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MARIONVILLE Opposing defenses are forced to play a little game of "pick your poison" every week when going up against Marionville.

Either they can try to shut downdynamic sophomore quarterback Wil Carlton or they can do all they can to stop5-foot-5 tailback Dakota Wilson from running all over them.

Try all the defenses want, but so far, nothing has worked.

Marionville (7-0) continued its resurgence with a 48-12 win over Sarcoxie (3-4) on Friday night.The Comets remain unbeaten after two consecutive four-win seasons.

WEEK 7 HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL COVERAGE

Dakota Wilson, of Marionville, runs with the ball during the Comets 48-12 win over Sarcoxie in Marionville, Mo., on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020. The Comets remain undefeated this season.(Photo: Andrew Jansen/News-Leader)

The one-two punch of Carlton and Wilson has the Comets back in the state rankings they were ranked No. 8 in the Class 1 rankings this past week. And it appears, as long as they're there, the Comets are here to stay.

"It's amazing having thatgreat of a pair, " Wilson said. "They don't know who to go for and I don't know how to explain it."

It is difficult to explain how Wilson can be so dominant, but his powerlifting resume might do the trick.

Dakota Wilson, of Marionville, runs with the ball during the Comets 48-12 win over Sarcoxie in Marionville, Mo., on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020. The Comets remain undefeated this season.(Photo: Andrew Jansen/News-Leader)

Wilson, listed at 5-foot-5 and 160 pounds, rushed for 182 yards and three touchdowns on the evening. His first score saw him carry what appeared to be most of the Sarcoxie defense the final 10 yards on a 23-yard run.

"I heard everyone yelling that I had the whole team on my back," Wilson said. "I felt a couple but I didn't know how many were on me, to be honest."

The junior ballcarrier is what head coach Paden Grubbs described as one of the pound-for-pound strongest athletes in the state. It's not an overreaction when you learn that he entered a state weightlifting competition last year and squatted over 400 pounds.

"He's a superb athlete," Grubbs said. "He's got great vision for a little back."

Wil Carlton, of Marionville, stiff arms a defender after intercepting the ball during the Comets 48-12 win over Sarcoxie in Marionville, Mo., on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020. The Comets remain undefeated this season.(Photo: Andrew Jansen/News-Leader)

Next to him in the backfield is Carlton who has been putting up some of the best statistics in southwest Missouri as a sophomore.

Carlton did pretty much everything else for the Comets on Friday night. He rushed for 66 yards and a score, he completed 10-of-14 passes for 88 yards and two touchdowns and he also picked off two passes on defense.

"He'd probably be good at pretty much anything he wanted to do," Grubbs said. "We're really fortunate to have him on our side."

The duo has Marionville in a position to be good for the next several years. Grubbs said he can feel the excitement in the community as well as in the elementary school and junior high with players excited to be Comets in the future.

Marionville defeated Sarcoxie 48-12 in Marionville, Mo., on Friday, Oct. 9, 2020. The Comets remain undefeated this season.(Photo: Andrew Jansen/News-Leader)

With Carlton and Wilson leading the way, the Comets should soar for Friday nights for at least the rest of this year and the next. Perhaps they're paving the way for the Comets to be among the state's best for years to come.

"It is (something special)," Grubbs said. "These kids, we talk to them all the time about being humble and just taking it one game at a time. I know it's a cliche but it's a matter of fact.

"It is special though when you hear people talking about it at the elementary and the coffee shops and it's something to be excited about."

Wyatt D. Wheeler is a reporter and columnist with the Springfield News-Leader. You can contact him at 417-371-6987, by email atwwheeler@news-leader.comor Twitter at@WyattWheeler_NL. He's alsothe co-host of Sports Talk on Jock Radio weekdays from 4-6 p.m.

See the rest here:

Marionville's one-two punch has the Comets undefeated and ready to make noise in postseason - News-Leader

PINCONNING Meridian spoiled Pinconning's homecoming with a 35-6 win in Jack Pine Conference football on Friday.

The Mustangs got on the board with 3:40 to play in the first quarter when Jake Schultz ran in a 3-yard touchdown. Schultz later added his second TD of the game on a 1-yard run with 11:55 to go in the second quarter.

Brayden Riley punched in a 5-yard touchdown with 9:08 to go in the half, then quarterback Cam Metzger hit Josh Barriger for a 33-yard TD with 1:07 to play. Meridian had a 28-0 lead at the break.

Early in the fourth, Metzger hit Barriger again -- this time for a 14-yard TD -- with 9:47 to play in the game.

The Spartans added a score late and missed the extra point.

Metzger finished 7-of-11 passing for 128 yards and two TDs. Schultz finished the night as the Mustangs' leading rusher with 52 yards on 13 carries and two TDs. Metzger was right behind Schultz with 51 yards on 10 carries.

Barriger was the leading receiver with 54 yards on three receptions and the two TDs. Dane Plichta had 45 yards on one catch.

Josh Nohel was Meridian's leading tackler with 7.5 total tackles (seven solo) including two tackles for loss. Alex Wall added four tackles (three solo).

Meridian kicker Gabe Mutai made all five of his extra point attempts.

"Tonight was great because we were able to get everyone in for a lot of reps," said Mustangs' coach Mike Bilina. "They work their butts off and we were able to reward them by getting them in tonight."

Meridian (3-1, 3-1 JPC) hosts Farwell next Friday.

Beaverton 42, Farwell 0

FARWELL -- Noah Coffey and Cam Mishler each ran for two touchdowns in Beaverton's 42-0 win over Farwell in Jack Pine Conference football on Friday.

Coffey ran for scores of 28 yards and 7 yards while Mishler ran for 36-yard and 3-yard scores for the Beavers, who scored all their points in the first half.

Trent Reed ran for a 60-yard score and Beaverton's other TD came on Mitch Hall's 28-yard interception return.

Reed was 4 of 5 on extra points and Coffey ran in a 2-point conversion.

Reed completed 4 of 4 passes for 81 yards and ran seven times for 111 yards and the TD.

Brayde Keeley had one catch for 48 yards.

On defense, Logan Love had six tackles while Mitch Hall and Kyle Hall each made four stops.

"Another good team effort tonight," coach Aaron Seiser said after his Beavers improved to 3-1 overall and in the JPC. "Our defense gave our offense great field position most of the night and we were able to capitalize.

"Another plus was the amount of experience our young players were able to get in the second half. We have a huge game coming up versus our rival (Gladwin). We must have a great week of practice."

The Beavers host the Flying G's next Friday.

Freeland 21, Swan Valley 14

FREELAND Bryson Huckeby took a 5-yard run into the end zone as time expired in the third quarter to give Freeland a 21-14 win over rival Swan Valley in Tri-Valley Conference Central football Friday.

Huckeby's run was his second TD run of the night. The other was an 83-yarder with 8:17 to play in the second quarter. That run put Freeland up 14-0 after Garrett Pistro had punched in a 4-yard TD run late in the first quarter.

Swan Valley scored late in the first half to cut the Falcon lead to 14-6 at the break.

The Vikings then scored with 4:49 to play in the third to tie the game at 14. Huckeby's run put Freeland ahead for good.

Huckeby finished the night as Freeland's leading rusher with 90 yards on eight carries and the two TDs. He was also 6-of-10 passing for 81 yards. Jacob Kundinger had 48 yards on nine carries.

Kundinger led the defense with 12 tackles and a sack. Cole Wiese had 11 tackles. Nolan Vanloo and CJ Schultz each had 10.

Freeland won the Battle of the Mountain Trophy for the first time in three years with the win.

"Just a little added fuel to the fire with the crosstown rivalry," said Falcons' coach Kevin Townsend. "They've had some special squads come through there.

"Bryson got targeted and that was a momentum swinger; the guys rallied around their leader almost going down. Starting safety Alex Duley rolled his ankle early in the fourth quarter. Carter Suppes had an interception. They (isolated) him on their best receiver, another senior stepping up to the challenge."

Freeland (3-1, 2-0 TVC Central) next travels to Bridgeport on Friday.

Clare 41, Gladwin 30

GLADWIN Gladwin dropped a back-and-forth battle against unbeaten Clare 41-30 in Jack Pine Conference football on Friday.

After the Pioneers took a 7-0 lead, Nick Wheeler hit Aaron Kozlow for a 13-yard touchdown pass to make it 7-6 at the end of the first quarter.

After Clare scored again, Wheeler connected with Kaden McDonald for a TD with 12 seconds left in the first half. But a missed two-point conversion left Clare ahead 13-12.

On the ensuing kickoff, Clare returned it 85 yards for a TD to take a 19-12 lead to the break.

With 7:18 to play in the third quarter, Logan Kokotovich carried it in from 15 yards to cut the deficit to 19-18.

