Both the girl’s and boy’s teams placed first and the whole team placed first overall against Pinetree and Nederland. Other goals were accomplished at Monday’s tri-meet, several swimmers earned their letterman jackets by qualifying in specific times. Freshmen Abby Yates, Matt Smithhart,  Jacob Morris, and juniors Marisa Willmon, and Desiderio Ramirez all qualified for their letterman jacket times.

According to swim coach Andy Stewart, the team is tired at this point in the season, but that hasn’t stopped some swimmers from improving their times.

“I thought the team performed fairly well.  It’s obvious the team is tired, but at this time of the season, they need to be tired,” Stewart said.

Both the girl’s and boy’s teams placed first overall. Swim Coach Andy Stewart said he was very proud and pleased with the team’s efforts and victories.

“The team performed well,” Stewart said. “They were motivated and aggressive for the entire meet.”

Lufkin placed first  in 20 different events. Juniors Jason Grosman and Julian Williams were two of four swimmers whose relay placed first in the 400-yard Freestyle event.

“Winning first felt great,” Williams exclaimed. “It was like eating frosted flakes.”

Grosman also was satisfied with the team’s performance and his own – first place in the 400-yard Freestyle relay and in the 500-yard Freestyle individual.

“The entire team did great, and it’s cool seeing everyone do well because of our hard work,” Grosman said.

Coach Stewart mentioned that around this time of the season the swimmers begin to feel tired, but that was not the case during last week’s meet.

“The meet was ran very quickly, so there wasn’t a lot of time to rest between events, and we were dominating pretty much every event,” Stewart said. “Under circumstances like these, some teams have a hard time maintaining focus and intensity. We focused beyond all that and had quite a few best times.”

Besides more than a dozen first place victiories and  quite a few best times, another achievement was accomplished. Junior Sophia Humphreys broke another Lufkin record at the meet in the 100-yard breaststroke event.

“Two down, two to go, well for this year,” Humphreys said. “My goal for next year is to embellsih the record board with my name. And ovverall, the team did really well and winning first in majority of the events is always a great feeling.”

The junior had planned to be a cheerleader at the middle school.

“But I turned in my application too late so I had to run instead,” True said. “I wasn’t too disappointed about it, because I felt as if I could get a better scholarship for running instead.”

Running has now become her passion. She feels that if she doesn’t work out she feels like she hasn’t done her physical accomplishment for the day and so she feels sluggish.Running is really a stress reliever for her.

“I love challenging myself and pushing past my limits,” True said. “I call it my “PR”, personal record. When my body tells me I can’t keep going, I push myself even harder.”

True said that she keeps her body in shape by never eating before practice because she feels as if she burns more calories. But she does eat a protein bar immediately after practice.

True really thinks her practices help her become a better runner, and on the weekends she even runs with her boyfriend.

“I really enjoy running,” she said. “And when my boyfriend and I run together, he runs much faster than I do so I try to keep up with him which makes me push even harder. I hope to continue running journey throughout college.”

In the second half throughout the whole game the possession of the ball was 50/50, but that did not stop Tigres to score another goal to make the game more of a actual win. Marco Antonio Jimenez had stoppped the ball with his hand which was a straight foul, which gave Tigres Striker, Mancilla, a penalty to score on goal with no cautious.

The ball was shot poorly when Queretaro’s goalie Sanchez stopped Mancilla’s celebration for a goal. Queretaro kept their game face on but it was no match for Tigres advancing to the finals against Santos Laguna.

These two teams are two of the best in the whole world, but only their players will make the difference in the field. Mourinho and Guardiola will have to make the right choices and make their players take the victory home and consider themselves the best team in the world.

This rivalry has been one of the most important rivalries of all time in Spain’s LBBVA League.Actually this is one of the soccer games that’s follow by millions and millions of people around the world. “El Clasico” that’s the name the press gave to this match that gets everybody’s attention all over the world.

