Walking past my winter overalls that were hanging on a clothes rack, nearly dry from the rain soaking they got the night before from having stood on the sideline in Warner last Thursday, it dawned on me that the number of football games left for me to cover this season are the fingers on one hand.

All that remains are a semifinal game next Friday, Northern State University’s final home game against Augustana next Saturday and as many as three high school championship games involving area teams we cover here at SDSportscene.com at the DakotaDome in Vermillion

I am often asked what is my favorite sport to photograph and I always say it is football, hands down. I have enjoyed watching and playing football since my single digit years. 

It started with the first youth-sized replica uniform of my future alma mater (the University of Missouri) which was a Christmas gift that cost my parents $19.95 at Western Auto. I know this because of how many times I looked at it on the shelf while my folks were off shopping elsewhere in the store. Then in my teenage years my little brother and I would play football for hours in the street with a neighbor kid down the block. 

I never played Pop Warner or on a junior or senior high team but I did have a strong enough leg to kick a ball from about 15 yards out over a power line. Not exactly Jan Stenerud or Morten Anderson but it kept me out of trouble and added to my love of the game.

In high school I started my journey in photography at the school newspaper and yearbook which gave me my chance to be on the sidelines of games that counted. Getting in for free didn’t hurt either. From then on I knew what I wanted to do.

Covering football from the sidelines keeps me close to the game and my love and understanding of the game makes me better at capturing the big moments in each contest. I don’t fully understand “Spider 2 Y Banana” but I do have a sense of a team’s tendencies and what they will do on second down and short or third down and long. 

While some of the games I have left on my schedule will be in the comfort and warmth of the DakotaDome, two will leave me at the mercy of Mother Nature. I am sure they won’t be as warm and mosquito ridden as those first games in late August. I would lay odds it will be cold out but I do hope they won’t be as damp as that last one. 

The next season on my photographic dance card will be indoors at gymnasiums filled with bouncing balls and squeaky shoes where I will be warm and dry while I work. But it isn’t the same as standing on a sideline amid the cracking pads and pageantry of a football game.

I can assure you I will savor these final games while they last.