Perryville Hosting Small School Tournament on Saturday

Perryville Coach Marc Tucker has admirable goals for his 7-on-7 tournament. "We hope to get this to be the biggest small school tournament in the state. We want the small schools to have a change to compete against teams on their own level."

Coach Tucker is trying to encourage teams who have been discouraged. He believes many small schools don't play 7-on-7 or don't play it much because most tournaments will be filled with teams from all different classifications all the way up to 7A. His desire is to provide a place where those teams can come and compete without worrying about being embarrassed.

This same idea was first conceived by Coach Marc Davis and Tommy Gilleran at Fountain Lake when their tournament had grown to the point where they had to solve the problem of keeping the likes of Springdale and Fayetteville from coming and feasting on teams like themselves and Dierks. They separated their tournament into a large school and small school division. This is best for both sides as competition is better for everyone involved.

So as many of the large schools travel to Fayetteville this weekend for the VYPE tournament, many small schools can get their work in at Perryville.

Coach Tucker is still looking for 3-4 more teams to put his tournament at 12. If you are interested, you can contact him at (501) 889-2266.

The tournament currently has 8 teams: Fountain Lake, Mansfield, Two Rivers (a consolodated school of Ola, Fourche Valley, and Plainview), Des Arc, Walnut Ridge, Mountain Pine, Cutter Morning Star, and of course, Perryville. He is also waiting to hear back from a ninth team, Union Christian.

They will begin play at 9 A.M. on Saturday. They will be divided into two pools with each team playing every team from their pool. The top two teams from each pool will play in a 4-team, single-elimination tournament to crown the champion. Each game will be 20-minute running clock using popular 7-on-7 scoring rules: 6 pts for TD, 1-pt automatic or 2-pt option from the 10-yard line, 2 pts for INT.

Admission will be free. T-shirts will be provided for coaches and for the championship team. Concessions will be provided with snacks, drinks, and burgers. Water will be provided for the players. These accomodations are made possible by two sponsors: Perry County Big Star Food and Drug and TJ's Quick Stop.