People can’t wait to see Cristiano Ronaldo go “one on one” againts Leonel Messi, both of these world class players will be competing for to be the new top scorer in the LBBVA League.

“El Clasico” will be on Saturday Dec. 10th at one the greatest soccer stages “El Santiago Bernabeu.”

The gloves came off, and there were fireworks in Homestead Sunday as a new champion was crowned.  There would be a new champion this year no question about it because “Old Five Time,” Jimmie Johnson, is back in seventh position in the standing and has no shot at winning the title for his sixth consecutive time, albeit it was an incredible feat to perform and win five consecutive titles from 2006 to 2010.

Carl Edwards has won only one race as he beat Tony Stewart on a late pit stop in Las Vegas in early March, and he has led the points for the majority of the season.  If Carl can keep Stewart in his rear view mirror, then he wins his first championship in his Sprint Cup history.

Meanwhile Stewart has won now four of the nine races heading into Homestead and the points stayed at a differential by three points with Edwards out front.

Heading into Homestead, Edwards was able to earn the pole position and Stewart was able to earn the fifteenth position with some early race troubles.  Stewart had grill damage from an unknown cause, and was put back at the back of the pack early in the going, but a caution due to rain led to a red flag that lasted almost an hour.

After the red flag, the sun was setting and nighttime was upon the drivers and the fans.  Tony Stewart restarted in the top ten along with Carl Edwards, but Stewart’s car was over powering every other car on the race track, putting the 14 car up front and getting bonus points.

Stewart was being put back on pit stops later in the race, giving Edwards a chance to lead the race and get bonus points. Edwards’ time of leading was short because Tony Stewart passed Edwards and Stewart started to lead again for the rest of the race to win his fifth race out of the ten Chase races.  The points were tied at the end of the race and the tie-breaker was based on how many wins a driver has.  Therefore, Stewart stole the championship from Edwards by a four win differential.

According to swim coach Andy Stewart, the swim team attends 1 of 4 meets held by T.I.S.C.A that showcase elite swimmers from around the state.

“The requirements for Saturday’s meet had the fastest standards in the state,” Stewart said. “The difference in qualifying (for TISCA) is that the time standards are much tougher in individual events.”

Johnson and Humphreys can attest to facing fierce individual competition at Saturday’s meet.

“It means a lot to me to say that I made it far enough to be in the finals,” Johnson said. “In the finals, Sophia and I competed against some of the best in the state, and that is an honor to say.”

Johnson placed 15th at preliminaries, making it to the consultation finals. Humphreys placed 2nd in the 200 meter Individual medley and 9th in the 100 meter butterfly stroke at preliminaries.

“The top 16 swimmers from the preliminaries go to the finals the second day.  Places 1-8 are in the finals, 9-16 are in the consultation finals,” Stewart said.

During the finals, Humphreys broke the LHS record in the 200 IM.

“It felt  great to achieve one of my goals. Breaking this record was one of many goals that I wish to accomplish this season,”Humphreys said.

The record was held previously by Rebecca Osborn with a time of 2: 16.11. Humphreys’ time was 2:12.15. Coach Stewart is confident that the record won’t last long until Humphreys breaks it again.

“She not only broke the record; she crushed it, to do that in the middle of the season, unrested, unshaved is almost freakish,” Stewart said. “She’s put in hundreds of hours of training and hundreds of miles of swimming, so it’s cool to see that all pay off.”

The team still has small meets scheduled in the season and district to prepare for.

“Up next is a dual meet in Longview, hopefully followed by lots of victories and broken records,” Johnson said.

These two teams had a competitive battle throughout the whole tournament to have a third cup in their trophy case and nothing was going to get in their way. Houston’s star players were Brian Ching and  Geoff Cameron, but it was no match for LA Galaxy’s team star players David Beckham and the player of the game midfielder Landon Donovan.

