The Hot Corner
Nothing keeps a sports reporter busier than high school playoffs, and with three Scurry County teams still in the thick of it, my journeys across West Texas will continue.
I’ve really enjoyed the past couple weeks. The basketball is at its best, the energy in the gyms is better now than at any other time of the year and the teams are playing at their peaks. But perhaps my favorite part about this basketball season and this postseason in particular, has been traveling and exploring the West Texas area.
As I have written before, I am not from this area and had little exposure to West Texas before moving here. Having the opportunity to travel and see all the towns and check out the schools’ facilities has been a blast.
The gymnasiums have far exceeded any expectations I had when moving here. Before joining the Snyder Daily News staff, I was covering 5-A and 6-A schools in Central Texas and I can confidently say that Ira and Hermleigh’s gyms blow those out of the water.
Early in my tenure here, I went to a basketball camp Hermleigh head girls basketball coach Duane Hopper held and saw that gym for the first time. The scoreboard that hangs from the roof, the seating on both sides with actual seats and the cleanliness of the gym impressed me. As far as high schools go, there are few gyms nicer.
In Ira, the gym is accented with huge wood beams, making for such a cool look. The stands are actual seats, not bleachers. It’s a very different setting than Hermleigh’s but I love the look the wood gives the gym.
Some other favorites that I have visited this season were Loraine, Lubbock Roosevelt and (I am sorry for this Snyder fans) Sweetwater.
With smaller schools, there is no telling what you will see when you walk into the gymnasium. Highland has a nice enough gym, but it is more along the lines of what you’d expect at a school of that size.
Loraine has a big, well-kept gymnasium plastered with the school’s colors. The walls behind the basket had padding with the Loraine logo and the court was maintained.
It was a pleasant surprise and the Loraine boys’ program has something special brewing over there.
Lubbock Roosevelt reminded me of a rodeo arena. When you walk in, you immediately see the court. It is in a horseshoe-shaped bowl a good four to five feet below the stands. The gym is completely separate from the school, across the street from the primary school, and to get to the court you have to go down a flight of stairs. The lighting left something to be desired, but the gym itself was in good condition and gives fans plenty of vantage points to watch the game.
They just do things different over in Sweetwater. Walking up to the gym, I couldn’t’ help but notice the bowl of the football stadium. That set the stage for the gym. It was old-school and vintage and I loved it.
It’s weird having the stands so far back and the tiles threw me off at first, but the dome is unique and I am a sucker for originality like that. It isn’t the nicest and it definitely isn’t the newest gym, but I thoroughly enjoyed watching basketball there.
Tonight, I will be at Hamlin High School for the Hermleigh boys’ area playoff game against the Munday Moguls, so be on the lookout for the game thread on Twitter (@SDNsports19), which I always post with a picture of the gym.
On Friday, I will follow the Snyder Tigers to Cisco for their area match-up with the Argyle Eagles at Cisco High School.
Reed Graff is the sports editor for the Snyder Daily News. Comments about his column may be sent to sports@snyderdailynews.com