My son played football yesterday in a battle of the undefeated teams. His Rams have gone 2+ seasons undefeated, and their opponents are always one of their strongest competitors. The Mustangs started strong, getting back to back to back first downs, culminating in a TD. They added another a while later, which the Rams answered. They swapped another pair of TDs and each team threatened a couple more times.

Late in the 3rd quarter, the Rams were receiving a kick-off. Cochrane caught it deep in their end, and started running, a Mustang player in hot pursuit. Jones laid a hit on the defender - hard - and the kid dropped and stayed down. It was a clean hit - they appeared to knock helmets.

There was a long delay of the game while the ambulance was called, and the player was taken to hospital. Rumour had it that he had a concussion 2 weeks ago, but that's unconfirmed.

We got an e-mail from the other coach:

Ron, thank you for asking about our player. He was home resting last night with a sore neck but no serious injury. He will be out for 2-3 weeks but will be back playing.

He lay motionless on the field for a good 5 minutes at least... and he has a sore neck?

This is the 3rd game in a row where players have been taken to the hospital. Last week it was 2 of our guys (one with concussion #5 - he's 14) and the week before it was 2 Nanaimo players, one with a leg/ankle injury the other with a concussion (I believe).

Our kids wear concussion helmets - all of them - but I can tell you.... if my son had a couple of concussions by now, we'd be seriously rethinking what sports he'd be playing.

Oh yeah... the game ended in a 35-28 win for the Mustangs. But it was probably the game of the year.