Houston had one shot on goal from Danny Cruz which were deflected by Josh Saunders, but Landon had two shots on goal. Out of those two, one of Landon’s shots was not deflected by Dynamo’s goalie Tally Hall. Landon scored the goal on the 72nd minute from assistant passes from Beckham and Robbie Keane. This was the only goal scored throughout the match which ended a win and another cup for LA Galaxy’s team defeated the Houston Dynamo with their a standing of  67 points of 19 wins, 10 draws, and 5 loses.

That’s what people say when they want to convey something is easy. It also is a term used often by  Lufkin defensive lineman Demontrai Lewis.

After Demontrai sacks the opposing team’s quarterback, he signals with his hands as though slicing through cake. In fact, Demontrai signs other things to the coaches, as well as anyone else and has been doing so since learning sign language after being hearing impaired at an early age.

Another reason for the “slicing of cake” is directed toward defensive line coach Brooke Stafford whose wife will bake the sophomore a cake following a good performance on the field.

And Demontrai has had a cake 10 of the 11 games played this year which doesn’t effect his performance, even at practices.

“Demontrai always comes to practice with a good attitude,” Stafford said. “I am very proud on how he has been playing, the boy loves football.”

According to Stafford, Demontrai has improved a lot this year, but there is still some stuff that he can work on.

“He has been doing really good,” Stafford said. “There is always something you can work on, but he has turned out to be a really good football player.”

According to Coach Stafford, it is not hard to coach a hearing impaired football player. The only time it is a problem is when he is trying to yell at him across the field.

Stafford sometimes forgets Demontrai is hearing impaired, but it is only when he is yelling at him or trying to speak to him.

“Whenever he is out on the field and you’re trying to yell and tell him something, you sometimes forget he can’t hear.” Stafford said.

Head Coach John Outlaw also said he enjoys having Demontrai on his team and as a part of his life.

“It is an absolute joy everyday to have him on my team and to see him with a smile on his face,” Outlaw said.

According to Outlaw, he and Demontrai are very close and feels no different than he does for any other kid and notes the only difference being Demontrai’s smiles.

“The feeling is no different when the boy succeeds as it is for any other child out there on that field,” Outlaw said. “Demontrai at least smiles, the others just talk.”

When Demontrai graduates and leaves, it is going to be different for Outlaw, but he will always have those great memories with Demontrai.

“It will be different when he leaves, but one thing is you will always have someone to replace him,” Outlaw said. “I will always have our great memories that we made.”

Just like everyone else, Outlaw learns from Demontrai who has shown not to find excuses.

“Everybody can learn something from Demontrai,” Outlaw said. “He proves that you can overcome any obsticle in life if you choose to and he chooses to.”

Demontrai said he does anything he wants without limits, and that includes playing football and other sports, but added that it is football that he most loves.

“I always played football, basketball and baseball growing up,” Demontrai said. “Any sport I wanted to play I could because I had no limits.”

D-1 colleges have started to look at Demontrai, but said he is focused on the attention.

“It does not scare me,” he said. “I’m not worried about that right now. All I want to be is successful for the team and with the team at high school.”

The fans go crazy on Friday nights when Demontrai sacks the quarterback or does something good. It makes Demontrai feel like a star on the field when he knows all of the attention he gets from students, faculty, and residents is all for him.

“It feels good that they are all paying attention to me, it makes me feel as if I am the star person,” Demontrai said.

According to Demontrai, he takes his grades, class, and the work he does on the field very seriously.

Demontrai knows that he will go to college like the rest of his family because he cannot let them down and wants to follow their examples of chasing a dream, and his dream is to play in the NFL.

“Well when I was six,all of my family had gone to college so I knew I would go as well,” Demontrai said. “One day my dream to play in the NFL will come true.”

René Heintschel, Demontrai’s interputer, wishes that after Lewis graduates that somewhere down the road she will be able to sign for him again, but if not, she really hopes they will never lose touch.

“The boy is like my own child to me,” she admits, “and when he succeeds, my heart burst and I get so excited. I will be very devastated and so lost after Demontrai leaves. I will sign for someone else, but it will never be the same.”

