By FRED CONLEY
T-H Sports Editor
The official Junior High football season opens tonight at sam Smith Stadium when the Forrest City eighth-grade Mustangs will host Brinkley.
The game is scheduled for a 7 p.m. start.
The junior high teams are being coached this season by Rich Trail, Stan Siler, Sonny Shields and Barry Hodges.
The junior high varsity Mustangs will open their season on Thursday, when they make the trip to Marianna.
The Forrest City seventh-grader football team will open the season next Tuesday at home when they host West memphis East in a 5 p.m. start. The Mustang eighth-graders will follow at 6:30 p.m.
Hughes and Palestine-Wheatley will begin junior high football on Thursday, Sept. 4.
By FRED CONLEY
T-H Sports Editor
The Forrest City Mustangs have been shut out once again.
No, not by an opposing team in any of the school's sporting events, but rather by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette's sports writers, who put together the annual All-Arkansas High School Football Team, which was published in last Sunday's edition.
Players from Forrest City, as well as all seven remaining members of the AAAAA-East Conference, were nowhere to be found on either the offensive or defensive list.
The most glaring absentee from either list was Forrest City senior lineman Stephen Henry, who, just last May, drew praise from Arkansas Democrat-Gazette recruiting columnist Otis Kirk.
I guess the rest of the Democrat-Gazette staff don't take the time to read Kirk's timely and informative columns.
Of course, to those who reside in eastern Arkansas -- especially Forrest City -- is this really surprising that once again, a talented athlete from this area is being overlooked or maybe even snubbed??
I'm certain each and every athlete named to the All-Arkansas Team is deserving of the honor and have worked hard for the opportunity to be included on such a list. And I'm certain there are dozens of other high school football players, along with Henry, who probably deserved a spot on the list but were left off for whatever reasons.
But to overlook an athlete like Henry, who has already drawn the interest of and high praise from Arkansas' Houston Nutt, Arkansas State's Steve Roberts, Mississippi State, Rice and Oklahoma State, leaves this sportswriter scratching his almost bald head in bewilderment.
I don't understand why the Democrat-Gazette, the state paper, continues to overlook this area in terms of talented athletes.
Last time I checked, Forrest City, Hughes and P-W were still within the state boundaries.
Henry, a 6-4, 330-pound specimen, who has been used by the Mustang coaching staff on both sides of the football, has already received a scholarship offer from Arkansas. OSU will probably do the same.
He has been impressive this past summer at each of the football camps he attended and in preseason scrimmages, he has been turning heads as well as mowing down those who have tried and failed to contain him on the playing field.
Henry brushes away "double-team" efforts with the same abandon as we brush away mosquitoes. They are only minor irritants to Henry, who has only been playing football since the ninth grade -- which brings to mind memories of another great Arkansas athlete who waited until the ninth grade to step onto the football field -- Dan Hampton.
It was only after some coaxing from Forrest City Coach Donnie Willis, that Henry decided to play football.
Last spring, Forrest City Athletic Director Mike Bender, a former Arkansas Razorback and coach at many levels of the game, began working one-on-one with Henry.
"He works hard and he takes coaching and advice very well," Willis said. "He is one of those kids you don't even know he's around. If we scheduled a workout at 8 a.m. during the summer, he was at the field house at 7:30, waiting on the coaches. Stephen is just a good kids."
Willis calls Henry the "best lineman in the state."
"He can play Division I football anywhere he chooses to go," Willis said. "He ranks up at the top of the list with most of the other top in-state football prospects I have seen play."
When the Mustangs begin their season this Friday, Henry will be used on both sides of the football, but more on offense that defense."
"He's so big and agile, we just line up and run almost every play behind him," Willis has said.
Henry has been timed at 5.38 in the 40-yard dash.
Back to the All-Arkansas Team.
You have to look all the way down to the state's top junior's-to-watch list before you find a AAAAA-East player. Two from the conference made that list -- Blytheville QB Brice Beck and West Memphis WR Keland MIlls.
Three Jonesboro players, another Blytheville player and one Jacksonville player were listed on the Super Sophomore list.
Texarkana, Springdale and LR Central placed five athletes on the combined lists followed by Ft. Smith Southside who had four athletes recognized.
Hughes and Palestine-Wheatley joined Forrest City in failing to place any athletes on the list.