Welcome to the dog days of summer.
Only summertime is not an "offseason" for high school area athletes as they gear up for the start of their respective seasons — some of which begin in less than two months.
These so-called "dog days" are ones filled with vigorous effort as young athletes strive to take the next step, in effect showcasing what dedication and a relentless work ethic can accomplish. These are the days when athletes feed off criticism, harnessing the choice words of naysayers into belief.
So the more and more outsiders criticize or doubt certain championship-caliber teams, the more and more these young athletes are waiting to prove them wrong.
Take three of last year's state champions, for example. At one point — if not frequently — Tipton football, Fort Cobb-Broxton basketball and Elgin baseball all were considered "underdogs" while in pursuit of their respective state championship.
What's funny about this trio is that the "underdog" misnomer actually catalyzed all three en route to a state championship.
Haters thought Tipton couldn't play defense, but when push came to shove, the Tigers played lights out, yielding only 16 points combined in the semifinal and championship games.
Haters thought Fort Cobb-Broxton couldn't recover from losing two All-State players and knock off a bruising two-loss team in Frontier. Then the Mustangs, fresh off a four-peat, showed what championship pedigree entails and waltzed away with another Gold Ball.
Haters thought Elgin shouldn't even be in the state tournament, and Skordle polls and fans from other towns not taking the Owls seriously reflected such skepticism.
"We were supposed to go 0-2 in regionals and get beat out," Elgin's Jake Meents said. "They said we're not even supposed to be here."
But here at State the Owls were, and they weren't planning on going quietly as they knocked off two 30-win teams en route to its first baseball state title since the fall of 1969.
Tipton has now won four state championships in the past six years and will be heavy favorites for a 3-peat and five titles in seven seasons for the budding dynasty come this fall. Along with Laverne and Shattuck in Class B, the Tigers are the kings of 8-man football.
Before demolishing Timberlake and Pond Creek-Hunter by a combined score of 112-16 in the semifinals and finals to claim the Class C state championship, Tipton had a wakeup call in the quarterfinals when its scoreline with Regent Prep shook the state.
Tipton 106, Regent Prep 58.
It was a shootout for which Tipton got as much flack — for giving up 58 points — as it did praise — for eclipsing the century mark in points scored.
"We've been hearing that people don't think we can play defense," said Tipton linebacker Jeremiah Smith. "So that was our challenge coming into the game. We thought if we played great defense we could show the whole class what we're about."
Here are Tipton's final defensive statistics from the semifinal and final: eight takeaways, three defensive touchdowns and a 48.0 point margin of victory. In addition, Tipton scored 36 points off turnovers along with limiting the opposition to 1-of-6 red zone scoring offensively in the title game.
"They say defense wins championships," said soon-to-be Tipton senior defensive back SemaJ McBride, also a state long jump champion in track and field.
What coach Travis White instilled in the Tigers' defense was belief — even when outside noise closed in on their camp.
"They would ask, 'Where's the defense?' Well, the defense is pretty good," White said. " I'll go to battle with our defense any day. We're scrappy and opportunistic defensively."
When your coach believes in you like White does with his Tigers, the narrative 'Tipton can score, but can the Tigers play defense?' only added fuel to the fire.
"All that juice — from people saying our defense wasn't good and that we're only a good offensive team — lit a fire under us," said Tipton running back Dillon Schmidt, who who scored on back-to-back touchdown runs of 49 and 50 yards in the semifinal and recorded an interception in the championship. "That made us want to prove it to people so much more that we're not just an offensive football team. We can play smash mouth football on both sides of the ball."
Flash forward to the winter months when Ft. Cobb was under the gun. Gone were a pair of All-State and now college basketball players in Greyden Steinmetz and Cameron Hines which led other small school programs across the state to believe the Mustangs' dynasty would be capped at a three-peat.
But Cameron's younger brother Kellen caught fire for a breakout season and found plenty of help from talented role players, most notably a freshman in Tyson Eastwood, who played well beyond his years to hand Kellen's dad, coach Scott Hines, his seventh state championship.
"One championship is just as special as the other because each year is a new team," coach Hines said. "But this group feels a little more special because everybody doubted this group."
"I never really doubted us like others did," echoed Kellen, who dropped 31 points on 13-of-17 shooting in the Class A state championship win over Frontier. "I knew that we could win it all again. We'd just have to have the luck it takes because it definitely does take some luck. And it takes some guts to be the tougher team pulling it out."
Kellen is right, it does take a twist of luck oftentimes to be the last team standing. But having a chip on your shoulder can have an immeasurable effect on team morale and force a group to dig deeper than ever before.
"It felt better than the other three championships when we were by far the best team in the field," Ft. Cobb senior forward Luke Lewis said. "With this last one, we had to work our tails off. People were doubting us all year so this year we got after it. It was a hard year, but there was so much relief when it was over because we had proved everyone wrong when they didn't think we could do it. It's something I'll never forget."
That chip has left Kellen and his fellow Mustangs just as hungry as they vie for a fifth straight basketball state title, a feat only one other boy's program in state history has ever achieved.
"We'll be just as hungry as this year, really," said Kellen, who will be a senior closing in on the 2,000 point milestone this coming season. "I think we can do it."
Flash forward to the spring, when Elgin's baseball team completed the 'underdog' trifecta.
Elgin skipper Levi Garrett chuckled when seeing a Skordle poll that showed the Owls without a single vote in terms of chances to win their semifinal game against a 30-win Verdigris squad.
"Hey boys, they say we have a zero percent chance of winning today," Garrett said to his Owls.
"Oh, really?" the Owls replied back to their skipper with a grin.
The Owls proceeded to run-rule Verdigris, 16-1, proving how foolish it can be to declare a talented team an underdog.
"This was super exciting because we are the 'underdogs' and nobody thought we were going to win it," said Elgin second baseman Lance Bianchini, who went 3-for-3 with 5 RBIs in the semis. "That's not stopping us from reaching our goals. Our goal is to win it."
Then Elgin did just that, toppling heavily-favored Blanchard for the Class 4A state championship, 7-6.
In need of a spark against Blanchard, senior Owl Jacob Dawson drew on the fiery Russell Westbrook's inspirational quote, "Why not?"
"Why not me?" asked Dawson. "Why not us?"
It was clear the Owls — just like the Tigers and Mustangs — were out to prove something, even when no one outside their circle believed.
"Being the underdogs coming in, nobody supported us outside the school," Dawson said. "We kept together in the dugout, we believed in ourselves and that's all that matters."
Belief is a funny thing when gathered collectively as a unit. Belief, which stems from the bond teammates share with one another, drowns out the deafening outside noise, making it irrelevant.
"Everything we've accomplished as a team has come from showing heart," said Meents, who delivered the go-ahead two-run triple in the sixth inning of the championship game.
Heart. Belief. Talent.
That was the perfect trifecta Elgin, Tipton and Ft. Cobb all displayed en route to inspiring state championships this past school year.
You can doubt teams all you want this coming school year, but let history show that you do so at your own peril — only adding fuel to the fire.
Take it from the most recently crowned champions — the Owls — who put in a nutshell what the Tigers and Mustangs also felt regarding the chip on their shoulder.
"Bring that target on us next year. We love it," Bianchini said. "We're not the underdogs anymore."
solson@swoknews.com