Dreadnaughts play for title tonight

Go 'Naughts!

The Lakeland High School Dreadnaughts football team, ranked No. 1 in the state and No. 1 in three national polls, take aim at their sixth state championship, and third consecutive, when they play No. 3 Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas (12-1) at 7:30 tonight in the Class 5A state championship game.


TV and Radio

The game can be viewed on channel FSN (Florida Sports Network) at 7:30 p.m. from Dolphin Stadium in Miramar. Lakeland radio station WLKF 1430 AM is also carrying the game live.

'Naughts aim for third straight championship

Update, 10:43 p.m.
Lakeland wins 45-42 in double overtime!

Report and photos HERE

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I have known Bill Castle, Lakeland's head coach, for 35 years. As someone said about another coach, "He could take his'n and beat your'n, and then he could take your'n and beat his'n."

Castle has an impressive ability to analyze what's happening on the field during a game and to make strategic adjustments in his play-calling. I could name a few college and professional teams that need a mind like his on the sidelines. Watching the Dreadnaughts defeat a physically superior team one Friday night several years ago, I concluded that Castle could just as easily have been a mechanical engineer as a coach. Combine that mental ability with his leadership and motivational skills, and you have a coach.

Castle does not always have the most physically talented team on the field, but he almost always has the best prepared and coached team. He works harder than anyone else, and he expects a similar dedication from his assistant coaches, trainers and players. That's how, with the support of the school community, he and his teams maintain the Nulli Secundus tradition at Lakeland High School.

So, I'm glad that Bill Castle chose coaching as a career -- and so are hundreds of athletes who have played for him. Year after year, he takes the strengths of his players and builds another winning team. He never blames them for a loss, but rightfully credits them for every win.

Coach Castle believes in kids and respects them enough to demand their best -- not by criticism and intimidation, but by example and understanding. He guides young men to become not only winners on the football field, but also in life.

Thanks, Coach, and congratulations to every member of your winning team. You are champions, and would be even if you had lost the game.

'Naughts cruise to first 'national championship'

MIAMI -- Lakeland left no doubt it has the best high school football team in the state and perhaps the country Friday night, capturing its second straight Class 5A championship in a 39-10 rout of Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas.

Going wire-to-wire as America's No. 1 team in the USA Today poll, the Dreadnaughts (15-0) posted their 30th straight victory before a crowd of 16,147 at Dolphins Stadium. It was Lakeland's fifth state championship and fourth in the last 10 years. The national championship that becomes official on Tuesday will be its first.

"I definitely didn't expect the score to be like that," said Billy Lowe, who was the quarterback in the Lakeland High program's biggest victory. "We're national champions, undefeated. It's the best feeling I've ever had in my life."

• Ledger coverage
• Photo gallery
• USA Today prep rankings

Yoga edge improves athletes' performance

LAKELAND - It's no surprise athletes find yoga a useful complement to their sport-specific training, says Frankie Hart, a longtime dancer who opened the Satya Life yoga studio in Lakeland last year. She has worked with high school and college soccer and basketball players, golfers and cheerleaders.

Hart, who has taught yoga for 15 years, says the regimen works a wider range of muscles than other forms of exercise. She says athletes tend to overdevelop certain muscles and neglect others.

Yoga benefits them by strengthening "counter muscles" -- for example, a cyclist might have strong quadriceps muscles but weak hamstrings. Yoga's emphasis on controlled stretching also loosens muscles, yielding better balance and agility.

In a more general sense, Hart says yoga creates "body intelligence."

"Yoga helps us learn how to work more efficiently," Hart says. "If you're an athlete, you're trying to gain better performance with less energy expenditure."

While athletes tend to notice the physical effects of yoga, Hart says the mental part of the discipline can be equally beneficial. She says the refined awareness yoga can produce mirrors the deep concentration athletes achieve during peak performance, a state often described as being "in the zone."

"Yoga can feed that for a person because yoga brings the mind and body together," Hart says. "There are no other distractions. You're completely in the moment, and athletes understand how important that is."



Student interviews ....

• Athletes strike a pose to improve performance

Photos of my way-cool Second City cousin, Christopher Starhawk -- instructor of Hatha Yoga and Raw/Living Foods nutrition ....

• Goddess and the Warrior yoga

New Hampshire boy gets his kicks in Lakeland

Pope, left, hopes to lead Eagles back to state as new season starts.

LAKELAND -- Kevin Pope enjoyed growing up in Durham, New Hampshire -- a small town of about 12,000, about 60 miles north of Boston. He thrived athletically, playing on two state championship teams in boys soccer for Oyster River High School.

Soccer isn't exactly a year-round sport in the Northeast. So his family moved to Florida and settled in Lakeland, and Pope ended up at George Jenkins. It couldn't have worked out any better. Pope emerged as one of the top players in the county on a state runner-up.

"Up there, there were three or four real good teams," Pope said. "Down here, you play against a lot of good teams."

George Jenkins coach Jim Cross [a friend of mine] said he heard that he was getting a very good player last year, but Pope turned out to be even better than advertised. He led the county with 42 goals and was second in overall points.

Pope joined a talented team that was led by the 2003-04 county player of the year, midfielder Jake Howard, who is now at the University of Central Florida. It didn't take long for Pope to fit in with his new teammates.

Pope is more than just a soccer player. Like his brother, he'll be playing college soccer although it won't be on an athletic scholarship. But that doesn't have anything to do with his talent. It's just that Ivy League schools don't give athletic scholarships, and Pope learned last week that he was accepted at Yale.

• Ledger article .... Move Benefited Jenkins' Kevin Pope

Let's Get Naughty!

The No. 1-ranked Lakeland High School Dreadnaughts will play their first nationally televised football game when they meet Kissimmee Osceola at 7 p.m. Thursday at Bryant Stadium as part of the FSN Nike High School Football Game of the Week, which is a package of five games.

'Naughts in National TV Spotlight