By Duncan Nixon
Correspondent
High school football is the sport of “Friday Night Lights.” Usually, more local fans are interested in home football games than in any of the other high school sports. Here in Fluvanna baseball does get a lot of support from the community, but a good football team is still king. Before COVID, the Fluco football team made the playoffs two years in a row. Unfortunately, the past couple years have been a real downer.
This year the Fluco football team has a new coach, Mitchell Pace, and it is reported that the players are enthusiastic about his coming first season. It may be too much to ask for a winning season immediately after a winless one, but hope is always there. The Flucos have scrimmages scheduled on Aug 11 and 18. They begin the regular season with a game at Broadway High on Aug 25. That is followed by a bye week. In September they play three home games in a row. They play Chancellor High on Sept. 8, Buckingham County on Sept. 15 and then start the difficult Jefferson District play on Sept. 21 against Charlottesville. Other home games for Fluco football will be Oct. 6 against Western Albemarle, which will be the Homecoming game, Oct. 20 against Louisa County and a Senior Night game on Oct. 27 against Goochland County.
A fall sport in which the Flucos have had consistent success is volleyball. This is a girls sport here in central Virginia. There is no boys volleyball team. Volleyball is an interesting and fast-paced sport under current rules that is spectator friendly. Like the football team, the volleyball team schedule starts with two scrimmages. They play at Harrisonburg on Aug. 17 and home against Madison County on Aug. 22. The first regular season event is the Fluco’s home 16 school Faruggion tournament on Aug. 26. That event is followed by two non-conference games on Aug. 29 and Sept. 5. Their first home Jefferson District match is Sept. 14 against Albemarle High.
A co-ed sport in the fall is golf. The golf schedule needs to be front loaded due to the loss of sunlight in the afternoon once the country goes off daylight savings time. The Jefferson District year-end tournament and the region tournament are scheduled for Sept. 18 and 25. On Sept. 25, the Fluco football team is only halfway through its regular season schedule. The golf team opens its season with one of the years’ biggest events. They host the multi-school Bockman Invitational on their home course, at Lake Monticello on Aug 3. The event is named after George Bockman who was a major citizen contributor to Fluco athletics. Immediately following that tournament, on Aug. 7, they compete in the Jefferson District tournament at the Birdwood course, which is home course for UVA golf teams. The Fluco golf team then plays a series of matches against Jefferson District opponents. They play matches on Aug. 9, 15, 16, 17, 23, 28 and 30. The matches on Aug. 9, 17 and 30 are at home.
Cross country is also a sport that the Flucos have done well in. This year their season opens on Aug. 30, with their only home match of the season. They will be running against Madison County and William Monroe. The huge Ragged Mountain event follows on Sept. 5. There are six meets scheduled in Sept. but all are listed as away.
Field hockey is a fairly new sport for the Flucos and like volleyball it is a girls only sport. Internationally, men play field hockey as well. The field hockey schedule starts on Sept. 5 with an away game. On Sept. 7 the girls host Monticello High. A week later they host Albemarle and on Sept. 19 they host Western Albemarle. Not all high schools play field hockey, so the Fluco schedule includes contests against schools Fluvanna doesn’t normally schedule, such as E.C. Glass, Highland Springs and North Umberland.
Competition Cheer has two away meets this fall season. On Sept. 20 they travel to East Rockingham and on Oct. 4 to Fort Defiance.