Wheeler gave the Flying G's their first lead on a 3-yard run to put Gladwin ahead 24-19 early in the fourth quarter.

Clare scored with 9:35 to play to take a 27-24 lead. But Wheeler connected with McDonald again -- this time on fourth down and from 4 yards out -- to put Gladwin back in front 30-27 with 7:33 to play.

Clare scored twice more within the last 3:30 to take the 11-point victory.

"We allowed too many big plays to happen in the first half," said Flying G's coach Marc Jarstfer. "They came out and received the ball in the second half. We played good defense. We would go down and score, then they would go down and score ...

"Just a good, hard-fought game. Clare has been the team to beat for the better part of two decades. We know they are well-coached and are going to be well-prepared. We just made too many mistakes down the stretch."

No other individual stats were available.

Gladwin (2-2, 2-2 JPC) travels to Beaverton on Friday.

St. Charles 37, Coleman 6

ST. CHARLES -- Coleman's Konner Carbeno had a strong night in the Comets' 37-6 loss to St. Charles in Mid-State Activities Conference football on Friday.

Carbeno had 22 carries for 149 yards and a touchdown.

Conner Schrank added seven carries for 57 yards for Coleman, which trailed 29-6 at halftime.

On defense for the Comets, Jaden Bovee had seven tackles, Schrank made an interception and Ayden Ruhle recovered a St. Charles fumble.

"We came into the game shorthanded and we turned into a MASH unit as the game went on. (Our) young kids got some good reps. We will keep fighting," Coleman coach Chad Klopf said.

The Comets host Montabella next Saturday at noon.

Read the original post:

Mustangs, Beavers, Falcons roll to football wins; G's, Comets fall - Midland Daily News

A growing body of research suggests the planet Venus may have had an Earth-like environment billions of years ago, with water and a thin atmosphere.

Yet testing such theories is difficult without geological samples to examine. The solution, according to Yale astronomers Samuel Cabot and Gregory Laughlin, may be closer than anyone realized.

Cabot and Laughlin say pieces of Venus perhaps billions of them are likely to have crashed on the moon. A new study explaining the theory has been accepted by the Planetary Science Journal.

The researchers said asteroids and comets slamming into Venus may have dislodged as many as 10 billion rocks and sent them into an orbit that intersected with Earth and Earths moon. Some of these rocks will eventually land on the moon as Venusian meteorites, said Cabot, a Yale graduate student and lead author of the study.

Cabot said catastrophic impacts such as these only happen every hundred million years or so and occurred more frequently billions of years ago.

The moon offers safe keeping for these ancient rocks, Cabot said. Anything from Venus that landed on Earth is probably buried very deep, due to geological activity. These rocks would be much better preserved on the moon.

Many scientists believe that Venus might have had an Earth-like atmosphere as recently as 700 million years ago. After that, Venus experienced a runaway greenhouse effect and developed its current climate. The Venusian atmosphere is so thick today that no rocks could possibly escape after an impact with an asteroid or comet, Cabot said.

Laughlin and Cabot cited two factors supporting their theory. The first is that asteroids hitting Venus are usually going faster than those that hit Earth, launching even more material. The second is that a huge fraction of the ejected material from Venus would have come close to Earth and the moon.

There is a commensurability between the orbits of Venus and Earth that provides a ready route for rocks blasted off Venus to travel to Earths vicinity, said Laughlin, who is professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Yale. The moons gravity then aids in sweeping up some of these Venusian arrivals.

Upcoming missions to the moon could give Cabot and Laughlin their answer soon. The researchers said NASAsArtemis programis the perfect opportunity to collect and analyze unprecedented amounts of lunar soil.

Laughlin said there are several standard chemical analyses that can pinpoint the origin of moon rocks, including any that came from Venus. Different ratios of specific elements and isotopes offer a kind of fingerprint for each planet in the solar system.

An ancient fragment of Venus would contain a wealth of information, Laughlin said. Venus history is closely tied to important topics in planetary science, including the past influx of asteroids and comets, atmospheric histories of the inner planets, and the abundance of liquid water.

Read this article:

Looking for pieces of Venus? Try the moon - Yale News

OLIVE HILL Barring an upset, Thursday night was not West Carters final match on John Hop Brown Court this season. That wasnt going to stop the Lady Comets from playing like it was the last time with their rivals in town.

West Carter used scoring spurts in the first two sets to gain the advantage and finished off the 3-0 (25-15, 25-14, 25-17) sweep of East Carter to earn its 14th win of the season.

This group of girls has been playing together for a long time, West Carter coach Christie Tackett said. They communicate well together, and we just work really hard. We have several good, strong and well-skilled players. They have been doing this for a long time. We are strong up front, and I think we have the best setter in the region.

West Carter has five seniors on the roster. Peyton Steagall has made an impact on the program and had the same effect on the opening set, collecting seven kills. Her team ended the frame scoring 11 of the last 13 points to take the early lead.

I think we all make an impact on the team, Steagall said. It really depends on the game and who is doing good at the time.

I think its our hard work and dedication, she added. I believe that is what makes us so good. We are in (the gym) every day and sometimes we come in on Sundays.

Tackett said Steagalls confidence and demeanor on the court and her calming effect off of it helps her lead.

She is a beast, Tackett said. She is a go-getter. She is the always the one that comes up to me when she can tell that Im nervous and says, Dont worry Christie, we got this. Its that senior experience coming through. She showed it tonight. She didnt have any nerves. She said that we are going to get this done and she meant it.

East Carter (7-3) grabbed a 10-8 lead, its first of the match, in Set 2 after an Alexis Thompson kill. The Lady Comets found another offensive punch with five straight points. Rebecca Stevens had three consecutive aces during the surge and West Carter increased its lead to 2-0.

We came out strong and we remembered that earlier game this season, said Tackett, who referred to a 3-2 win over Lady Raiders earlier this year. We played a little relaxed and we didnt want to do that tonight. When you are playing good teams, you never want to relax. They didnt let up. East Carter is a pretty good ball club.

The Lady Raiders kept fighting in the third set. They shrunk the deficit midway through the frame to 15-13 but could get no closer. Steagall punctuated the victory with a final kill. The force of the shot hit the West Carter (14-2) side of the net but found its way over for the point.

We are a scrappy team, but they get so down on themselves, East Carter coach Jennifer Clark said. They set such high expectations for themselves. They get disappointed when they are not doing well. On the other side of it, there was more that I could have done as a coach to prepare them. I think it falls on my shoulders.

Unofficially, Steagall finished with 12 kills for the Lady Comets. Stevens added eight. Madison Adkins dished out 20 assists. Thompson tallied four kills for the Lady Raiders.

The 16th Region Tournament will be held in Olive Hill and West Carter hopes it will see the home court three more times. Steagall believed the Lady Comets performance on Thursday night was a fitting end for their regular season home finale.

Its bittersweet for me, Steagall said. Its sad that its coming to an end, but I wouldnt want to beat anybody else on this court.

(606) 326-2654 |

msparks@dailyindependent.com

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See more here:

West in beast mode: Lady Comets top East Carter in sweep - The Independent

The Rosetta mission of the European Space Agency and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) has discovered a comet which has its own "far-ultraviolet aurora".

The comet named 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko - Chury for short - is one of a kind as it is for the time that an ultraviolet aurora has been detected on a celestial object that is not a moon or planet.

According to the space agency: "It is the first time such electromagnetic emissions in the far-ultraviolet have been documented on a celestial object other than a planet or moon."

Launched in 2004, Rosetta is the space exploration's most travelled comet hunter. It orbited comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P/C-G) from August 2014 "until its dramatic end-of-mission comet landing" in September 2016.

According to Nasa, the data reveal that 67P/C-G's emissions are auroral. The findings were published in the journal Nature Astronomy.

"Electrons streaming out in the solar wind - the stream of charged particles flowing out from the Sun - interact with the gas in the comet's coma, breaking apart water and other molecules. The resulting atoms give off a distinctive far-ultraviolet light. Invisible to the naked eye, far-ultraviolet has the shortest wavelengths of radiation in the ultraviolet spectrum," Nasa said.

The space agency further said that "exploring the emission of 67P/C-G will enable scientists to learn how the particles in the solar wind change over time, something that is crucial for understanding space weather throughout the solar system".

According to Nasa, the northern or southern lights, also called aurora, are "generated when electrically charged particles, speeding from the Sun hit the upper atmosphere to create colourful shimmers of green, white, and red". However, this is the case on Earth.

Elsewhere in the solar system, Jupiter and some of its moons, as well as other planets like Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and even Mars - all have showcased their own version of northern lights. "But the phenomena had yet to be documented in comets," Nasa said.

