Big Crowd, Scrimmages Highlight Warrior Day

Thompson celebrated it's annual Warrior Day Saturday, August 10th to showcase the football teams, the band, and the cheerleaders who are sure to make the Fall season a memorable one for the Warrior faithful. The event marked two weeks until the beginning of the Warriors’ 2019 football season as the team looks to follow up one of the best runs in school history and their furthest foray since moving to Class 7A five years ago.

Over a thousand fans filled the home side of the stadium and cheered as the varsity ran onto the field for stretching and drills. The team donned helmets with shirts and shorts as they went through their routine. The main idea of the day, Head Coach Mark Freeman explained, was for the squad get used to typical game day preparation as the season. Freeman was quick to point out what the support of the fans means to the program and how it feeds back into the lives of the students-athletes.

The support from the crowd is huge, we have great support, but tickled for everybody who was involved and it was a great day and I️ appreciate everyone who was able to come out and support it.”

“We have some good home games coming up and the revenue produced from those games is predominantly what we use to provide for our kids. The food and nutrition and video and everything else that we do are supported by our home crowd and Warrior Day is a big part of that as well,” said Freeman.

The band took the field as the varsity concluded their practice and treated the home crowd to a series of tunes the student-musicians had been working on during the summer months. If the performance is any indication, Warrior Stadium will be a raucous atmosphere as the team hosts 7A powers Hoover, Mountain Brook and Foley this Fall.

Thompson’s cheerleaders also performed several routines in between the action on the field along with their work during the scrimmages.

Alabaster City Schools’ Superintendent Wayne Vickers was pleased with the event and proud of the many people who worked to put it on.

“We want to thank everyone involved who’s made Warrior Day such a positive experience for our community. You know this is a city-wide event and we had a crowd here at 10 AM to see the varsity and got a chance to hear our Marching Southern Sounds who did a fabulous job, our cheerleaders have been here all day doing an amazing job. Just want to thank our community for coming out and making this a special day for the city of Alabaster and Alabaster City Schools.”

The middle school, freshmen and youth team scrimmages rounded out the day and set the stage for the Go Gold Bowl on August 24 where Thompson will host a doubleheader at Warrior Stadium to help raise support for Children’s Hospital of Alabama and the Elaine Roberts Foundation.

Thompson Athletic Director Vincent Pitts talked about the much-anticipated event and the chance it gives Thompson to further their community outreach.

“Well most importantly it’s an opportunity to help people,” said Pitts. “We appreciate the partnership with the Warrior Foundation and our presenting sponsor Full Moon BBQ and we’re excited to welcome Clay-Chalkville, Dothan and Davidson to Alabaster and it should be a day of great football. Excited about that, but more excited for the opportunity to help people.”

Clay-Chalkville and Dothan will square off in game one of the doubleheader at 3:30pm with Thompson and Davidson kicking off at 7pm.