Stump using summer to recharge for fall
Fresh off a vacation in the Smoky Mountains, where the temperatures hovered around a very pleasant 79 degrees, Atascocita coach Craig Stump took some time to reflect on the South Texas Bowl.
Stump led the East to a 13-10 win over the West in his first all-star game as a coach.
“It was a lot of fun,” Stump said.
“It was done really well. They called back in February or March and asked if we’d be interested in doing it and we said yeah.
“We didn’t pick the rosters. They did that based on the kids who committed to play (who were all-district picks), but it was a lot of fun. The kids played really well.”
Winning made the game, a matchup of East and West all-stars at Aldine ISD’s Thorne Stadium, that much more fun.
“Our goal going into it, what I told them, was to have fun but win the game,” Stump said. “That’s how you have fun. So we wanted to win, those kids wanted to win, and they were great to work with.”
Stump hoped to work with recent Atascocita graduates Kameron Jones and Allen Smith, but neither played.
Both ended up with other obligations that took them away from the allstar exhibition.
“It would have been fun with them,” Stump said. “They would have, obviously, been able to help some of the guys with learning the plays and things like that. They might have learned them a little faster. But the guys who played still did a good job of learning what we wanted them to do.”
Jones is planning to walk on with SFA as a running back, and Smith signed with Texas A&MKingsville as a receiver.
Bellaire’s Le’Mant Monroe was Stump’s star.
The Texas Wesleyan signee returned a punt for a touchdown in the first quarter, giving the East an early 7-0 lead.
“You had three days – Wednesday, Thursday and Friday – to practice, two hours (each day),” Stump said. “Well, I guess you could have practiced as long as you wanted but it was probably 150 degrees on that turf, so we went about two hours, and we did special teams a little bit each day.
“So, what we told them was, look, they don’t get to work on covering (punts), so put some effort into it and block the guy you’re supposed to block, and you will probably have a chance to break one of these.”