René Heintschel has been with Demontrai since he was 3 years old. She did not start signing for him until he was at Brookhollow Elementary School.

She said the deaf ed music class had just came in from music time and she just started signing with Demontrai. The inturpeter at the time Shela Stoddard told her they were looking for a new inturpeter and they wanted her for the job. René turned down the job three times until she finally took it.

“I managed restaurants before, the money was good, but it felt like something was missing,” Heintschel said. “I sarted to substitute at Brookhollow one day when I was the deaf ed music class came in and I started signing for Demontrai. Mrs.Stoddard told me they were looking for a new interputer, and she wanted me for the job. I turned the job down three times because I never thought I could do it. Soon it felt like God was throwing this at me to do it so I took the job.”

When Heintschel was little she would pray at night and ask God why he made her mom deaf. She soon realized it was because she would soon help out with deaf kids in her future.

Heintschel loves to watch Demontrai play because she can learn from Demontrai and it is absolutley amazing to her when he makes an outstanding tackle behind the line of scrimmage.

“Seeing Demontrai out on the field playing is an amazing experience because I can learn so much from him and pick up everything, it is awesome.” Heintschel said.

Heintschel believes that in the future Demontrai will be able to play for the NFL.

“The boy has no limits, he has the drive and determination and wheel power to go as far as he wants to go,” Heintschel said. “I have faith in him that he will be in the NFL.”

One of  Demontrai’s defensive lineman friends is Corey Clark.

“I have been friends with Demontrai for a little over two years,” Clark said. “It is great and fun to watch Demontrai play and to be out there on the field with him.”

Clark said he learns a lot from Demontrai during practices and during games.

“It is great and fun to watch him make plays and breath taking to see some of the stuff he does out there on the field,” Clark said.

Clark said the two have learned to grown close enough to understand what each one is saying, sometimes with a little help.

“It is not hard to hold a conversation with Demontrai,” Clark said. “He always figures out what we are saying even without Mrs.H. After a while, it gets easier because he reads our lips.”

Clark treats Demontrai the same as all his other friends because he is just like an ordinary person who just has hearing problem.

“I treat him just like all my other friends,” Clark said. “There is nothing wrong with him. He is an ordinary person and there is no reason to treat him any different.”

Students, swim alumni, and family members were all in attendance to support the team. The stands were full and the facility itself was packed with other swimmers and teams, in total there were 13 teams at the meet.

Both the Lufkin swim girl’s and boy’s teams placed 3rd overall. If anything, the entire team was supportive of their fellow team mates, during every race swimmers could be seen encouraging and cheering on other Lufkin swimmers at the end of the swim lanes. Overall, it was a great supportive and exciting atmosphere.

“It was exciting and bitter sweet because it’s the seniors last invitational”, junior Sophia Humphreys said. “It went well, most people dropped time and everyone did well.”

Senior Dylan Johnson agrees with Humphreys in that the entire team did well considering that it was still early in the season. Johnson felt that his individual performance was not satisfactory enough for himself, but admitted that he couldn’t complain. Johnson remains hopeful on his outlook of the entire team for the rest of the season.

“ The team’s expectations of themselves are high driving them to push themselves to the limit each time they enter the water,” Johnson said. “I’m so proud to be apart of this team.”

Both the girl’s and boy’s teams performed well and swam fast, junior Julian Williams had to overcome an obstacle of his own while swimming.

“The meet went well. Individually,”  he said, “I feel that I did okay, considering my left shoulder was injured. I did my best”

Lufkin swim coach Andy Stewart thought his team performed pretty well and considers them at a good place in the season for this year.

“ They seemed mentally well prepared and I saw some good racing at this meet,” Stewart said. “There were some places where we could improve, but of course there’s always room for improvement.”

Up next for selected swimmers is the TISCA swim meet, where only those who qualify can attend and swim at the Conroe I.S.D. Natatorium against other Texas swim teams.

“I’m definitely looking forward to this weekend’s TISCA meet,” Humphreys said. “I’m ready to kick some butt.”