{"id":14485,"date":"2012-05-10T16:55:29","date_gmt":"2012-05-10T20:55:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=14485"},"modified":"2013-07-01T09:29:53","modified_gmt":"2013-07-01T13:29:53","slug":"middleton-football-coach-wants-to-bring-back-school-spirit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=14485","title":{"rendered":"Middleton Football Coach Wants To Bring Back School Spirit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>BY LEON B. CREWS<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> Sentinel Staff Writer<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In 1971 when Howard W. Blake and G.S. Middleton ended decades of being Hillsborough County\u2019s top two African American high schools, Middleton head football coach, <strong>Alonzo Ashwood<\/strong>, was only 3.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Coach Ashwood<\/strong> grew up in Ybor City before his family moved to West Tampa, and said he feels connected to the history of both schools. \u201cI know about the history of those two programs, and I\u2019d like to see them return to the days of glory they had before desegregation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When <strong>Coach Ashwood<\/strong> arrived at Middleton in 2011, he immediately set out to recapture that spirit and glory by launching an effort called the Tiger Club.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s starting to come along fine, and I\u2019ve talked with <strong>Coach Billy Reed<\/strong> and <strong>Fred Hearns<\/strong>, as well as members of what would have been the 1972 class, <strong>Ralph Kyle<\/strong>s, <strong>Alfred Pyles<\/strong> and <strong>Ron Peterson<\/strong> just to name a few.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018I\u2019ve attended their meetings, as well as meetings with the 1959 graduating class, and all of them are excited about what we\u2019re trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Coach Ashwood<\/strong> said the group gave him some ideas on how to make things better at Middleton when it comes to school spirit.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI know when we start winning, we know the support will come. What\u2019s more important to me is how my guys are improving in the classroom.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I arrived here, there were 12 guys determined to be ineligible to play because of their grades. That number is down to 6, and I\u2019m working on getting it down to zero.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Coach Ashwood<\/strong> said right now, 10 people are members of the club, and he expects that number to go up. \u201cMy goal is to create unit within the Tiger community, and bring back some of that old school spirit.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI want the Blake-\/Middleton game to be the extravaganza it was before desegregation. I might not have been a part of that rivalry then, but I\u2019ve been told about the games at Phillips Field, and how passionate the two schools were about those contests.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Among the benefits a member of the Tiger Club gets is free admission to games, photo identification, refreshments, a tee-shirt, and much more.<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Coach Ashwood said anyone seeking more information about the Tiger Club, e-mail him at aashwood32@yahoo.com or just go on Facebook to Middleton Tigers.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BY LEON B. CREWS Sentinel Staff Writer In 1971 when Howard W. Blake and G.S. Middleton ended decades of being Hillsborough County\u2019s top two African American high schools, Middleton head football coach, Alonzo Ashwood, was only 3. Coach Ashwood grew up in Ybor City before his family moved to West Tampa, and said he feels [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14485"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14485\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}