LH Today is excited to introduce Paige Mabry to our readers.

Paige is a senior at Lake Highlands High School and will be interning with us through RISD’s Professional Internship Program for the fall semester.

Paige will be writing special interest articles, sports articles and working in both the booth and on the sidelines as part of our LIVE Game Day Broadcast Team.

“Paige’s Play by Play” will be a weekly feature and will track the activities of senior Wildcat football team captain and starting defensive lineman, Tré Stewart.

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Paige's Play-by-Play:

Tré Stewart is a team captain and second year starter for the Lake Highlands Wildcat football team.

Tré will be joining me each week for his take on the ‘Cats performance from the previous week and perhaps offering his perspective on a few other topics of interest.

While he might be known for his play on the football field, like many athletes at Lake Highlands High School, Tré excels in the classroom as well.

He is padded down with AP classes, regularly attends Young Life, is leader in FCA, a mentor to the 8th graders at LHJH and participates in church activities at Greater Cornerstone Baptist Church.

Back to football.

As many know, a defensive lineman’s job is to cover, penetrate, and tackle. Most d-lineman are pretty big in stature. They have to be in order to handle the constant beating they take from the rather large offensive lineman.

What makes Tré so special is he gets the job done even though he probably considered a bit small for the position he plays.

“Being smaller doesn’t really bother me,” Tré said. “I get to practice everyday with Scott Hanks and Jeffery Gerbara who both are all district players.”

“They are pretty big guys and most of the opponent’s lineman I’ve faced can’t compare,” he says with a huge smile.

As we continued to talk about football, we spoke about the challenges and advantages the Lake Highlands Wildcat team has this season.

As Tré explained, "Football is a brotherhood." Not only does being on the team give you a close family, but it puts other lives in perspective.

“There are so many backgrounds of all the players,” Tré said. “When someone needs support or advice there is plenty of it because everyone on the team has been through something.”

That bond between Wildcat teammates was certainly evident last week in the season opener against Mesquite.

While the Widcats won the game, 49-38, a loss was still felt by the team, giving the 'Cats an early season wake-up call.

Late in the 2nd quarter, starting senior linebacker Roderick Mackey went down with a knee injury. That status of his injury is unknown but initial reports varied from a strain to a career ending ACL tear.

“Losing Mackey was a wake-up call,” Tré said solemnly. “He isn’t just a good football player, he is a team leader. He is very valuable to the team for a lot of reasons.”

“What his injury did do for all of us was provide immediate, important and necessary perspective,” Tré continued. “Everyone needs to play like it’s the last play of your career. You never know when it could all end.”

Up next: Mesquite Horn. The Jaguars took the ‘Cats to task last year so it’s pay back time.

GO ‘CATS!