WHATABURGER / ETB PLAYERS OF THE WEEK IS BACK! | It’s Elle and White Oak’s Jaxsen Ludlow!

For two years now, the Whataburger / ETBlitz.com Players of the Week Awards have been the gold standard for every such award in East Texas.

In short, other outlets may have similar awards, but often imitated, never duplicated, the Whataburger / ETB Awards are the original, the standard-setter.

The awards are back, now, for the 2025-26 school year, presented by both DKT Investments-backed Whataburger throughout East Texas, and by ETBlitz.com, founded in October 2023. ETB brings fans sports in a different light, sports you care about including the surrounding elements of sports, with an outside-the-box thought process that isn’t just the same-old, same-old.

Whataburger – the standard-setter, the gold standard, in the food industry – paired with ETB in late 2023 to recognize a boy and a girl from the ETBlitz area each week of every school year who achieve a level of excellence in their sport.

In this, the announcement of the first awards of this school year, we are proud to name Kilgore High School volleyball standout Elle Litchenburg and White Oak High School quarterback Jaxsen Ludlow as the Whataburger / ETBlitz.com Players of the Week for the week of August 25-31.

Both young athletes were unanimous choices, something that has not happened often in this space. Both are also repeat winners. Litchenburg won the award during the 2024 season, and Ludlow is now a three-time winner. He won the award last year in the football season for his performance in the Roughnecks’ homecoming win over Quitman, then won again in baseball season, making him one of a growing list of athletes to win the award in more than one sport.

Both Elle and Jaxsen had to have big-time performances to win these awards – we’ll recognize some other special performances of the past week later in this story – but volleyball is regularly charged with playing multiple times in a single week.

This last week, Kilgore coach Mika Hubbard sent in six game reports from the Lady Bulldogs’ tournament run in Hawkins, and here’s what Elle managed to do.

She had 15 assists, five aces, two digs and a kill in a win over Carlisle; had 16 assists, six digs, three aces, a block and a kill in a win over Sabine; and had 22 assists, three digs, a block and an ace in a win over Jefferson, all on Thursday.

Kilgore went 1-2 on Friday. Litchenburg had 17 assists, six kills, seven digs and a block in a loss to the Tyler HEAT; she had 23 assists, 13 digs, eight kills and an ace in a loss to North Hopkins; and had 17 assists, eight digs, and three kills in a tournament-closing win over Greenville Homeschool.

And after all that, she was named to the all-tournament team.

Here at ETBlitz.com, we have Kilgore with an 18-10 overall record, and the Lady Bulldogs will visit another ETB-coverage-area program, West Rusk, on Tuesday night.

Fantastic job, Elle, on a busy week and you killed it!

On to Jaxsen Ludlow, now, who has the pressure not only of being the starting quarterback for the Roughnecks – a lot of responsibilities come with being the starting QB at any program – but also doing so with the added pressure of playing for his father, Michael, who is the ‘Necks’ head football coach and athletic director.

Well, the pressure doesn’t appear to be too much for Jaxsen.

In fact, he’s thriving under it.

“All” Ludlow did last weekend, in the Roughnecks’ season opener at Eustace, was score six times. That’s right: six touchdowns in White Oak’s 58-7 win, just a stupid-ridiculous number.

Here’s how he did it.

He threw three touchdown passes and completed 11-of-15 of his throws for 277 yards. He ran the ball eight times, eight carries, for exactly 100 yards, and scored twice (that’s five total touchdowns). And then he became a receiver, making a 1-yard touchdown catch from his younger brother, Tucker. “It was a pretty freaking cool dad-coach moment,” coach Michael Ludlow said. “(Tucker) is a sophomore and was our JV quarterback last year. We had a run call on with an RPO tag, and Tucker pulled it, and ripped it to (Jaxsen).”

The Roughnecks went on to total 461 yards of offense on just 46 snaps (316 passing, 145 rushing yards), averaging over 10 yards a snap.

White Oak will be home this Friday against Paul Pewitt.

Here is a look of great performances last week that were also considered for these awards.

BOYS

Josh Childress, quarterback, Troup: Went 12-of-18 for 250 yards and had four touchdown passes, and ran for 41 yards and another score in Troup’s 56-14 win at Shelbyville.

