The team won the state championship earlier in the summer and played in the World Series in Orland, Fla. last month.

The Wooly Boogers played seven games in the World Series. On the first day, they played two games and one game the second day of teams in their pool and won two of three to qualify for the championship round.

The Wooly Boogers and the East Side Falcons of Cincinnati, Ohio, tangled up in the first game and the Wooly Boogers came out on top 8-4.

The second game was played against Kenosha Merchants and they lost 7-6. The Wooly Boogers came back and shutout the SW FL Raiders 8-0 in the third game.

Ole Miss is taking away Colonel Reb while Mississippi State is losing its cowbells.

You say it’s a big difference. Not really. Both are traditions, even though not very old, with the schools.

The fight for Colonel Reb is a lot more vocal than for the cowbells and really is hitting the school’s pocketbooks. Unlike Miss. State fans who have found a way to get those cowbells in the stadium, the mascot Colonel Reb is not allowed on the field anymore.

That’s why that fight is more heated.

But have both schools waited too long to remove these symbols from the university?

Ole Miss officials seem to think the university will not be adversely effected moneywise by the banning of Colonel Reb but the new coalition puts those thoughts to the test.

Already students are not buying the tickets and the first game is next Saturday. Usually students tickets are the first to go but not this year.

Earlier in the year, Ole Miss was citing Colonel Reb as affecting enrollment of minority athletes and other minority students. They even thought people from other states would not come to the University of Mississippi because Colonel Reb had something to do with the race issue.

There has been the fight with "Dixie" as the school’s song. There is the flag. There was a time when people fought to get into Ole Miss and the national guard had to be called out.

Those days, thank God, are long gone. People can go wherever they want to go and can afford to go if there is some entity about the school which offends a particular set of people.

Granted the officials want to continue bringing in money and want to take away anything that offends people, but it just may be a little too late for the removal of Colonel Reb to make a difference.

The only short term difference seems to be in the alumni who usually puts a lot of money into the school during the football season.

What would be a mathematical equation for this problem?

TRADITION=MONEY=NEW TRADITION?.

Obviously, the banning of traditional university icons like Colonel Reb and the cowbells have been well thought out.

These officials had to know what the ramifications to the money belt would be. They had to know what risks the schools would be taking when these announcements came.

Granted, the cowbells was an NCAA decision, but Colonel Reb was strictly a school decision. Miss. State officials really did not have to stick their necks out and risk getting them chopped off with the cowbell decision.

Ole Miss officials are in a totally different boat. I too wonder how long the REBELS will be a part of the university name.

The single most important thing is both decisions have to do with tradition.

This contest going on for a new mascot is going to get pretty interesting. The name Rebels stays but a new icon will have to be associated with the name. Will it be like the Auburn Tigers with a War Eagle as the mascot? Or the Alabama Crimson Tide with an elephant?

This could get interesting.

South Panola junior tailback Marcus Griffin scored his first points of the season with three touchdowns and 161 rushing yards on six carries to lead the Tigers.

South Panola had a total of 470 yards and held North Panola to 50 total yards.

Even though South Panola made some mistakes and coughed up the ball, North Panola was not able to get through the Tigers’ stingy defense to capitalize and score.

In the first quarter, South Panola fumbled the first punt and North Panola recovered but ended up punting again. Except North Panola fumbled the punt and downed it on their own 10 yard line.

Griffin then went 10-yards, untouched, for the first score of the night with 6:34 left in the first quarter. The extra point was no good.

Looking forward to a war tonight with Hinds coming to Northwest. That one is always a good one. I’m sure it’ll be better than the one I was in last Saturday at Auburn.

The game was at Auburn but I’m not sure where the team in the Auburn uniforms was from because they sure didn’t look like what is usually found on the Plains. USC was good but not that good – almost seemed dead on the field. It was sure quiet anyway.

I guess the biggest factor on a game’s outcome is how much intensity a team can muster. Intensity is pretty tough to define relating to a football team.

Some refer to how "up" is the team. To me it seems there is a level of energy that can be felt on the field before the game. I remember the 2001 version of the Tennessee – Florida game.
It was rescheduled from September 15 to December 1 because of September 11. As it became the playoff game for the East slot in the SEC Championship Game, there was enough energy within The Swamp to light up the state of Florida.

Seeing some of the Tennessee coaches I know before the game indicated how ready they were to play. They could hardly talk – it was more like a squeak that came out. And even Coach Spurrier was more subdued than usual. It was one of the best games I had ever been in.

When I think back to the "energy level" surrounding the USC -Auburn game last week, there was just no comparison.

Early on in the game when the score differential was just a touchdown, the players seemed to have a look coming off the field of, "Well that’s it. Let’s go on to the house."

It’s frustrating to me to see things like that. I guess I’ve been spoiled.

With our 9- and 10-year old team, we try so hard to get their energy level, their intensity, up which is no easy task. It is very difficult to do for players of any age.

I’ve heard some college coaches say that it’s impossible to get a team "up" or ready to beat the world more than four times a season.

The good teams then are the ones who can get by and win four or five other games not being completely "up" for the game. I think too that the more individual players a team has who play the game with a very high level of focused intensity influence the others on the team more.

Linebacker Dick Butkus of the Chicago Bears is one who always comes to mind when talking about an intense player. I always love those NFL Films pieces showing how he punished running backs on every tackle. He made sure they knew they were hit. After they got through wiping their nose. Now I’m showing my age talking about a player from 40 years ago.

But I do get mad when I see players who are behind in the score acting as if it’s all a big joke or something. Especially when I see a team that’s not too far behind in the score or still capable of winning a game and their players are on the bench talking, joking and looking like they could care less about the game. That is simply not being focused on the job at hand.

Well, it’s official now: the first regular season game of the NFL is in the books and it was within a few seconds of going into overtime.

With the first week of college games done it’s always fun to see how much the polls shift between week one and week two.

Then it’s Hinds at Northwest, which is usually a pretty good little war. Best thing about it was our Rangers took them down early and kept them out of it.

Worked some high school Friday night and even though I’m off from the SEC for a Saturday, our 5-year-old has a game at 9:30 and his older brother has a game at 1:30. So I’m not ever really off from football. Get out and see a game.