Continued here:

In a first, scientists discover comet having own northern lights - India Today

Beau Bearden| bbearden@gannett.com

For the first time since 2017, the Dickson and Lone Grove high school football teams will battle on the gridiron in a district matchup.

However, the squads arent strangers just16 miles separates the two and the Longhorns have won 11 of the past 16 meetings dating back to 2004, with the Comets tallying a victory in 2018.

Lone Grove has played (Dickson) forever either being in the district or non-district, said Longhorns head coach Brad OSteen. Its kind of a rivalry game, being that were so close and everything. This is a big game for both teams.

Thats especially the case as each squad is coming off a district loss. Lone Grove dropped a 28-8 setbackto Kingston last week, while the Comets fell 48-7 to Plainview.

The Longhorns (3-2 overall, 1-1 District 3A-2) sit in a four-way tie for second place with Pauls Valley, Plainview and Madill, while Dickson (0-5, 0-2) isstill looking for its first win of 2020.

However, the Comets have the same mentality after a loss as they would following a victory.

We always call it a 24-hour rule, said Dickson head coach Steve Day. Whether you win or lose, you get 24 hours to move on from it. Even if youre 5-0, its the 24-hour rule. You act like youre 0-0 and competing to win the next game. Thats kind of been our motto or our thought process since Ive been here. Whether you win or lose, you move on from it.

Meanwhile, Lone Grove is likely using the same strategy afterits two-game winning streak came to an end at the hands of Kingston, which is tied for first in the district with Sulphur at 2-0.

The Longhorns trailed the Redskins 7-0 at halftime, but the momentum shifted in the wrong direction during thesecond half.

We caught some breaks in the first half as far as on defense, OSteen said. As far as defensively, we couldnt execute and didnt capitalize on some things. We should have been up 14-7 at halftime. (Kingston) came out and turned it up in the second half and we didnt. We have to learn from that and get better.

The Comets also know they have some areas to improve on, as they struggled to get much going offensively against Plainview.

We go through all of our goals each week for offense, defense and special teams and kind of review it as a team to see which ones we hit and which ones we didnt, and why wedid and didn't hit those goals,"Day said. We try to point out positives and the kids knew it there werent a whole lot of positives with that game.

However, that doesnt mean Dickson doesnt have stars that can make a difference. Johnny Smith and Jzavionn Bennett have caused problems for many teams and Lone Grove knows it.

They have some guys who can play, they have some good athletes, OSteen said of the Comets. This is more about us trying to get better. Obviously, we have to take care of our business against those guys. During a week like this, you just have to go get better, learn from your mistakes and not let them happen again.

Link:

Comets, Longhorns to square off in Dickson - Daily Ardmoreite

The Comets brought in an astonishing number of new players for this year's team with 88 newcomers.

They also have a new head coach in Rocky Larson who was the defensive coordinator at Wisconsin-River Falls last season.

Mayville State is 0-1 after playing a shootout last week, falling 50-40 to Waldorf, while the Blue Hawks are looking to go to 2-0 after beating Dakota State a week ago.

Last fall, Dickinson State downed the Comets twice winning 79-14 and 63-13, but Dickinson State head coach Pete Stanton believes this year Mayville State will pose a much bigger challenge.

We look at every week as an opportunity. We dont look back whether that is a team we beat or lost to. We talk about how each week is an opportunity for us to get better, Stanton said. All our kids have to do if they have any misconceptions about Mayville is to look at the tape and the speed they have. They are obviously a different team than last year. If you look at the Waldorf score against them last year, it was similar to ours, and then they played a 10 point game last week.

The Comets are led by senior quarterback, Creighton Pfau, who has unique ties to Dickinson and Stanton.

Pfaus father, Pete, played for Dickinson State in the 1980s and was the free safety in 1987, while Stanton was the strong safety.

He was also a standout at Trinity High in Dickinson before moving on to play for the Blue Hawks.

As for the younger Pfau, he started off his career by playing basketball for the Comets, but transitioned to football and had an excellent week last week versus the Warriors.

He threw for over 350 yards, and freshman Elijah Roundree from Georgia was his favorite target.

Roundtree set a school record with 213 yards on seven catches and two touchdowns.

Stanton said that including Roundtree, they are deep at wide receiver and tight end.

We have to be aware of all of those guys and keep the ball in front of us, Stanton said. We have to limit the big play. We didnt do a great job of that last week... But we have to go up and win some jump balls.

As for Dickinson State, Drew Boedecker is making his second start at quarterback.

He went 14-19 last week passing, but he did throw one interception and failed to fall on the ball after a bad snap.

Turnovers are something that the Blue Hawks have been working on all week because in addition to Boedeckers interception, they lost four fumbles last week.

It is something we have to work on. We need to remind the guys on the importance of taking care of the ball, Stanton said. It would be different if it was the same guy, then he probably wouldnt be playing this week.

As for the Comets defense, they will do a lot of different things in what Stanton says is an unorthodox defense.

They will have defensive linemen all over the place, and at times, their linemen will stand up on the line of scrimmage, then drop back into coverage.

The key for the Blue Hawks offense will be to be patient.

Due to having a new coaching staff and so many new players, one week of film isnt enough for Stanton and his staff to gather enough information to see the Comets tendencies.

They will have to adapt on the fly this week and base play calls off personnel on the field and base formations.

The hope for Dickinson State is that they can handle their business to move to 2-0.

It is really hard to tell with them. You dont get enough tendencies on film after just one game. They have a bunch of new guys and especially with them having only played Waldorf who plays a lot of press man coverage. Since they didnt face a lot of the same coverages as us (last week), we will get different route combinations.

The hope for Dickinson State is that they can handle the uncertainty of the Comets and move to 2-0.

Read more:

Blue Hawks to face completely new Comet team in home opener - The Dickinson Press

Front row: Alec Baker, Josh Kipp, Bryce Middleton, Matthew Federico. Second row: Dylan Crandall, Dylan Penny, Bo Carbeno, Max Marovich. Third row: Ty Klopf, Richard Sapp, Ayden Ruhle, Conner Schrank, Jack Wiggins Fourth row: Jaden Bovee, Ty Murray, Konner Carbeno, Dawson Haller. Fifth row: Jack Gates, Carson DeJongh, Kaden Boyer, Kris Haney, Isaiah Biers, Shane Cole. Sixth row: Mason Tucker, Sam Bovee, Brooke Falor, Vance Sysak, Jackson Harsh, Marlon Garcia.

Front row: Alec Baker, Josh Kipp, Bryce Middleton, Matthew Federico. Second row: Dylan Crandall, Dylan Penny, Bo Carbeno, Max Marovich. Third row: Ty Klopf, Richard Sapp, Ayden Ruhle, Conner Schrank, Jack

Photo: (Katy Kildee/kkildee@mdn.net)

Front row: Alec Baker, Josh Kipp, Bryce Middleton, Matthew Federico. Second row: Dylan Crandall, Dylan Penny, Bo Carbeno, Max Marovich. Third row: Ty Klopf, Richard Sapp, Ayden Ruhle, Conner Schrank, Jack Wiggins Fourth row: Jaden Bovee, Ty Murray, Konner Carbeno, Dawson Haller. Fifth row: Jack Gates, Carson DeJongh, Kaden Boyer, Kris Haney, Isaiah Biers, Shane Cole. Sixth row: Mason Tucker, Sam Bovee, Brooke Falor, Vance Sysak, Jackson Harsh, Marlon Garcia.

Front row: Alec Baker, Josh Kipp, Bryce Middleton, Matthew Federico. Second row: Dylan Crandall, Dylan Penny, Bo Carbeno, Max Marovich. Third row: Ty Klopf, Richard Sapp, Ayden Ruhle, Conner Schrank, Jack

Comets aim to get back on winning track

Seeking its first winning football season in six years, Coleman has a favorable schedule in this abbreviated season with four of its six games at home, including four of the last five after this Friday's opener at Breckenridge.

"Right now, the expectations for the guys themselves are pretty high," 12th-year Comets' coach Chad Klopf said. "Theyve had really good practices. Our team culture and family atmosphere have been really strong. Our offense has looked really good the last few weeks. Were pretty excited to see how it all comes together Friday night. The number one thing is letting them play and getting them some normalcy in their lives."

Coleman's new quarterback is junior Ty Klopf (5-11, 143), the coach's son, who was a starting receiver last year on varsity and played junior varsity QB two years ago.

Chad Klopf, who noted that offensive coordinator Luke Mastee chose the starting quarterback, said Ty has a strong knowledge of the game and has had a recent growth spurt and added some arm strength.

Meanwhile, junior Conner Schrank (5-10, 186) will split time between running back and wide receiver and will be joined in the backfield by junior Konner Carbeno (6-0, 201).

