things are looking much better with the number situation. We've got enough to practice and play with." C.B. Ay cock competes in the East Central 2A Conference against the likes of Clinton, James Kenan and Wallace-Rose Hill. The Falcons were 2-3 in the league and 6-4 over all last season. C.B. Aycock Coach Mike Goyne said he's looking forward to the practice game against West Bruns wick, which won the state 2A cham pionship in 1992 and the 3A title last year. "In my scrimmages I try to play the best I can play so my guys know what to expect if they want to get in the playoffs," Goyne said. "West Brunswick is one of the best teams in the state in any classification." "We may look really bad, but at least we'll know what we need to work on," Goyne added. To get to C.B. Aycock, take U.S. 17 north to Wilmington and 1-40 west to the Mount CHive exit Follow U.S. 117 north through Goldsboro into Pikeville. The school is on the right about a quarter-mile past Hardee's. West Brunswick will play its final pre-season contest next Friday, Aug. 19. The Trojans will square off against Wallace-Rose Hill in the UCB Football Jamboree at Wilm ington's Legion Stadium. The jamboree, which begins at 6 p.m. with a cheerleading competi tion, is a series of four, 24-minute scrimmages. Other matchups are New Hanover versus Whiteville, Hoggard against South Brunswick and Laney versus South Columbus. Tickets to the jamboree are on sale at UCB branches in Shallotte, Southport, Whiteville, Wilmington, Wallace, Rose Hill an3-7 is pleased to announce we will cany live each week West Brunswick High School Trojan Football Business sponsorships of the games are avail able. Please contact Regina LaFontaine Account Executive or Brenda Williams 579-1037 rtycg.