By John Loop

Sports Writer

Friday nights in Texas are not complete without a high scoring battle between two tough football teams. The crowd goes crazy, the bands play fervently, and the cheerleaders encourage the team to stay pumped.

But with last year’s pricey acquisition of a new high-definition scoreboard, Coppell High School’s huge fan base has had so much more to cheer about.

The hefty purchase of a cutting edge piece of technology didn’t come easily for the Coppell Independent School District. But the deal went through and the old scoreboard was removed, already beyond repair.

Once the purchase had been confirmed, students part of KCBY, Coppell High School’s award-winning student television network, including senior Mason Adams, were told that they would be employed by the school district to run the board under the Friday night lights for fifty dollars per game.

“Mrs. K (Irma Kennedy, KCBY Advisor) emailed a group of us, saying ‘I need some of the best guys to do this” Adams said. “I accepted the offer because I was interested in that kind of stuff.”

Before the first home game, the crew went through a three-day workshop, conducted by Daktronics, the company who built and installed the board.

The first game ran quite smoothly, aside from a small hiccup with the 200-foot long chord that connects the on-field cameras to the board’s live feed.

The board, in its first full year of use, was dubbed a success. This year, the sports crew for KCBY put together an intro video to pump up the crowd before the action.

“I would give the first year a B-plus,” Adams said. “We knew it was going to be something where we would have to do a lot of learning on the fly, but I honestly think we have gotten a lot more comfortable with the equipment and the board itself.”

Most students only see what happens at the games, but the long preparation time for the video board crew is what makes the magic happen visually.

“We set up all of the cameras and tri-pods starting right after school”, Adams said. “We test all of the new graphics and video clips we’ve received or created throughout the week. We do not leave school on Fridays until after the game is over.”

Although the crew is running frantically alongside the field to get the best shots of the players and touchdowns, no one is more stressed than senior Davis DeLoach, who operates the board from a small control room at the top of the press box.

“The control room is very busy, and as the director I have to focus on several things at once.” DeLoach said. “My most important job is running the switcher, I have to select which camera angle I want, then cue the camera, and then switch to it. I also have to oversee the graphics, and tell the graphics manager which graphics to put up and when. As long as things are going well, I don’t really get stressed at all.”

The level of stress doubles especially when the Cowboys play in a big game, like the thrilling overtime victory over the area’s top ranked team, the Allen Eagles.

Most of the crew was filled with completely new bodies. Adams, along with fellow seniors and regular crew members Eric Park and Adam Borel were in Austin to capture the Texas Association of School Administrators (TASA) performance put on by the theatre and choir departments of CHS.

Amongst the fill-ins were juniors Logan Farthing, Keith Kellenberger and Trevor Stiff, as well as sophomore Michael Butzer.

After senior wide receiver Cameron Smith scored the game-clinching touchdown in overtime, DeLoach and the rest of the crew breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

“I was really worried that it would be a complete disaster, but I was pleasantly surprised with the job that the new crew was able to do,” DeLoach said. “The game itself was so nerve-wrecking that everyone in the booth was really tense during overtime. Once (senior quarterback) Colby Mahon connected with [Cameron] for the game-winning touchdown, we all jumped up, and were high five-ing, but we quickly sat back down realizing that we had a job to do.”

Most of the team was caught up in the celebrations, but quickly realized that, like DeLoach, their job was not over for the night.

“I kept asking them, ‘should I put the We Won! graphic up?’,” junior Keith Kellenberger said after the Cowboy victory on September 28. “In the end, I just put it up myself.”

As the fans rushed the field, a field camera got broken. All of this equipment is state-of-the-art, so there is quite a large cost for repairs and maintenance.

Because of the updated technology, the new video board has expanded the role of spectators at every home game.

“I think you definitely get to see more of the game itself,” Adams said. “With the other board, you did not have the instant replay capability we have with the new board, it is really cool to put the big plays on the screen and hear the crowd’s reaction.”