By BAKER ELLIS / Sports Editor

After a tough week for the highest ranked team in Shelby County in Oak Mountain, there is just one Shelby County team across the entire span of classifications that received a top 10 ranking in the ASWA week two polls. Calera, ranked 10^th in the preseason and ninth after week one, continued its slow crawl up the ladder, falling into place at eighth, 32 votes ahead of ninth place Mortimer Jordan. While the Eagles have been moving up slowly, there is a wide chasm in votes received between the seventh-place Russellville team and the Eagles, 34 votes to be precise.

Oak Mountain fell from fifth to 11^th after the tough opening game loss to Hillcrest-Tuscaloosa, a game in which it was without both its coach and quarterback. Both Spain Park and the Thompson Warriors also received top 10 votes at one vote apiece. Two weeks into the season, Thompson head coach Mark Freeman has already taken mammoth steps towards forgetting the debacle of 2014’s winless campaign.

The only other team to receive any votes from the ASWA in week two was resident pleasant surprise Montevallo. The Bulldogs have worn the moniker of “unluckiest team in the county” for some time now, but after starting the season with a one-point overtime win on the road and following that performance up with a sound victory over a hapless Francis Marion team to get to 2-0 on the young season. The offense has come on strong in Andrew Zow’s fourth season as the head coach, and the proof can be seen just in the first two games of the year. Montevallo played the same opponents to start 2014 as it did this year. The Bulldogs have hung 65 points on the board in two weeks. Their point total through two weeks last season, against the same teams? 9.