Story by Annie Thomas
On Sept. 26, the showdown began on the Lee’s Summit High School’s football field as the Titans took on the Tigers.
The border war game had been anticipated by both students at West and Lee’s Summit, not only to see who had the elite football team, though. Tension erupted and the competition went to a different level.
Over twitter, students from both schools shot tweets back and forth dissing each other over everything from teams to grades to style.
After these controversial tweets made their way around West, more and more people began to hear about them, including the coaches of the football team.
Within the same week the tweets were made, coaches from both West and Lee’s Summit decided to put both teams together before the big game for a family dinner.
“We were trying to build some community unity, making sure that these kids know that they live together in a community, that they’re not enemies,” said Careswell.
Even though the teams would be facing off on the field Friday night, senior Bryce Kreikemeier said he enjoyed hosting the Tigers for dinner.
“It was different, but it was a pretty neat experience. It’s something we weren’t used to, but it was a cool new idea,” said Kreikemeier.
After both the teams came together for a short while, Friday night they were back to business as both the Titans and Tigers said they were focused on one thing: winning.
“The advice we gave them was to trust in their technique, their scheme, and to play with confidence…” said Careswell.
Although the Titans came to Lee’s Summit ready to win, things began to turn when the Tigers scored straight off the bat.
Play after play, West continued to fight until the very last second, but by then it wasn’t enough. The final score of the Border War game was 44 to 38, an extremely close call.
“I think we had a good game plan, I think the boys executed fairly well, there were some things that obviously we could try to fix if we really looked at it. Offensively, we can’t have three turn-overs, that doesn’t help. We gave the ball back to a very very good offense in Lee’s Summit. Eliminating the stakes that we could control would help. It just comes down to the fact that they’re a good team and we’re a good team, unfortunately a Lee’s Summit team was going to have to lose,” said Coach Dziurawiec.
Friday, that team was the Titans, but with more games to go this season and more wins to focus on, the football team said it is still pushing forward in the constant hopes of succeeding.