Junior Jaden Bovee (5-8, 148) is a returning starter at wideout, a position which will also feature sophomore Ty Murray (5-8, 145), junior Ayden Ruhle (5-10, 170) and senior Dylan Crandall (5-7, 152).

Up front, the Comets have three returning starting offensive linemen in junior left guard Richard Sapp (6-0, 222), junior center Max Marovich (5-9, 271) and senior right tackle Josh Kipp (6-3, 300).

Senior left tackle Bo Carbeno (6-3, 266), Klopf noted, hadnt played football since his freshman year.

"He's a huge addition for us," Klopf said. "I think his senior year came around and his buddies were talking to him (about coming out for football again). He bought into everything we were doing. He's been a big bright spot for us."

Meanwhile, senior right guard Bryce Middleton (6-2, 285) is poised for a comeback season after an injury limited his playing time the past two years.

"He started getting healthy last year during wrestling season," Klopf said. "Hes been a tremendous leader for us this year. Hes been able to hold everybody together."

Senior Matthew Federico (5-10, 231), who started at all three positions on the line last year, will be the first lineman off the bench, Klopf said.

On the defensive line, Kipp and Marovich will likely be the tackles, with Federico at one end and Bo Carbeno and sophomore Dawson Haller (5-11, 213) rotating at the other end position.

Sapp and Middleton will be the middle linebackers, and Konner Carbeno and Schrank will be outside backers.

Senior Dylan Penny, Murray, Wiggins and Ruhle are vying for positions in the secondary, and Bovee will play free safety.

On special teams, Federico will kick extra points, Bo Carbeno will kick off and Middleton will be the punter.

Coleman adds St. Charles to its schedule as a new member of the Mid-State Activities Conference, replacing Merrill, which went to eight-man football.

Klopf said Coleman will play eight-man football at the junior varsity level this year.

"We want to give those kids some playing time. It's hurt our program the last few years not being able to play enough JV games," he said.

COLEMAN'S SCHEDULE

Sept. 18 - at Breckenridge

Sept. 25 - CARSON CITY-CRYSTAL

Oct. 2 - SAUGATUCK

Oct. 9 - at St. Charles

Oct. 17 (Saturday) - MONTABELLA

Oct. 22 (Thursday) - VALLEY LUTHERAN

Originally posted here:

Comets aim to get back on winning track - Midland Daily News

Just because a team is struggling to find wins doesnt mean that the season is not successful. Genoa second-year volleyball coach Christianna Bialorucki is experiencing that right now. After finishing 2-21 last year, including 1-13 in the Northern Buckeye Conference, the Comets are winless in nine matches so far. As a matter of fact, they have only won two of 29 games so far one against Delta and the other against NBC foe Otsego, having been shut out in the other seven matches. Of course, it does not help that Lake is ranked 17th in the first Division III state coaches poll, and that was one of the three game sweeps. I think our competition is great. Lake, Eastwood, and Otsego all have long standing great programs, Bialorucki said. They produce great athletes and overall well skilled volleyball players. Woodmore, Elmwood, and Rossford are younger but they have a great defensive specialist mentality. Bialorucki had seven letter winners returning, including key players in middle hitter Kaity Truman, outside hitter/defensive specialist Sydney MacDonald, setter/right side hitter/DS Sam DeVerna, OH/DS Alisah Bailey. Of the four, all but DaVerna are juniors and returning letter winners, which is why it may take another year before they can even talk about becoming contenders, plus they are learning some new roles, too. Bailey leads the team with 37 kills and MacDonald follows with 34, DaVerna has a team-leading 26 aces and assists (45). They have the height, the power, and the skill to put the ball away, Bialorucki said. Sam DeVerna has never set for Genoa before but she's really stepped up. She has a lot of volleyball knowledge and she uses it on the court appropriately. On the defensive side, Truman and Bailey are joined by junior Brittney Diekman, who has a knack for digging out potential kills. Truman has a team-leading 43 blocks. She's tiny but mighty. She's fast on her feet and can really read the hitter and ball, Bialorucki said. If you think that is not enough to make the future look bright, a couple freshmen make the outlook even better. Lillian Frias has got the right height and the right attitude. She's got a ton of power and her timing is impeccable, Bialorucki said. Lilly Papocchia is currently being trained as a setter/hitter and she's really taken on the quarterback role. All in all, its a work in progress, says the Genoa coach. We have some great serves and our blocking and defense has really stepped up this year. We strive to be an all-out effort, all-the-time team, Bialorucki said. She says the biggest concern her team has to get over is serving and receiving serves. It was a struggle last year and it's a struggle now. We know the fundamentals but we can be a little slow on our feet, Bialorucki said. The only three seniors are Sam DaVerna, defensive specialist Olivia DaVerna and right side hitter Macenzy Haley. Olivia DaVerna has a team-leading 98 digs, followed by MacDonald (81) and Sam DaVerna (65). Other juniors contributing are right side hitter Lauren Novotney, settet/defensive specialist Lauren Martin and lone sophomore is right side and outside hitter Marin Butler.

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Young Comets winless, but they're learning on the job - Press Publications Inc.

An astrophysicist offered the Elizabeth City Rotary Club this week a sobering account of the potential for a catastrophic impact from an asteroid or comet.

Malcolm LeCompte of Comet Research Group spoke to the club about the potential damage to earth from the impact of a near-earth object, or NEO, striking the earth.

Tim Witwer, the clubs president, also is associated with Comet Research Group.

LeCompte said Comet Research Group is focused on early identification and warning as well as hazard mitigation.

Were trying to save the planet, LeCompte said.

LeCompte explained that the solar system is less stable and more dangerous than had been long thought. In one generation the perception of the solar system changed from the safe old solar system pre-1970 to the new and dangerous solar system during the 1970s and later, he said.

The older notion of the safe solar system stressed nine predictably stable planets and asteroid belt objects located safely between Mars and Jupiter.

That change in perception resulted mainly from the discovery of much larger numbers of near-earth asteroids and also the observation of dwarf planets, which are large bodies in the outer solar system.

LeCompte said more than 20,000 NEOs have been identified.

An NEO roughly the size of Washington, D.C., would cause global-scale destruction, LeCompte said.

A smaller NEO, roughly the size of the National Mall, would still devastate most nations, he said.

Although much of the attention is often given to asteroids, comets are far more dangerous, LeCompte said. Comets are unguided missiles, he said.

Comets are characterized by high speed and a low density but potentially high mass, according to LeCompte.

The dinosaurs were likely wiped out by an asteroid about 30 million years ago, LeCompte said.

Even objects that never strike the earth can wreak extreme havoc, LeCompte explained.

As an example he cited the 2013 event at Chelyabinsk in Central Russia in which the explosion of a meteor miles above the earth caused damage on the ground and injured more than 1,000 people.

The 1908 Tunguska Event in Siberia also was caused by an explosion in the air. LeCompte said its important to note that the object exploded miles above the earths surface but still caused massive damage on the ground.

LeCompte holds a doctorate in astrophysical, planetary and atmospheric sciences from the University of Colorado. From 2004-14 he was professor of math and computer science at Elizabeth City State University.

Since 2015 LeCompte has been co-director of Comet Research Group.

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Scientist: Early ID, warnings will defend against comets - The Daily Advance

10 YEARS AGO | 2010

Halifax County is in line to receive $1,572,136 in additional federal aid for the school system from the Education Jobs and Medicaid Assistance Act. As a whole, the 5th District will receive approximately $23.8 million from the Education Jobs and Medicaid Assistance Act, a full paid-for package of aid to states, according to a release from the 5th District Congressional office. Funds are designed to support elementary and secondary teachers, school-level administrator and other essential school level staff salaries and related costs, the release states.

South Boston Town Council got doses of good and sobering news at its biannual retreat over the weekend at Berry Hill Conference Center. Town finance officer Erie Scott said in his estimation the town is in pretty good shape compared to other towns and cities, despite the recent economic downturn. A review of FY 2009-2010 revealed the Cash Operating Fund grew from $2,523,817 to $3,077,369, with total revenues 104.9% of the budget goal, Scott reported, with a program for collection of delinquent real estate taxes and the DMS Stop Program as a means of collecting delinquent personal property taxes responsible for much of that increase.

Injured Halifax County High School running back Dominic Henderson had to watch from the sidelines while the Comets played their first two games of the season. Henderson returned to the Comets lineup in Friday nights annual border clash with Person (N.C.) High School. His season debut was a big one. The Comets junior scored a touchdown and ran for 103 yards on 32 carries to help lead the Comets to a 14-9 win over the Rockets n Roxboro, North Carolina.