K.J. Edwards, running back, Carthage: Had 17 carries for 114 yards and two touchdowns in the Bulldogs’ 21-10 win at Kilgore on Friday, and also had six catches for 34 yards.

Rylan Holleman, quarterback, Overton: Went 13-of-19 for 184 yards and four touchdowns, and ran for 126 yards and a touchdown on 10 carries in Overton’s 45-0 blanking of Alba-Golden in Friday’s road game.

Tayveon Horne, running back, Gilmer: Finished with 151 yards and two touchdowns on 23 carries in the Bucks’ win at Pine Tree.

Brett Wells, running back / linebacker, Troup: On defense, had 12 tackles, one for loss, and an interception returned for a touchdown (68 yards), and on offense, had 113 yards rushing, a touchdown, and caught two passes for 22 yards and a touchdown.

Roger Attaway, running back, Pine Tree: Had 15 carries for 176 yards and a touchdown in Pine Tree’s 41-25 home loss to Gilmer Friday.

Ja’Kalen Sheffield, defensive back, Kilgore: Had 16 tackles and a forced fumble in Kilgore’s loss to Carthage.

Isaiah Watters, linebacker, Kilgore: Had 13 tackles, two for loss and a pass break-up in the Ragin’ Red’s loss to Carthage.

Levi Sipes, White Oak: Sipes had 10 tackles, three for loss, recovered two fumbles and returned one for a 92-yard touchdown, and had a pass break-up and three quarterback hurries.

Ty Langley, Arp: Returned two interceptions for touchdowns in the Tigers’ 49-0 road win at Harleton.

Gunnar Harp, wide receiver / defensive back, West Rusk: Had four catches for 32 yards, a kick return for a touchdown and an interception on defense.

Gabe Miller, running back, Overton: Had 164 yards and two touchdowns on 14 carries in the win over Alba-Golden.

GIRLS

Carly Chadwick, Pine Tree: Competing in the White Oak / Shirley Atkins Tournament, Pine Tree beat Carthage and Garrison, and lost to Pleasant Grove. In the win over Carthage, Chadwick had four kills, five digs, 11 assists, and two aces. In the win over Garrison, she had 19 assists and 10 digs, and in the loss to PG, she had 27 assists, nine digs and four kills.

Kamdyn Scott, Tatum: Playing in the Forney Tournament, Scott had nine kills and four digs in a win over Forney; she had 15 kills and five digs in a win over Naaman Forest.

Sarah Roberts, Sabine: In the Hawkins Tournament, Sabine went 2-1 on Thursday, and also went 2-1 on Friday. In three games Thursday, Roberts had 20 kills, 20 digs and two assists. On Friday, she had 19 kills, and 26 digs, two assists, and two aces.

Kellen Weaver, Beckville: Went 3-0 Friday in their own tournament over Huntington, the West Rusk junior varsity and New Diana. Weaver had nine kills, three aces, two blocks and two assists against Huntington; had six kills against West Rusk; and had 11 kills and three digs in the win over New Diana.

Kaysen Foster, Tatum: Had 10 kills in the win over Forney, and had five kills and seven digs in the win over NF.

Taydem Barker, Tatum: Had 14 assists and four digs over Forney, and 22 assists and two digs over NF.

And we’d like to take this opportunity to thank Whataburger for their faith in the ETBlitz brand, in our staff, and in our commitment to bring you the best in local sports – AND for their commitment in such great food.

Seriously: our staff spends a lot of time in Whataburger, and that’s not because it’s convenient, it’s because we love the food! Now, it IS convenient, because Whataburger is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And they serve breakfast longer than any other franchise that’s not a full-time breakfast chain. Whataburger begins serving breakfast every night at 11 p.m., and does so for 12 hours, until 11 a.m.

Whataburger has the best burgers, shakes, malts, chicken sandwiches and more. Order them in the Whataburger App, and earn points for free items, or simply order them online right here: Whataburger | Order Online with Curbside and Delivery.

And again, congratulations to Elle Litchenburg and to Jaxsen Ludlow, the first Whataburger / ETBlitz.com Players of the Week of the 2025-26 school year!