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Sunday, August 31, 1997

Sealy, La Marque should have historic seasons

By JAIME ARON / AP Sports Writer

DALLAS (AP) -- More than anything, the 1997 high school football season is about history.

Sealy, winner of the last three Class 3A titles, will be going for four in a row -- something no school has done since the University Interscholastic League began crowning champions in 1920.

La Marque, the last consolidated Class 4A winner and the first 4A Division II champ, will try to become the first team to rule 4A, or its equivalent, three straight years. La Marque also could become the first school to appear in fifth consecutive title games since the UIL broke into classes in 1948. The 1922-27 Waco teams were the only ones to ever pull off that feat.

With all that at stake, Sealy coach T.J. Mills and La Marque's Alan Weddell don't mind the added burden of being ranked No. 1 in their classes in The Associated Press' preseason high school football poll. The other No. 1s are Tyler John Tyler in 5A, Groveton in 2A and Tenaha in 1A.

Mills wasn't surprised to learn his team's preseason position. In fact, he would've been surprised to see anyone picked above them.

"Looking at the numbers we have back compared to everyone else, we're as good as everyone else in the state," Mills said. "So since we have three (championships), you'd almost have to give it to us."

Sealy returns 20 lettermen, including seven offensive starters and four on defense. There aren't many holes to be filled, either.

"We've got a good solid nucleus and a lot of good people," Mills said.

History says Sealy will be stopped. None of the other four schools that won three straight titles -- Waco (1925-27), Amarillo (1934-36), Abilene (1954-56) and Big Sandy (1973-75) -- even made it back to the championship game to play for No. 4.

Still, that likely won't be enough to ease the pressure on Sealy's seniors. Since they were freshmen, every 12th grade class has left as state champions. The Class of '98 doesn't want to be remembered as the ones who didn't.

"It's a shame that's the only goal you can have to determine whether you're successful or not," said Mills, whose team has won 18 straight playoff games.

"But that is the only goal we have. If we go to the finals and lose, we'll be failures."

Commerce, which came within a two-point conversion of beating Sealy for the 1995 title, is ranked second after fading to 8-3 last year. Crockett is third, followed by Vernon and La Grange. Each of the top five schools received at least one No. 1 vote.

The rest of the 2A top 10 are Daingerfield, Tatum (a 36-27 loser to Sealy in last year's championship game), Cuero, Breckenridge and George West.

While La Marque is on as impressive a streak as Sealy, Weddell doesn't take anything for granted -- not even with 14 first-place votes from the AP panel of 20 sports writers and broadcasters and 188 of 200 possible ballot points, both tops in the preseason survey.

A self-described "student of traditions, history and streaks," he is somewhat awed that his team could join Sealy and the others as three-peat champions or could be the first team to reach five straight title games since Waco played in six straight from 1922-27.

"My point is how difficult it is because of all the great teams that have come and gone in the last 60 years and only a few have won three in a row," Weddell said. "Then you look at all the great teams that have been in the playoffs and none have been to the finals five years in a row. ... It's amazing."

Defense has been the backbone to La Marque's four-year run. This year, though, it should be the offense's turn to lead the way.

"If we're going to uphold our No. 1 ranking, we're going to have to find a defense," Weddell said. "We've also got to find a kicker because the last two years, we've kicked a field goal in December to help put us in the state championship game."

La Marque's only losses in 1993 and 1994 were to Stephenville in the championship games. The 1995 title team went 16-0.

So there was obvious reason for panic last year when the Cougars were shut out (albeit by John Tyler) in week four, then fell to Lamar Consolidated in week nine. La Marque hadn't lost two regular-season games since 1990.

Weddell, though, thinks that dose of reality went a long way.

"It shook us up and it made us a better team," Weddell said. "I've never said that in 25 years of coaching, but we would not have won (the title) if we hadn't lost to Lamar Consolidated."

This year's stiffest competition could come from their closest foe: Texas City. The Stingarees came in second, followed by Denison, Waxahachie and Stephenville. Sweetwater was sixth, Brownwood and Corpus Christi Calallen tied for seventh, Corsicana came in ninth and Highland Park 10th.

Defending 4A Division I champion Grapevine tied Lubbock Estacado for 13th.

Voters weren't too high on several other defending champions.

Austin Westlake, the 5A Division II winner, came in third and 5A Division I champion Lewisville is fifth.

Iraan, the surprise 2A winner last year, came in 11th, but that's understandable considering coach Larry Hanna and his talented son, Robin, are now at 3A Monahans.

Windthorst, which went 15-0 in winning the 1A crown, sank to No. 10.

Instead of leaving last year's champions on top until they get knocked off, the top spots went to perennial powers who had good records last year and return many key players.

"We've had fairly good teams the last three, four years and with all the kids coming back (eight starters on offense, seven on defense, I guess they figure we'll be good again," said John Tyler coach Allen Wilson.

"But I don't know. They (poll voters) haven't seen us work out. If they come see us work out, they'll drop all those impressions."

Converse Judson, a Division I finalist four of the last five years, was a close second. Longview was fourth, 5A Division II runner-up Abilene Cooper came in sixth, followed by Duncanville, Garland, Richardson Lake Highlands and Fort Bend Dulles.

Groveton coach Don Hill felt that his team was boosted in this year's rankings based on what the program has done in the past.

Laughing, he recalled that some of their best years were when they started out ranked seventh or eighth.

"I hope it works the opposite way this time," he said.

Groveton, which began last year ranked fourth, suffered its only loss of the season to Iraan in the finals. Hill expects 14 or 15 of last year's players to be among the 24 on this year's team.

"Experience," he said, "will be one of our strengths."

Second-ranked Pilot Point returns almost everyone from its 6-4-1 district runner-up, while the guys at No. 3 Schulenburg have grown up watching the Shorthorns last into December almost every year.

Rounding out the top 10 are Lockney, Mart, Elysian Fields, East Bernard and Grand Saline (tied for seventh), Stamford and Alto and Holliday (tied at No. 10).

Tenaha has been an AP poll mainstay in the 1990s, but didn't make it to the finals until last year. The blowout loss to Windthorst should serve as motivation for the 17 returning lettermen, including star quarterback Chavis McCollister.

Wheeler is second, followed by Granger, Wink, Runge, Burkeville and Springlake Earth (tied for sixth), Celeste, Munday and Windthorst.

One rules change to note this year is that all varsity football games will use the NCAA tiebreaker system. It wasn't used in non-district games last year.

And, beginning with the third overtime period, teams scoring a touchdown must attempt a two-point conversion to keep from going to too many overtimes.