Pea Ridge High School will be well represented this week at the annual Arkansas Activities High School Sports All-Star Games to be held in Conway on the University of Central Arkansas campus.
The All-Star week is composed of competition in football, baseball, softball, volleyball and basketball. There are two All-Star rosters composed of graduated seniors from eastern Arkansas vs. All-Stars from western Arkansas.
Former Blackhawk All-Staters Duncan Truesdell and Zaine Holley will be representing the West squad along with Pea Ridge head coach Stephen Neal who is on the West All-Star coaching staff. The fourth member of the Pea Ridge contingent will be three-time All-State basketball player Joey Hall.
Blackhawks upgrade
2018 non-conference schedule
The AAA announced some of the new football schedules as it relates to the 2018-2020 competition cycle in a recent news release.
The growing Pea Ridge High School will have an all 5A non-conference schedule, upgrading from games against 3A and 4A school opponents. Dropping Booneville and Green Forest from their first two seasonal games was followed by the addition of games against Harrison and Maumelle. The 'Hawks kept Farmington as an opponent, their first ever 5A competition last season.
Although dropping Green Forest this year from the non-conference, the 'Hawks and Tigers will continue their series next season as Green Forest has been moved up from the 3A-1 district to the 'Hawks 4A-1 home. They are replacing the departing Huntsville Eagles who will be moved back up into the 5A class after this season.
With the 'Hawks' rate of growth, most observers fully expect that Pea Ridge will be assigned 5A status for the 2021 season. Playing 5A schools early will give them experience in playing in that classification when the time comes.
The first three games of a high school team's season has no bearing on conference races or playoff considerations. It does affect polling numbers and of course, everyone likes to win as much as possible.
This fall, the 'Hawks have the unique challenge of taking on two of the state's top contenders in the first week of the official season. They play Hamburg in the Hooten's Football Classic on in Conway and then take on a solid Booneville team on the road four days later. No one can say that the Blackhawks of Pea Ridge avoid challenges.
There is a t-shirt being sold at the Blackhawk Nest store on the high school campus which has emblazoned on the back "Good to Great." The past several years and he plans to date have proven those words are more than just a catchy slogan.
Ain't it interesting
When Hooten's magazine published the list of the 50 top high school potential collegiate football recruits in the state of Arkansas for the 2017 season, Pea Ridge had two athletes who made the list (Drew Winn and Hayden Holtgrewe). I noticed later that no athlete from Fayetteville, Springdale, Rogers, Rogers Heritage or Siloam Springs had any honorees. Bentonville had one athlete listed, wide receiver Kam-Ron Mays-Hunt. Springdale Har-Ber's big down lineman Alejandro Ramirez is on the list with Bentonville West matching the 'Hawks number with two of their own. Wolverines Ryan Macy and Michael Toney, both offensive lineman, are top recruits for the season.
AAA to vote on
changes for 2018
I have already detailed the plans for the AAA to radically change the set-ups for classifications for every sport in the state save football. The new plan would likely leave Pea Ridge in the 4A class for every sport except football after 2020.
Another item to be voted on would be to eliminate blended conferences which saw Pea Ridge play in a 4A-3A-1 Conference last year which only saw the 3A members beaten down by the 4A members. The AAA made the change to improve revenue and reduce travel, but the result was increased travel and reduced revenue. They ought to end it immediately but that won't happen.
To rein in some schools with their runaway 7-on-7 football competition and some camps that seem to go on and on, the AAA proposes to limit to just eight days an athlete can compete in athletic competition/camps. I've heard that some football teams were having their athletes spending most of their summer in some of those pursuits and that's not good.
In another bid to free up student time, the AAA proposes to have a three-day dead time from Dec. 23-27 where athletes cannot be required to be anywhere. Schools can chose their own three-day period with Christmas Day being one of them. With the plethora of holiday tournaments that go on typically, schools can schedule around the three days to suit their schedules.
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Editor's note: John McGee is an award-winning columnist and sports writer. He is the art teacher at Pea Ridge elementary schools and writes a regular sports column for The Times. The opinions expressed are those of the author. He can be contacted through The Times at [email protected].
Sports on 06/21/2017