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Prep Confidential

Hall-of-Fame night

Posted by: Marcus Jackson

Saturday, October 4, 2008 12:03 AM

The message prior to the game from the 1957 Gibson City Greyhound to the 2008 Gibson City-Melvin-Sibley squad was "Good start, but you've still got work to do."

The Falcons went out and put on a show in front of members of the 1957 squad, who joined 1983 grad Steve Mueller and 1993 grad Lisa Noble Wood as the newest members of the school's athletic Hall-of-Fame on Friday night during halftime of the 51-20 homecoming romp of Deer Creek-Mackinaw.

The Falcons took the message to heart, jumping out to a 14-0 lead less than three minutes into the game. Michael Romshek scored a pair of first-quarter touchdowns, as did Tyler Smith for GCMS which led 28-0 after the opening frame.

"We'd like to bring those guys back every week," GCMS coach Mike Allen said of the 1957 team that fired his players up with a pregame speech.

To Allen's knowledge, this is the first time a GCMS team has started 6-0 since the co-op was formed during the 1993-94 school year.

But Bill Gross, the coach from the 1957 team, told this year's group that 5-0, 6-0 or even 9-0 means nothing if you don't finish. So the Falcons have their eyes set on playing on Thanksgiving weekend at Memorial Stadium.

The Falcons boast a solid two-headed monster in the backfield of senior Tyler Smith and junior Michael Romshek. The duo ran for 205 yards and accounted for five touchdowns against the Chiefs on Friday.

Quarterback Stephan Birt is a good dual-treat option out of the backfield, too.

Other observations from Friday night:

— It looked like the Week 9 matchup between GCMS and Fisher might be between a pair of 9-0 squads, but Fisher's loss at El Paso-Gridley ended that talk. The Bunnies ran into an EP-G squad that was sparked by the return of a pair of players who were injured in the early part of the season. Either way, that's still going to be one heck of a game between arch-rivals. Colten Unzicker continued to have an awesome season for the Bunnies, rushing for 162 yards and two scores in the loss

— Champaign Central woke up after falling behind 14-7 at Matton and scored 48 points in the second quarter en route to a 69-28 win. Denzel Stewart ran for six touchdowns for the Maroons in that one, which might help them get back on track after a pair of losses to Bloomington and Decatur MacArthur.

— I thought the game between St. Thomas More and St. Joseph-Ogden was a toss up, but STM ripped the Spartans 30-0 on the road Friday. Joe Parkhill led the Sabers with 230 yards of total offense in STM's first ever win against Dick Duval's Spartans.

— With three tough games coming up, including one against Maroa-Forsyth next week, Tuscola deserately needed Friday's win against Central A&M to keep itself in prime position to make the postseason for the 15th consecutive season. After next week's game at Maroa, the 5-1 Warriors will face Meridian and Argent-Oreana to close the season, and will likely need to win one of those three contests to get a playoff berth.

Be sure to grab Saturday's News-Gazette for a full recap of all of Friday's action and pick up Monday's edition for my prep football insider, complete with brad new rankings.

mjackson@news-gazette.com