Football season begins

I smell freshly cut grass and see the grass stains starting to accumulate. Football season must be right around the corner. While everyone is watching intently to see whether or not Brett Favre is returning to the Minnesota Vikings, I am looking forward to the start of another Cook County Viking football season.

While I love the summer, there is just something about the fall that I love more than anything. A lot of that has to do with football, but I think what I love most is the camaraderie of a group of men working toward a common goal. I love practice,

love scheming with coaches and most of all, I love to work with the young men on the football field.

It all starts this Sunday night, August 8 at 6:30 p.m., when we issue equipment to the players and give an overview of our expectations to the team. Even with limited resources, we take great pride in being able to provide top quality equipment to our players. Many businesses in our community over the past years have given money for helmets and to the Booster Club, that supports us yearly. Our football team is truly a community supported activity.

Official practice starts on Monday, August 16. We practice from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. in our best effort to both beat the heat and allow players who work the ability to do so. Thefirst week and a half of practice is a frenzy as we get players in the physical and mental condition necessary to play the game.

The annual Blue vs. White inter-squad scrimmage comes fast, as this year it will be on Wednesday night, August 25 at 7:00 p.m. It is our first big event and fans can watch right from the field if they choose to do so.

Our coaching staff this year is the same with Mike Boomer heading up the defense, Pat Eliasen working with linemen, and Kyler Hawkins working with wide receivers and defensive backs. Bryan Carpenter and Caleb White will be back to coach the junior high program while Coach Carpenter also helps the varsity as much as he can on game days.

While I work on the offense and with quarterbacks, I am always so incredibly impressed with how our coaching staff works together and collaborates on ideas. They all love working with young men and the relationships we form throughout the season are the highlight of the season.

Our only change in coaches this year is in John Jacobsen who decided to take a year off to watch his son Johnny play, who is now a ninth grader. Coach Jacobsen has been a tremendous asset to the program and we will miss him, although we know he won’t be far away…maybe on the sidelines?

As a player when I grew up here, and even now as a coach, there is one little thing that I secretly always enjoyed. On Thursday evenings I would walk through town and look in some of the businesses that had a “Go Vikings” sign on their door or open window. It always made me feel good that the community supported us. It is one of the little things that gives me an extra sense of pride in our community.

Theseason is about to begin and our schedule does vary from last season’s, with a tough match-up against Esko to start the season. I can’t wait!

Mitch Dorr, a Cook County High
School Class of 1993 graduate,
is now a social studies teacher
and coach at his former alma
mater. Mitch coaches Vikings
football and boys’ basketball.

Here is this year’s
schedule:

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