20 YEARS AGO | 2000

Halifax County School Board members and other school and construction officials broke ground yesterday for renovation and expansion work at Clays Mill Elementary School. The Clays Mill work will cost $1.9 million and is expected to be completed by next summer. Other work going on simultaneously includes additions and renovations at Scottsburg and Sydnor Jennings Elementary Schools at a cost of $3.3 million and $3 millions respectively. Trustee Allen Gravitt; superintendent Dennis Witt; trustees Mac McDowell, G.C. Ratliff and Wanda McDowell; supervisor Tom West; Trustees Patty Nelson, Steve Anderson, Carl Furches and Jason Parker; supervisor Dickie Abbott and Robert W. Lee participated in a groundbreaking ceremony.

Since she was 8 years old, Katherine Williams Austin has been joyfully careening through the woods aboard her favorite steed. It is an abiding love. Now, the Halifax native has sealed a bid to complete individually in the three-day combined driving event during the U.S.-hosted World Championships in October. Twenty-two countries will compete at Hamilton Farms in Gladstone, New Jersey, headquarters of the U.S. Equestrian Team.

It has been a fun past few days for the Halifax County High School gridders. For the first time this season and for the first time in a while, the Comets have had the opportunity to relish the sweet taste of victory. The 35-6 win, the teams first win of the season and the second career win for the Comets head coach James Hodges, was a much needed morale booster. It came just in time. The Comets, who will be in the middle of a three-game road trip, will travel south of the border Friday night to face the Person High School Rockets.

40 YEARS AGO | 1980

Last Christmas, Union Ruritan Club members surprised Ethel P. Perkins when they named her the first woman honorary member of the club. Perkins was honored for her many hours of service to the club. She is one of the most dedicated people we have in our club, and she is the only honorary woman member. She works from sunup to sundown, and she has never missed a stew, Union Ruritan Club President Irvin Oakes explained yesterday. The 70-year-old great grandmother who has been helping the Union Ruritans with various club projects for the past eight years recalled her special of moment of recognition from club members with pride as she took a brief respite from her chores Saturday.

Governor John N. Dalton Saturday urged the Small Business Administration to declare 29 additional Virginia counties as drought disaster areas, among them Halifax County. The requested, if granted, would enable farmers to apply for low-interest loans in order to tide them over until their next cash crop was harvested. According to Daltons request, the total crop loss in those localities already exceeds $131 million. Halifax County has already been designated as a disaster area by the Farmers Home Administration.

This was probably the most rewarding coaching experience ever! Those were the words from H.C.A. volleyball coach Joe Farnitano after his kiddie korps upset Vance Academy on Thursday. Starting a squad, which included four sixth graders and two eighth graders, the Patriettes jumped off to a 13-3 lead and rolled to a two game sweep, 15-5; 15-8. We just played our game good services and keep the mistakes to a minimum. This was reflected in the stats: Mary Tucker Thrift nine serves, nine points; Mary Susan Llyod 13 serves, 10 points; Winnie Evans 10 serves, six points; Kelly Long four serves and two points; Millie Bennett six serves, three points.

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BLAST FROM THE PAST: Week of Sept. 16 | County Life | yourgv.com - YourGV.com

Comet 2I/Borisov during its passage through the inner solar system, 2019-20. Image taken with the 8.1-meter Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii on November 12, 2019. The bright spiral galaxy is LEDA 1168242. Courtesy NSFs National Optical- Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory/NSF/AURA/Gemini Observatory.Perihelion: 2019 August 8.55, q = 2.007 AU

According to our present understanding of how the solar system formed and evolved, all the various comets, including those passing through the inner solar system as well as those in the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud, are the leftovers from the planet formation process. Over the lifetime of the solar system, various processes, including gravitational perturbations by the planets (especially Jupiter) as well as gravitational influences by stars passing near or through the Oort Cloud, have ejected many comets from the solar system into interstellar space. If, as would seem logical to suspect, the same processes operate in other planetary systems as well, we would accordingly expect interstellar space to contain many, perhaps large numbers of, comets that have been ejected from their original planetary systems. The existence, or non-existence, of such objects, along with the frequency with which we might encounter them, would then tell us much about how valid our understanding might be and about the number of planetary systems in the Galaxy and how the formation processes operate there, and physical studies of any interstellar comets that might pass through the solar system would tell us much about how conditions in other planetary systems are similar to and/or different from the conditions within ours.

The detection of comets arriving from interstellar space has thus been of very high interest to astronomers. Ever since their importance was realized there had been no confirmed detections of any such objects, until October 2017 when the Pan-STARRS program in Hawaii detected the object now known as 1I/Oumuamua. The true physical nature of this object was never able to be determined; although it did not exhibit any overt cometary activity, it did exhibit some circumstantial evidence of such. Its story is the subject of a future Special Topics presentation.

Two years later the second interstellar object passed through the inner solar system, and this one was clearly a comet. It was discovered on the morning of August 30, 2019, by an amateur astronomer in the Crimea, Gennady Borisov, who over the past several years has carried out a moderately successful CCD-based search program for comets at small elongations from the sun. This particular comet, his 8th overall comet discovery, and which he made with a recently-completed 65-cm telescope that he had built himself, was an 18th-magnitude object at an elongation of 38 degrees and located a few degrees east-northeast of the twin stars Castor and Pollux in Gemini. As orbital calculations were performed over the next couple of weeks its interstellar nature quickly became quite obvious, as it was found to be traveling on a strongly hyperbolic orbit with an eccentricity of 3.4. Meanwhile, astronomers with the Zwicky Transient Facility program in California were able to identify some pre-discovery images of the comet to as far back as December 13, 2018, at which time its heliocentric distance was 7.9 AU.

Comet Borisov brightened fairly rapidly as it approached perihelion, being at 16th magnitude in early October and then reaching a peak brightness of magnitude 14.5 around the time of its closest approach to Earth (1.94 AU) in late December, remaining in the morning sky throughout that time. By early 2020 it had begun fading and, traveling southward, entered southern circumpolar skies in early February, where it remains at this time. Theoretically, the comet may still be detectable with very large telescopes, although the most recent observations that I am aware of were obtained in early July with the Hubble Space Telescope.

Astronomers began making physical observations of Comet Borisov early on, and for the most part, it has behaved more-or-less like a solar-system comet would behave. Its overall chemical composition is also somewhat similar to those of ordinary solar-system comets, although there are some subtle differences, one of these being an unusually high ratio of carbon monoxide to water rare, although not unheard-of, in solar-system comets. This suggests that Comet Borisov formed in an unusually low-temperature environment, perhaps at a large distance from its parent star, and/or that the parent star was a low-temperature object such as an M dwarf (which constitute roughly 75% of all stars in the Galaxy).

Studies with the Hubble Space Telescope indicate that Comet Borisovs nucleus is roughly 400 to 1000 meters in diameter. In late March the comet exhibited a brief flare in brightness and Hubble images showed the existence of an accompanying fragment, which led to some initial speculation that the comet might be breaking up. This fragment was apparently quite small, however, and although Hubble images from July still show it, the comet itself appears to remain intact.

An examination of Comet Borisovs trajectory prior to its entering the solar system indicates that it came from near the plane of our Galaxy, in Cassiopeia not far from the location of the Double Cluster in Perseus. One early study suggested that roughly one million years ago the comet passed 5.7 light-years from the double-star system Kruger 60 (HD 239960) in Cepheus currently located 13.2 light-years away, but approaching the solar system although this miss distance seems too large to be a plausible origin point. A more recent study has identified several other stars that the comet would have passed close to with the (astronomically) recent past, the closest of these being a miss of just 0.22 light-year (14,000 AU) from the star Ross 573 a 10th-magnitude star in Eridanus, and currently about 70 light-years away roughly 910,000 years ago. (Incidentally, both components of Kruger 60, as well as Ross 573, are M dwarf stars.) A lot of uncertainties still remain, however, and it is rather likely that we will never conclusively determine Comet Borisovs point of origin. Meanwhile, it will depart the solar system in the direction of the constellation Telescopium somewhat to the south of Sagittarius which is also in the plane of our Galaxy. One can only speculate as to what Comet Borisov might encounter in the future during its almost endless journey through the depths of interstellar space.

This Week in History Special Topic Free PDF Download Glossary

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Comet of the Week: 2I/Borisov I/2019 Q4 - RocketSTEM

Its awfully important to have momentum on your side in a football game.

Midview learned that the hard way in its 43-21 loss to Southwestern Conference opponent Amherst on its home turf.

The momentum swung between the Middies and Comets several times, but no single swing was as important as Amhersts last one before halftime, an interception that led to a 30-yard touchdown heave from quarterback Tyler Brezina to Ty Weatherspoon that put the Comets up 10 heading into the break.

Weatherspoon put up an impressive first half statline, gathering six catches for 160 yards and the touchdown.

