Carpenter’s Crunch Time Column: Wrapping up another year of football

Duane Carpenter
December 9, 2021

BUCKHANNON – If you decided to copy my picks last week, then shame on you.

That is because the best I could do is post a 2-3 record. Not good at all. It was still enough to hold onto the championship of the first annual Crunch Time Contest.

My Buckhannon owner Brian Bergstrom, and my opponent in our little contest, went 1-4, so he wasn’t able to steal the title away from me…thank goodness.

Anyway, I finished the year with a 43-22 mark while Brian posted a 37-28 record.

And special thanks to our guest picker last week, Buckhannon-Upshur head football coach Zach Davis. Coach Davis went 1-2 in his high school football championship picks and had to suffer a little ridicule at the hands of yours truly, but he was a good sport about it.

Congratulations to Martinsburg, Fairmont Senior and Ritchie County on winning football championships in their respective classes. The football season goes by so fast. It seems like we go from the first practice in August to the last game in November in the blink of an eye.

Of course, we still have bowl games for Marshall and WVU to view and the rest of the NFL regular season to keep an eye on. I have no idea how the Steelers can beat the Ravens but look so bad against the Vikings Thursday night and against the Bengals two weeks ago.

Marshall drew a tough draw against Louisiana in the New Orleans Bowl. There are worse places to be in December than New Orleans, but the Herd will have their hands full with the No. 23 Ragin’ Cajuns in what will amount to a home game for Louisiana. Marshall currently sits as a six-point underdog.