Thirty years ago, in 1983, a team for the ages played high school football here in Texas. That team is the 1983 Daingerfield Tigers. In 16 games, the Blue and White gave up eight, thats right, EIGHT points all season. A reliable source, also known as my cousins husband said that Carthage, a Class 4A semi-finalist, scored the only touchdown. The safety came on a snap over the punters head against Kilgore. Daingerfield is not quite as isolated as Center, Texas. Roughly speaking, its about halfway in-between Longview and Texarkana At the time, my mother taught in the Post Independent School District. That season, Post reached the semi-finals and played Daingerfield. On the first play from scrimmage, Post quarterback Joel Kirkpatrick rolled out and completed a pass for a first down. On the next play, fullback Tracy Price fumbled the ball away to Daingerfield and the Tigers didnt stop until they had a 42-0 victory in hand. Now, 42-0 is a pretty bad beating, but Post most likely felt better after Daingerfield bested Sweeney, 42-0 the next week to win the Class 3A state championship. That Christmas, like several Christmases before that, part of the day was spent at my uncle and aunts house in Kilgore, Texas. We, with my grandmother, would go from Paris, Texas to Kilgore and back. On the way back, Dad asked me if I would like to go through Daingerfield, which wasnt that much out of the way. I said I did and we saw the stadium. I also noticed a sign shoe-polished on a window that read: Our defense dominates; Our offense is awesome. It just so happened that one of the stalwarts on that team, Eric Everett, came to Texas Tech. I interviewed him and wrote a story about him for my reporting class. My professor suggested I send it to his hometown newspaper and they would probably print it. The newspaper in Daingerfield at the time was called The Steel Country Bee. I sent it on and, sure enough, they did run it. The headline above the story said: Journalist recalls glory days of Tigers state champs. That was the first story Id written that was published in a newspaper. Thanks for listening and God bless.
Posted on: Tue, 19 Nov 2013 18:04:08 +0000
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