Today we were just trying to spread the ball out a little more, because last week we couldnt with all the rain, Weatherspoon said. We wanted to make sure we could prove to the conference that we have a passing game and not just a running game. And I think we did that today.

For the second straight week, Amhersts defense shut down the opposing offense, limiting the Middies to 14 offensive points. Contributions from seniors Alden Steele and Lavell Gibson gave the Midview running game fits.

It was a team win, Amherst coach Mike Passerrello said. Offense, defense and special teams. We didnt come out to play, and Midview gave us fits in that first half. We needed to find a way to respond, and we did.

Steele added two special teams touchdowns to his final line as well, taking a kickoff 99 yards in the first quarter and a punt 51 yards in the fourth.

Hes a huge weapon, Passerrello said. It doesnt matter where you put him, the other team is going to have to account for him.

The first of the returners scores came after the Middies took their first lead of the game, on a strip sack. The first of many backbreaking miscues by a young Midview team, led by a new head coach.

I think that was probably the big story. There were key situations where we were getting ourselves into the game, and it could have gone either way, Coach Luke Beal said. But their guys made plays, and ours didnt. We didnt rise to the challenge when we had opportunities.

Midview retook the lead shortly after the Amherst kickoff return on a two-yard toss from junior quarterback Ethan Surdock to tight end Preston Botos. But a Brezina touchdown throw to Casey Hamrick from 12-yards out in the second quarter put the Comets up for good.

Now 2-0, Amherst moves on to a meeting with Berea-Midpark on Sept. 11, before an important conference test against Avon Lake on Sept. 18.

Midview faces those Shoremen in its next game Sept. 11, as it looks to find its footing in the rough-and-tumble SWC under Beal.

Were going to get better, but it doesnt get any easier, Beal said. Its a great football conference, and were going to have to slug it out week after week. There are still a lot of things that we have to work on fundamentally.

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Amherst at Midview football: Comets dominate in all three phases to top Middies - The Morning Journal

1. A comet has four components.

It has a nucleus, a coma, a dust tail, and an ion tail.

This is because they are composed mostly of ice, rock, gas, and dust. A comets nucleus is made of ice and can be as small as a few meters across to giant boulders a few kilometers across.

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These areas of space are way out in the solar system, far away from the Sun. The Oort cloud is so far away we have never even seen it!

Most take less than two hundred years to do so, and others travel much slower, potentially taking millions of years to complete an orbit.

As a comet gets closer to the Sun, it begins to experience heat. That causes some of its ices to sublimate. It turns the gas in the comet into a halo around it. The halo is known as the comets coma.

Its orbit makes it visible from Earth every 76 years. It was named after the British astronomer Edmond Halley.

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Scientists believe that there be up to one billion comets in our solar system.

A great comet is one that is bright enough to be visible from Earth without the need for a telescope. Approximately one great comet happens every ten years.

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+Mars Facts: Interesting facts about the Red Planet you never knew+10 facts that you should know about the Holocaust+ Jupiter: 10 shocking facts about the massive gas giant you didnt know+The Ringed Planet: Interesting facts about Saturn you didnt know

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Comets: Facts about the icy cosmic bodies you didnt know - News Landed

The final buzzer sounded on March 6 in the Virginia High School League state quarterfinals where Halifax County High School basketball team suffered a devastating three-point loss to the Millbrook Pioneers.

With optimism surrounding the future of the program with 12 players returning for the Comets, head coach Sterling Williams and his staff were ready to get to work with their offseason workouts.

But mere weeks after the season ended the coronavirus pandemic swept the world, and the Comets have yet to step back on the court since their loss in the state quarterfinals.

With the VHSL tentatively setting the return for basketball season for Dec. 7, there are still questions involving Halifax and other schools around the state whether they will even be able to play this season.

Halifax County High School athletic director Allen Lawter has said that there will be no workouts, tryouts, practices or games until students go back to school in person.

Halifax County Public Schools are closed to in-person instruction for the first nine weeks, but the school board plans to hold a meeting halfway through the first nine weeks to determine the next steps.

For Williams, his team has already missed out on important time that they spend in the offseason preparing for the upcoming season.

The spring and the summer is the time they really make the big jumps with their athleticism and skill improvements, and all of that was halted, Williams said.

Even if we were to start workouts today they still just missed six months when they would have been able to really focus in on their individual games, he added.

As far as coaches we miss our guys of course because those six months are time that we really get to bond with them over the spring and summer, and we really felt like this summer was going to be a big one for us, Williams said.

It was going to be the best one that we had had since taking over the program, not just player wise but just kind of the direction we wanted to go into the spring and summer, he added.

For the Comets basketball program, the spring and summer months also are spent bonding with each other and building relationships between players and coaches.

Last year we went to Staunton River together all of us under one roof, and we wanted to expand on those team bonding activities and stuff like that. That is what we really missed out on, Williams said.

Another big event that the basketball program missed for the first time was their annual kids camp.

Not only is it a big event for the kids in the community, it also is a big fundraiser for the basketball program. It also is a time for the players on the team to interact with some of the younger players.

All of the players in the Comet basketball program came through the kids camp, Williams included.

Being able to give back and teach kids the game of basketball is big for Williams, and missing out on that this year was another setback.

When the season ended back in March, and COVID-19 first began shutting things down, Williams thought that it would be a good thing for his players since they had just come off of a long season.

When we first started quarantining it was only like a week after the season ended so it was like we needed this and then comes May and then June comes and then July comes, and you realize how much you are missing, Williams said.

Even that little break from March on up to May would have been great for them to kind of let them get their legs back underneath of them, help heal any of the nicks and injuries and then get back to it, but we missed that, he added.

Being unable to even get together for any type of workouts has been tough for Williams, his staff and players as the start date for the season gets closer and closer.

Williams has been in constant contact with his players and making sure they are working out and staying in shape.

He knows that their basketball skills will come back quickly, but being able to get back into game shape takes time, so he is hopeful that they will all come back in shape and ready to go when the time comes.

Williams has 12 players returning off of a team that just went to the state tournament for the second year in a row. He mentioned that 12 players is an entire basketball team for some schools, and he is hopeful that the team chemistry off of the court translates on the court.

There are some programs around the state that are already working out and having practices together, and that puts Williams and his staff behind already with being unable to do anything at the moment.

Another thing that may go unnoticed to those on the outside are the missed opportunities to work with some of the new players that are coming into the system from the middle school.

Comets JV head coach Hakeem Pettus teaches at the middle school so he has had the opportunity to get to know a lot of those kids that will be moving up to the high school this year, but they are still missing out on crucial time together.

We would have those guys over here by now building those relationships, showing them how our guys work out and seeing how tough it is and letting them see the level of commitment and dedication that it takes to be successful, and we are just missing that time, Williams said.

From a coach and player standpoint we are missing out on those relationships, he added.

While the future is still up in the air when it comes to when and if high school sports will be played this winter, Williams and his staff are ready to get their players back on the court and make another run at a state championship whenever they get the OK.

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Missed time is crucial as Halifax basketball looks toward season - YourGV.com

Chris Bodkins| For The Ardmoreite

COMANCHE The Dickson High School football looked to be in good shapeby starting strong Friday night, but fiveturnovers in the second half proved to be too much in a 30-20 setback to Comanche.

Our guys played better than last week, so there is progress, said Comets head coach Steve Day. We had two opportunities in the red zone to score in the first half and we failed to do so.The turnovers in the second half were our downfall.

Dicksons issues started early in the second half as an interception resulted in Comanche kicking a field goal for its first lead of the game, 23-20. However, it could have been a touchdown if not for Comets senior Kameron Helm making a big stop.

Unfortunately, the turnover bug struck again as the Indians picked off another pass with 10:08 remaining and turned it into a touchdown two plays later for a 30-20 advantage.

Jzavionn Bennett gave Dickson hope with a long kickoff return, but the drive stalled with a fumble at the 8:58 mark of the 4th quarter. The Comets could never recover and suffered their second loss of the season.

Dickson did show positive signs to start the game though, stopping the Indians on three consecutive downs to force a punt. The Comets wasted little time with the ball as Tommy Milsap scored the first touchdown of the game.

Dickson juniorquarterback Johnny Smith kept it rolling byconnectingon a 68-yard pass to senior Jack McDonald. One play later, Smith found McDonald again for a 13-yard touchdown.The ensuing extra point was no good, but that didn't stop the Comet faithful from rocking the stands.

Dickson had another opportunity to increase its lead with 16 seconds left in the first half, but the Comets ran out of time at the 2-yard line and went into the locker room leading 20-12.

Up next is Dicksons home opener at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 11 against Ringling.

