A new school year is almost here, and I’ll be back where I usually am—on the sidelines with a camera.
This season will look a little different. Tiger Stadium has been renovated, new athletes are joining the teams, and another group of seniors is getting ready for its final year.
Before all of that starts, I wanted to take one more look back at last season and explain what I hope to photograph in the year ahead.
Looking Back Before Looking Ahead
High school sports change quickly.
Seniors graduate. Freshmen arrive. Rosters turn over, and teams start again. By August, everyone is focused on the next season.
But the previous year does not disappear that quickly.
Earlier this year, I published 25 Frames, One School Year on the Sidelines. I selected 25 photographs from roughly 25,000 images published during 168 Twinsburg athletic events.
The photographs were not necessarily the 25 biggest plays.
Some were action shots. Others showed celebrations, disappointment, exhaustion, friendships, or the few seconds after a season ended.
Choosing the photographs was harder than I expected. Finding 25 good images was not the problem. The problem was finding 25 that felt like the year when they were placed together.
One image might show the intensity of competition. Another might show the relief that follows a difficult finish. A celebration can communicate months of preparation in a single frame. A quiet photograph after the final home game can say more about the meaning of a season than the scoreboard ever could.
Taken together, the photographs form a visual history of the school year—one that belongs not only to the athletes, but also to their families, coaches, classmates, alumni, and the broader Twinsburg community.
The numbers show how much ground was covered:
| Athletic events photographed | 168 |
| Published photographs | Approximately 25,000 |
| Selected year-end photographs | 25 |
Every event added another piece to the record of the school year.
That is really what these galleries have become. They are not just collections of sports photographs. They are a record of the athletes, teams, families, coaches, and people who were there.
Meet the Photographer
For those who do not know me, my name is T.J. Powell.
I have been photographing Twinsburg High School sports for more than a decade. What started as an interest in sports photography gradually turned into something much larger.
Over the years, I have photographed football, soccer, basketball, wrestling, volleyball, track, cross-country, baseball, softball, and plenty of other events.
I enjoy photographing the big moments. A game-winning score, a diving save, a close finish, or a championship celebration will always make a strong picture.
But those are not always the photographs people care about most.
Sometimes it is a coach talking to an athlete after a mistake. Sometimes it is teammates laughing before the game, parents reacting in the stands, or a senior standing alone for a few seconds after the final home game.
Those moments are easy to overlook while they are happening. A few years later, they can mean more than the final score.
If you see me at a game this year, stop and say hello. Meeting the athletes, families, coaches, alumni, and supporters has become one of the best parts of doing this.
Tiger Stadium Will Look Different
The renovated Tiger Stadium will be one of the biggest changes this year.
Work completed during the summer included a new synthetic turf field, a new track surface, updated fencing, pavement work, electrical improvements, new goalposts, and other upgrades around the facility.
It will be a better setting for football, soccer, track and field, marching band, and the other school and community events held there.
It will also change how the stadium looks in photographs.
I have covered a lot of events there, and the old field, track, fences, and backgrounds became familiar. Looking through earlier galleries now, I realize those photographs also show a version of Tiger Stadium that is gone.
That is something photography does whether you plan for it or not. A picture made for an athlete or family today eventually becomes a record of what the school and community looked like at that time.
The first events in the renovated stadium will start a new part of that record.
The Season Ahead
By early August, the break between school years is already ending.
Practices begin. Parking lots fill up again. Athletes return to the fields, courts, courses, and weight rooms. Coaches start putting their teams together.
Football returns under the lights on August 21, but the season will already be underway by then.
Boys soccer and girls soccer will be underway. Volleyball, cross-country, cheerleading, marching band, and the rest of the fall schedule will not be far behind.
Every team begins the year in a different position.
Some bring back experienced groups. Others are replacing seniors who played major roles. Freshmen are adjusting to high school competition, while seniors know they are starting their final season.
That is why one season never looks exactly like another, even when the uniforms, fields, and traditions stay the same.
The Moments I Will Be Looking For
This fall I’ll be looking for…
- The first celebration of a new season.
- Teammates supporting one another after a difficult moment.
- A coach recognizing that a player has finally understood something practiced for weeks.
- Parents and classmates reacting from the stands.
- Seniors realizing that a home game or meet is their last.
- The expressions that appear immediately after a dramatic finish.
- The quiet moments that reveal what being part of a team really means.
- The quiet conversations after the final whistle.
These moments do not always receive attention in a game recap. They may not appear in a box score, and they are rarely planned. But they often become the photographs that carry the most meaning after the season is over.
More Than the Final Score
Sports are measured by numbers. Wins, losses, records, rankings, statistics, and championships all matter.
But they are not the whole experience.
Years later, most athletes will not remember every score. They may remember a teammate who picked them up after a mistake, the bus ride home after a big win, the noise before a rivalry game, or what it felt like to put on a Twinsburg uniform.
Parents will remember watching their children change over four years. Coaches will remember the athletes who grew into leaders. Students will remember the band, the student section, and Friday nights at the stadium.
Photographs give people a way to go back to those moments.
That is why I keep doing this. The goal is not just to make good action photographs. It is to document the people and the experiences that make up a season.
Follow the Season
Throughout the 2026–2027 school year, galleries will be published from as many Twinsburg athletic events as possible. The following pages provide the simplest ways to follow the season:
Whether you’re an athlete, parent, grandparent, coach, alumnus, or simply a Tigers fan, I hope these galleries become a place where you can revisit the moments that make each season memorable.
See You on the Sidelines
Last year included 168 events and approximately 25,000 published photographs.
Now it starts over.
New teams. New seniors. New athletes wearing blue and white for the first time. A renovated stadium and a full school year ahead.
I’ll be back on the sidelines, camera in hand, trying to catch the big plays and everything happening around them.
See you out there.
Go Tigers!
T.J. Powell | Blog 