Tuesday Night Lights: Hunting Bucs
By Wade Kwon
Guns! Intrigue! Drills (running, not power)! Snooze.
What if they started the state playoffs, and no one really cared? Apparently, the Hoover Bucs are going through the motions, but surely that would make for another exciting installment of “Two-a-Days”? Right?
Oh, shoot. The hunt for another trophy is on.
The Playoff T-shirt of Destiny™
Highlights from episode 5, season 2 of the MTV reality series …
Slip me up, slip me down: Charlie continues to be haunted by his last report card, with a 69 in English. Teammate Mark? A 93. A scholar and an athlete.
During an algebra quiz, Charlie unsuccessfully tries to pry answers from neighboring students.
Charlie admits to his older sister Sara, visiting from the University of Alabama, that he hid his report card. And like any loving sib, she busts his chops.
Sara: “Dude, you do know that they don’t let you go to college just to hang out, right? You had to take Spanish I twice.”
Charlie (indignantly): “That’s another language.”
Sara (looking at report card): “Dude! You have a 69 in English. It’s the language you speak! Dad’s gonna kill you.”
Really! Dude!
My brother is a dumbass.
Ballcap for now, wizard’s hat for later.
Later, Charlie and his dad Rick cut into a pie at the dinner table. Dad asks about the missing report card, and eventually, Charlie ’fesses up. Pie time is ruined.
Charlie: “There was one slip-up.”
Dad: “You mean a slip-down?” (Zing!)
But Dad is in a forgiving mood, and gives a really nice (yet dull) speech about Charlie needing to work as hard at academics as he does at football. He’ll show ’em, and he’ll beat that snooty rodent Algernon at the maze, too!
My son is a dumbass.
Prey day: Mark’s other love, besides football and Brittany? “I’ve been hunting since third grade. If I wasn’t playing football right now, I’d be spending all my time deer huntin’ in a tree stand, and just getting fatter and fatter and lazier and lazier.”
Guns ’n’ poses.
They try on gear at the sporting goods megastore, as Mark talks about Brittany’s first kill, a perfect shot on her first try.
The day after the big game, the pair head to the woods to hole up in a stand, with rifles and camcorder in tow. They talk about how they love spending time together, and that they’re best friends. No, no, shoot me.
Cute.
Cuter.
Cutest!!
Downgrade to Panther: Coach Propst worries about the team, especially since they’ve seen Hoover win four straight state championships since junior high. “They’re a hard group to reach,” he says. “It seems like you’ve got to be on them every second to get them to do anything.”
Practice runs long, as he has them repeat drills while the players resist.
Not.
Impressed.
The first playoff game against the Pell City Panthers takes place on home turf. (The show skipped the last regular season game, a 37-7 win against Theodore, for the record.) And it’s a massacre — Pell City plays like a deer caught in the camera lights.
The radio announcers for Pell City declare that if Hoover was “classy,” it would take a knee on the final drive before the half.
Hoover throws for a touchdown, making it 41-0. One announcer calls Propst “a jerk.” Classy!
The final … 44-0.
All right! Shutout Five!
“Two-a-Days” airs at 9 p.m. Tuesdays on MTV, repeating throughout the week and available for free online.
Previously: Propst chases his 100th victory.
And next: Ross picks a school; a foot-brawl at the Thompson game.
Also:
- Enter to win a season 1 DVD set
- Buy this episode or the entire season.
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Dude, more “Two-a-Days.”
