Goshen High School senior lineman Landon Wilks says that he likes to taste the grass before a game. If it’s moist, it means good things for Goshen, he says. If it’s dry – it’s going to be a bit tougher.

Unfortunately for Wilks, grass wasn’t on the menu at Goshen’s “Meet the Eagles” event Friday. Instead, cheerleaders and members of the football and volleyball teams gathered with fans in the Goshen Annex to eat hamburgers, hot dogs, chips and cookies.

Head football coach Bart Snyder said the school has held some kind of event like this for at least seven years, and for four years the meal has celebrated the start of the season. The dinner was scheduled to be held after the football team’s scrimmage, but heavy rain forced the cancellation of the scrimmage.

When asked which event the players would least want to be cancelled, Snyder laughed. “They like to eat,” he said. “But seriously, they were ready for the scrimmage. It just rained forever today”

Instead of having an internal scrimmage, the Eagles will have to wait until next Friday night for a tune-up, when they participate in a jamboree game in which they will team up with Elba to face two other schools from the region.

Goshen begins its schedule on August 26 at home against Ariton at 7 p.m. They will then face Calhoun at home before going on the road to take on Luverne and Elba.

As for Wilks, he said that he was able to taste that grass before the dinner event began.

Obviously, after hours of rain, it was moist.