Things you didn't know

I think the most surprising thing about this entire Tribune story is that Libertyville football players have a big screen TV in their locker room complete with an Xbox. BUt then, when you consider the JumboTron thing... well, not much fazes me anymore.

Really, Ryan Kennedy made the suggestion almost as a joke. Libertyville wanted to install an option play, to whip up formations and the blocking schemes promptly, and offensive coordinator Karl Jennrich asked his senior quarterback for ideas.

Kennedy's mind immediately fixed on the pixels of the big-screen television in the Wildcats' locker room, on a play he encountered in Purdue's virtual playbook from the video game NCAA Football '07. Jennrich has coached at Libertyville since 1972 and probably wouldn't know an Xbox from a box step, but Kennedy proffered the play anyway.

The virtually stunning result: Kennedy soon was running the play in reality. Libertyville needed an option--it just didn't figure a video-game playbook was one.

"He kind of took it and ran with it," Kennedy says of Jennrich. "I guess I just threw it out there. He liked my design--or, actually, the game's design--better than he liked his own. That's the play we're running now."

Drawing up plays in the dirt with a stick? Try the new phenomenon of drawing up plays with joysticks, as ubiquitous video games like Madden Football and NCAA Football '07 blur the boundary between simulation and real life.

Read the full story here.