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Comets open up the pass, but turnovers prove costly in loss at Comanche - Daily Ardmoreite

By Graham Thomas

Staff Writer n [emailprotected]

The varsity football game between Kansas and Colcord on Thursday was canceled after a student athlete at Kansas tested positive for covid-19, according to Cory Steele, superintendent of Kansas Public Schools.

The Comets were scheduled to host the Hornets in their annual South Delaware County rivalry game at Dee Neel Stadium.

"We had a student athlete who participated in both the junior high and high school games test positive for covid-19," Steele said. "Being around that many kids, it ended up being 70 or 80 contacts. I called the health department and not knowing how far it went out, we went ahead and went to distance learning."

Steele said the school district will be in distance learning until Sept. 14.

"We're not doing any extracurricular activities at this time," he said. "We're just trying to keep kids and their teachers safe."

The Comets' game at Ketchum on Sept. 11 also is canceled.

The Comets' next football game will be against Westville on Sept. 18.

Colcord scheduled a game against Liberty on Saturday. Results were not available at presstime.

Watts 66, Welch 16

Watts improved to 2-0 with the win at Welch on Friday. The Engineers host Oaks on Friday.

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Covid-19 KOs rivalry game with Colcord and Kansas - NWAOnline

Its been more than a year since the season opener gridiron game for the Chanute Blue Comets, but today is finally the day Chanute High School plays their first football game of the 2020 season.

Scheduled for 7 pm today at the Chanute Community Sports Complex, CHS will play Circle High School in the season opener for the third year in a row. Chanute has a two-game win streak the last two seasons against Circle, with the Blue Comets dominating 31-8 two years ago, and shutting out the Thunderbirds 24-0 last year.

Second-year CHS head football coach Clete Frazell said its important to get off to a good start, especially since last seasons good start when former kick returner and running back Briley Peavy returned a kick for a touchdown early on to get things started. The season eventually led to a 9-2 record and a trip in November to a state sectional matchup versus Paola.

...Its going to be really important again just to get off to a good start, and the kids will realize its a fresh year, with some different faces on each team and the score is 0-0 going in, and nobody is favored to win this game, Frazell said.

Since June 1, the Blue Comets have been pumping iron and readying themselves for the start of the 2020 season, including conditioning, position-specific drills, and practicing plays on offense and defense. Through the process, Frazell said there has been ups and downs, but overall the team is where it needs to be for the start of the year.

The challenge, he said, will be to get his players to relax come the first game, as it is perfectly normal to get out of character and get a little too hyped about the situation. Frazell, however, noted that his players know exactly what they are doing, and they need to take a deep breath before assignments and the next play.

Every CHS player will be focused, and running backs fans can expect to see senior Ryker Donovan, junior Jackson Coombs and sophomore Ty Leedy. Donovan is the power back with athletic ability, while Coombs and Leedy will have a change-of-pace style when it comes to running the football.

Blocking and creating holes for the running backs will be the offensive line. At the center position is junior Tuker Davis, who started last year in the same spot. At either of the guard positions will be junior Nathan Cunningham, who has added some weight bolster that Blue Comet rushing attack that was so potent a year ago. Sophomore Bryan Jackett will likely be at the other guard position, as last year he played well versus Paola in the state sectional game as a freshman.

All-State senior All-SEK offensive tackle Brayden Dillow will lead and galvanize the offensive line attack. Also at the tackle position will be senior Elijah Keever, who missed all of last season because of a shoulder injury.

Catching passes on the outside will be senior All-SEK tight end Garrett Almond, junior Kam Koester, senior Blake Atwood and sophomore Dagen Dean. Both Almond and Atwood will use versatility, while Koester and Dean will use their height and versatility to put pressure on the defense. Senior Curtis Harris, sophomore Rawley Chard and Leedy will also use their all-around skillset to make plays on the outside.

Quarterbacking the team will be sophomore Eric Erbe, who has looked good in practice and camp. Erbe has the ability to throw darts on the outside, and he can roll out and throw on the run. The new starting quarterback will replace All-State and All-SEK quarterback Ty Bowman, who is now playing tight end at Kansas State University.

Hes done a great job. Hes put in a ton of time in the off-season to perfect his craft, hes done a terrific job in facilitating our offense, and calling plays and taking charge, so thats good to see when you have a sophomore quarterback, Frazell said.

On the line defensively will be a mix of the student-athletes on the offensive line. At the linebacker position will be Donovan, Leedy and junior Kedric Emling.

In the secondary will be senior All-SEK defensive back Harris, who does an exceptional job flying around the ball and hitting his opponent hard. Koester, Coombs and Atwood will use their skills in the secondary as well.

The guys are a veteran group and they are ready to have a big season on the back end of our defense, Frazell said. They are strong kids, theyll come up in run support. Theyre also good cover guys.

The team will be without several All-SEK players due to graduation: wide receiver Peavy, offensive lineman Jacob McDonald, linebacker Tyler Davis, kicker Jacob Adams, linebacker Hunter Zubieta, wide receiver Jaden Costin, offensive lineman Collin Hutson, offensive lineman Nolan Werner, and defensive back Colten Fritch.

Senior Tyson Lucas will replace Adams as kicker. His showings at national camps makes him one of the more talented kickers in the area.

Chanute will need their new leaders to step up versus Circle today. The Thunderbirds last season went 1-8 and lost in the first round of the playoffs against Andover Central a school that went all the way to the 4A state finals to play Bishop Miege.

Circle lost several all-league players to graduation, but making their return will be junior All-League Honorable Mention wide receiver Jake Shaults and junior Luke McGinnis. McGinnis last season played receiver, but will start this year at quarterback.

Fourth-year Circle head football coach Logan Clothier said his group has been paying attention to detail and rallying around the football throughout camp the past few weeks.

Im just very excited, I know were very blessed to have a season with everything going on, I know our kids are excited, especially those seniors, Clothier said. Im just extremely excited for our seniors and just our coaches. Weve been putting in a lot of work in various Zoom calls just to keep the kids engaged when we werent able to meet in person. Im just excited to kick the season off and take it one day at a time and keep getting to play.

COVID-19 There is at least one player on the Blue Comets who is quarantining due to a potential exposure to COVID-19. Circle doesnt have any players impacted.

TICKETS Every student-athlete will be given four vouchers to buy tickets.

STREAMING CHS will stream as many games and matches as possible on YouTube. To stream these games, search for CHS Blue Comets on YouTube or look for the link on USD 413 social media.

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Blue Comets to play Circle in first football game of year - Chanute Tribune

The month of September always marks the beginning of autumn for us in the northern hemisphere and will happen on Tuesday, Sept. 22 at 9:31 a.m. There are only two days each year that the sun will rise due east and set due west and this is one. The other is the vernal equinox half a year later.

Within a couple of days of the equinox the days and nights are exactly 12 hours long for everyone on Earth except for the poles. That is because we travel around the sun in a slightly elliptical orbit and we are tilted at 23.5 degrees now. However, that tilt is constantly and slowly changing over a 41,000-year time period. The maximum obliquity we reach is 24.5 degrees and the minimum is 22.1 degrees. It is currently diminishing toward the 22.1 degrees, which we will reach again in about 20,000 years. Without that tilt there would be no seasons and life on earth would probably never have evolved much past hunter-gatherer tribes because our climate would become stratified. If we did not have a moon no higher life forms may have evolved on earth at all since the gravitational forces between the earth and moon stabilize all those cycles along with creating stronger tides and good circulation in our oceans to make them suitable for life without getting too extreme.

The other two continually and slow-changing cycles that contribute to the formation and dissolution of ice ages are the changing eccentricity of our orbit around the sun over 100,000 years, and the 26,000-year precession of the equinoxes. Those three together are called the Milankovitch cycles, named after the Serbian engineer who discovered them in the 1930s. Right now our north star is Polaris but it will be Vega, the brightest star in the summer triangle, in 13,000 years.

We will soon get cooler and crisper nights that will make for great viewing of the night sky this month. There are many good highlights this month that include the four brightest planets all near their best for the year, Mars doubling in brightness to outshine Jupiter, a very close conjunction of the moon and Mars, and another comet close to comet Neowise.

Jupiter and Saturn are already up before sunset and then Mars rises by 9:30 as the month begins and by 8:30 at the end of the month. Then Venus still rises about 3 am in Gemini in the winter hexagon each morning this month as it is getting farther ahead of us in our respective orbits. Mercury is the only one that can only manage a poor appearance toward the end of the month in the evening sky. Look for our first planet to pass within just one degree of Spica in Virgo, near where comet Neowise was a couple of weeks ago.

Both Jupiter and Saturn end their retrograde motions this month and go back to their normal eastward treks across our skies. That will happen on Sept. 12 for Jupiter and Sept. 29 for Saturn. After that notice that Jupiter will be slowly closing the 8 degree gap currently between them. That will continue for the entire season of autumn and on the winter solstice they will reach their closest conjunction in about 400 years at less than one tenth of a degree apart, easily visible in the same field of view in a telescope. Usually each planet is quite a treat and learning experience by itself, but just one season from now, they will look like a great double planet.

