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thisiskeith12 · December 21, 2004

Fans cheer teams at Super 6

Intensity echoes rivalry on the field

By DANIEL JACKSON

BIRMINGHAM POST-HERALD

At first, the only sound at Legion Field was a light rain falling on the metal bleachers in the end zone.

Then, cleats pattered on the pavement as the Prattville High School Lions filed out of the locker room. Soon, drums rolled as the Hoover High School band marched into the stands. And fans soon filed in to see the high school Class 6A state football championship game Thursday night.

As the game got under way, tubas softly crept into the undulating melody of the theme song from "Jaws," building in volume and tempo until the entire crowd erupted in a climactic roar. Their cheers echoed the intensity of the rivalry on the field.

"This is a big game," said Prattville sophomore Garrett Draper, who was banging on a metal pot with a spoon to cheer his team. "We've got horns, cowbells, pots and pans. We're going to get loud. That's a tradition."

High school football fans are making a lot of noise in Birmingham this weekend for the Alabama High School Athletic Association's Super 6 Championship at Legion Field and Hoover Metropolitan Stadium.

The games will draw an estimated 40,000 people from a dozen high schools across the state, generating approximately $4.5 million for the local economy, the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce reported.

At Legion Field Thursday, fans for the Hoover Bucs and the Prattville Lions made themselves heard. Hoover students said they have a tradition of being loud and rowdy at games as well.

A group of teens from Hoover played a bent and dented bugle that has been passed down and entrusted to incoming senior students for the last few years. The horn, which is sounded after big plays, has become a school tradition, said 17-year-old Jeff Sommer, while Hoover cheerleaders shouted, "Go! Let's Go! Get Loud! Stay Proud!"

"It gets the fans pumped up, and the players love it. They can hear it," said Sommer, who played the bugle Thursday with fellow seniors Taylor Newmann and Daniel Smith. "Seniors are the only ones who can touch it. It's beat up a little, but it'll still go."

Meanwhile, 10 Hoover students with orange letters spelling "Threepeat," painted on their chests, sounded air horns to celebrate Hoover's first touchdown of the night. On the Prattville side, several people rattled cowbells, borrowing from a practice made popular by fans of the Mississippi State University Bulldogs.

Gary Johnson, 62, who had four daughters graduate from Prattville High School, said cowbells are catching on among fans. Johnson had two cowbells, including a small one he bought from another fan during the playoffs three years ago and a larger one he recently bought at a feed store in Montgomery. He rattled the small cowbell too hard during Thursday night's game and broke it.

"We're trying to start a fad," he said, keeping his eyes glued to the action on the field. "Every game we hear a few more in the crowd. The bigger the bell, the farther the noise carries. Every game is (loud) like this."

Of course, the marching bands kept the stands rocking. Both Hoover and Prattville fans seemed to go crazy every time a band played the theme music from the ESPN's "SportsCenter."

Hoover drum major Cain Anne Boxx, 17, said that song gets fans excited for some reason. Prattville students started screaming and jumping up and down when their band played the "SportsCenter" theme as well.

Hoover has played in the state championship all four years that Boxx has been a student there, winning three, including Thursday's 22-7 victory over Prattville. Boxx, who will start at Auburn University next fall, said her last game was a great one.

"I might get a little misty eyed," she said.

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