Homecoming festivities hit Hot Springs

HOT SPRINGS – Homecoming festivities took hold of the town of Hot Springs and did not let go for several hours on Thursday as the community gathered to support the high school and its athletic programs. Events included a parade, a rally in the park and games between classes on the high school football field.

As the volleyball and football team sat perched atop fire engines, floats constructed by students awaited the signal to head toward downtown Hot Springs. Members of the community came out to salute the teams and students as the parade made its way down Main Street.

Floats and fire engines adorned with athletes stopped near the city park and all participants dismounted their rides for the pep rally led by coaches and players. The football team was announced first, running through a human tunnel of volleyball players as Head Coach Jim Lawson called their names.

Next through a similar tunnel except this time made up of the football players was the volleyball team. Head Coach Alisha Pablo summoned the players to the trailer/stage and proceeded to serenade the crowd with an original rap song.

Senior Alex Green of the volleyball team followed Coach Pablo with a contest between classes to see who had the loudest cheer. The senior class was the clear winner in the eyes of the judges. The junior class took home the title of best float.

The students then headed back to the high school football field for the culmination of the day’s events. The contests between the classes included a relay, powder-puff football, a pie-eating contest and the ever-popular tug-of-war competition.

The relay involved teams putting on football gear including pads, helmets, pants and jerseys over their existing clothes as fast as they could and sprinting to the other side of the field. Awaiting their arrival was a teammate who had to do the same thing as soon as the previous contestant had removed the cumbersome gear. The junior class came out victorious.

Next was the tug-of-war competition pitting freshmen against sophomores and juniors against seniors for the ultimate bragging rights of strongest class at Hot Springs High School. Students strained and dug in their heels, desperately trying to get their opponents off balance. Despite valiant efforts from the upperclassmen, the juniors won the title defeating the seniors.

The messiest event of the afternoon was the crowd-pleasing whipped cream pie eating contest. The four participants Joe DeTienne, Sam Hoff, Wyatt Carr and Lane Foster buried their faces in the pies attempting to locate a piece of bubble gum and be the first to blow a bubble signaling victory. Freshman Wyatt Carr won the competition despite some controversy as to what constituted an official bubble.

The homecoming celebration on Thursday concluded with the powder puff football game. Looking as tough as their male counterparts that would take the field for the real thing on Friday, girls from all four classes took the field without the cushion of pads and helmets and went at it.

Pulling no punches and giving no quarter, the girls battled each other on the gridiron. Once in a while players seemed to forget that the game was supposed to be a flag football game instead going straight for the takedown. For the most part the ladies played by the rules as the event was eventually called a draw.

Organizer of the homecoming events Robin Miller said she was pleased with the results.