Weir(d) memories
Thursday, December 1 , 2005
By TOM BONE - Bluefield Daily Telegraph

Weir, weird, weirder. As if linked by some invisible band of fate, for the third straight year the Bluefield Beavers will meet the Red Riders of Weir High School in the Class AA football playoffs.

This Friday night, of course, it’s for tåhe big prize. The state championship trophy.

There is no doubt that the two teams and their coaching staffs will take the field at Wheeling Island Stadium with memories of Bluefield’s overtime victories in the 2003 and ’04 playoffs at Mitchell Stadium.

Yes, ex-coach Tony Filberto and his son have departed from the Weir sideline, and a bunch of BHS players graduated last spring. But, the history of the battles between the schools is compelling — because it just seems to be too scripted to be true.

Two years ago, it was a quarterfinal playoff that the Beavers won 37-30 when David Perdue fell on a fumble in the second overtime. Bluefield moved on, eventually, to the state finals in Wheeling where they lost the game — in overtime on a point-after kick try.

At the end of November a year ago, the two squads met in the semifinals. Many readers know the story well — Weir’s 14-0 fourth-quarter lead dissolved in an amazing sequence of improbable plays. The Red Riders ultimately lost 21-20 on a point-after kick that sailed wide left. The Beavers claimed their latest state championship a week later.

This year? The finals, just a few Ohio River-bends south of the Red Riders’ home, Weirton.

Quarterfinal. Semifinal. Final. Seems now as though it was inevitable all along, doesn’t it?

No. Nothing of the sort seemed inevitable when Bluefield started 0-2, or when BHS finished ranked No. 11 with a 5-4 record. No home playoff games, right? Wrong. Grafton upset No. 2 Herbert Hoover, then got demolished by the Beavers at Mitchell Stadium.

Weir, which beat Logan 66-0 and Scott 34-8 in the early playoff rounds, had its own struggles with the high-scoring and top-ranked Wayne Pioneers last week before claiming a 22-7 victory and a berth in the finals.

Weir has been to the championship once before in Class AA, taking a 20-17 win over Dupont in 1998 — sandwiched between Bluefield’s win over Grafton in ’97 and its loss to Wyoming East in ’99.

Weir(d)er yet, Weir and Bluefield almost met as Class AAA powers around 45 years ago. The Beavers claimed state titles in 1959 and ’62, beating Parkersburg both times. In between, Weir won the other two championship trophies, in 1960 and ’61, even though Bluefield finished those seasons with records of 10-0 and 9-1, respectively. Playoffs were single-game affairs back in those days.

But back to the present — and the immediate future.

The Daily Telegraph presses are to start at midnight Friday, we’ve been told. What if the big game is going into its third overtime about that time? I know the press operators will probably be keeping their ears close to their radios. I know they’ll understand.

You can’t argue with fate.

Tom Bone is a Daily Telegraph sports writer and editorial cartoonist. Contact him at tbone @ bdtonline.com.