I recently showed these two showcase planets, along with several other celestial favorites, to a small group of people through my telescope. The moon was a slender crescent with earthshine and we saw about 10 Kappa Cygnid meteors over the course of a couple of hours. This is a minor shower and I did not expect to see any of them, so that was a nice surprise. We also saw several satellites, which was expected because they are now launching 120 new satellites every month, 60 at a time. Then we watched the Cygnus arm leading us right into the center of our Milky Way galaxy below Sagittarius and Scorpius slowly become more defined as the night got darker and remained crystal clear after the moon set soon after sunset.

Jupiter is about half as far away as Saturn and is 15 times brighter than the ringed planet. Jupiter is about half a billion miles away, or 42 minutes at the speed of light. They are both getting slightly fainter and farther away now, but they are still brighter and closer than usual since they are not too far past their oppositions.

Mars is a different story. The red planet will double in brightness this month to outshine Jupiter as it gets considerably closer and brighter as we rapidly catch up with it in our orbits. That will happen on Oct. 6 of next month when Mars will reach a close opposition and rise right at sunset. You can already see some detail on the Martian surface in an average telescope and that will improve dramatically throughout this month and next as long as no planet-wide dust storms obscure its surface from view as often happens near its opposition because it is also getting closer to the sun. You can expect to see some dark markings on its surface, one or both of its polar icecaps, and even some of its thin atmosphere.

Watch carefully on the night of Sept. 5 around 11 p.m. as the waning gibbous moon will pass just half a degree below Mars. It will even occult the planet in Central America and parts of South America. The other nice lunar conjunctions this month are Venus and the moon on the morning of the 14th, Jupiter and the moon on the evening of Sept. 24, and Saturn and the moon the next evening.

There is another comet now that will be visible in our evening sky in Libra and Scorpius this month and next. It will not be as bright as NEOWISE was, but it should reach 9th magnitude by the 26th, when it will be at perihelion or closest to the sun for this orbit. It is called 88P/Howell and was discovered back in August of 1981 by Ellen Howell. It orbits the sun every 5.5 years, so it is nothing like NEOWISE which will not return again for nearly 7,000 years

Comet Howell was the target of a proposed NASA mission in 2017, but it did not make the cut. That was called CORSAIR, which stands for comet rendezvous, sample acquisition, investigation and return. We did successfully land a spacecraft named Philae, part of the Rosetta Mission, on Comet Churymov-Gerasimenko in November of 2014. Then we also smashed a probe named Deep Impact into Comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005. It created a crater 150 meters in diameter on this comet and released a large dust cloud that was carefully analyzed to learn more about the nature of comets. It is ironic that comets have been hitting the earth for billions of years, but this is the first time that humans could actually hit a comet.

SEPTEMBER HIGHLIGHTS

Sept 2: Full moon is at 1:23 a.m. This would normally be the famous Harvest moon if it occurred within two weeks of the equinox, but this one is too early and is therefore simply called the corn moon, similar to last months moon, which was green corn or grain.

Sept. 3: On this day in 1976 Viking 2 landed on Mars. It was preceded by Viking 1 in July of that year. We had landed some earlier missions on Mars in the early 1970s, but they both failed. Only about half of the Mars missions were successful.

Sept. 5: The moon and Mars will be less than half a degree apart in Pisces this evening by 11 p.m. They will rise together and then get even closer. Mars will be occulted by the moon in some parts of the world.

Sept. 9: Mars starts its retrograde, or westward motion.

Sept. 10: Last quarter moon is at 5:27 a.m.

Sept. 11: Neptune will reach opposition in Aquarius at 7.8 magnitude. It will be four hours away at the speed of light, which is nearly 3 billion miles.

Sept. 14: The moon and Venus will be 5 degrees apart in the morning sky.

Sept. 17: New moon is at 7:01 a.m.

Sept. 23: First quarter moon is at 9:56 p.m. On this day in 1846 J. Galle discovered Neptune. It has only completed one orbit since then because it takes 165 years for Neptune to orbit the sun.

Bernie Reim of Wells is co-director of the Astronomical Society of Northern New England.

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What's Up in September: Beginning of autumn brings action in the skies - Press Herald

ST. CLOUD Saturday morning kicked off the high school division of the Great Plains Alliance tournament at Tech High School and Sartell Community Center.

Central Minnesota-based MN Comets hosted the five division, 60-team tournament that gave Division III, NAIA and junior college coaches their first live glimpse of high school prospects since COVID-19 began canceling tournaments in March.

I got to watch over a dozen local players in five games throughout the day Saturday. Here arefive takeaways from a full day of action at the Great Plains Alliance:

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1. Diew, Lund keep improving

Thomas Diew capped off his sophomore campaign at Apollo by scoring the winning basket in the section 8-3A final over Alexandria, and he started off the scoring for Comets Elite 2022 on Saturday with a fast break layup. Diew finished with 8 points and two blocks, showcasing his wide-array of post moves. Sartell's Mason Lund had 7 points and 4 rebounds off the bench, and Comets Elite finished their day 3-0 with all three wins by double figures. The 6-foot-6 wing Lund and 6-foot-8 post Diew should be on college radaras they enter their pivotal junior seasons.

Alexandria's Kristen Hoskins dishes a pass for MN Comets Elite 2022 Saturday, Aug. 8, 2020, at Tech High School.(Photo: Zach Dwyer, zdwyer@stcloudtimes.com)

2. Alexandria will be dangerous in 2020-21

Alexandria was only one bucket away from making an appearance at state in 2020. The Cardinals lose only two starters next season and return all three all-conference starters.Two of their leading scorers will be back in juniors Kristen Hoskins and ErikHedstrom, and both were on display Saturday morning for Comets Elite 2022. Hedstrom knocked down three 3-pointers and finished with 13 points, and Hoskins led the pace and offense to finish with 10 points. Both averaged double figures as sophomores, and they will be a force in the Central Lakes Conference this upcoming season.

Sartell's Gus Gunderson makes a no-look pass for MN Comets Kirchner Saturday, Aug. 8, 2020, at Sartell Community Center. (Photo: Zach Dwyer, zdwyer@stcloudtimes.com)

3. Comets Kirchner has plenty of talent

Central Lakes all-conference guard Gus Gunderson had a great all-around game on Saturday night for MN Comets Kirchner, shooting 4-7 from the field and adding four assists and three rebounds. Gunderson showcased his court vision and awareness on multiple no-look passes, leading the offense in a similar manner as his junior season at Sartell. Granite Ridge all-conference post Andrew Hahn of Albany finished in double figures with 10 points on 4-5 shooting and grabbed four rebounds. He played similar to his high school season by setting great screens, fighting for rebounds and being reliable in the post. Sartell guard Evan Templin just finished his sophomore year but is playing upa grade with Comets Kirchner, and he finished the game strong with three baskets in the closing minutes of a 77-55 win.

ROCORI's Jayden Philippi high fives a teammate for MN Matrix Saturday, Aug. 8, 2020, at Sartell Community Center. (Photo: Zach Dwyer, zdwyer@stcloudtimes.com)

4. MN Matrix love their space

The Matrix featured three upcoming seniorsin Ethan Opsahl (Sauk Rapids), Sam Stolzenberg (Cathedral) and Jayden Philippi (ROCORI) in the 22-team junior division, but they ran into a tough foe in Select Ohnstad on Saturday night. The Matrix used incredible spacing and cutting to constantly look for open three-pointers, running a more fluid offense than any other game I watched on Saturday. However, the trio combined for only three field goals and the Matrix couldn't get on any shooting hot streaks to stick with Select's superior size and speed on the fast break.

Tech High School was one of the host sights of the MN Comets Great Plains Alliance tournament Saturday, Aug. 8, 2020, at Tech High School.(Photo: Zach Dwyer, zdwyer@stcloudtimes.com)

5. Safety first

To be able to pull off a 60-team tournament in today's world is quite an accomplishment. Players assembled outside Tech High School and the Sartell Community Center by signs for their court, entering as a team with masks on until they reached their court. Temperature checks were done at the door, and players and the limited number of fans were funneled out a different entrance after games.

Overall it was a great day of AAU's return to St. Cloud. The event ran on time and seamless throughout the day, giving high schoolers another weekend to feel a sense of normalcy being back on the court.

Zach Dwyeris a sports reporter and photographer for the St. Cloud Times. Reach him at 320-406-5660 or zdwyer@stcloudtimes.com. Follow him on Twitter @sctimeszach.

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Five takeaways from the Great Plains Alliance tourney - SC Times