Every high school football team in this area, or as far as that goes, in the state of Texas, is either 2-0, 1-1, or 0-2. Now I know that most fans thinks that the 2-0 teams are probably going to win a state championship. The 1-1 fans are just not real sure. They’ve got to let it play out a little bit longer. The 0-2 fans, a lot of them have just given up. Those are the ones I want to talk to.

In 1969, the Brownwood Lions won the state championship, but they certainly didn’t start well. Not only did they start the season stumbling out of the gate, back when there was one playoff team in every district, they almost stubbed their toe in district against a very bad Stephenville team.

Fact is, very late in the ballgame, in Stephenville, we were down 8-7. Jimmy Carmichael, one of the best at Brownwood, and one of the best in Texas, threw a pass to Perry Young, one of the greatest receivers I’ve ever seen. Perry caught it in the end zone, and that touchdown put us ahead 13-8 with only a matter of seconds on the clock.

Carmichael, who was a great athlete, was inserted into the ball game to play safety on defense, and it paid off immediately. Stephenville threw a pass, Carmichael intercepted, and he was brought down, and one of the most violent spearing infractions I have ever seen occurred.

When that happened, the stadium erupted. It is by far the biggest fight I have ever seen in a high school football game. The benches emptied. The stands were trying to empty. It was unbelievable. Police were having to separate players, and coaches, and whatever, but it was the scene for about 15 minutes. Then, we were able to take a knee and we survived that night in Stephenville.

By the way, back then they had a quarterback club that met and viewed the film with the coaches every Monday night. I went to a bunch of them and that Monday night, which showed the fight, was the biggest crowd I ever saw at a quarterback club meeting.

Brownwood went into the playoffs and they had the biggest road block in the state of Texas standing in front of them. You see, the year before in 1968, Lubbock Estacado, which won state, took us to the woodshed in Abilene. 49-8 was the final score. Well, here was Estacado the following year, had their entire team back, and were still undefeated in the 3-year history of the high school, although they had tied a team once.

The Lions were prohibitive underdogs again. Just before halftime in that game, Estacado scored a touchdown to make it Brownwood 14, Estacado 13. Now, in two years of competition, their field goal kicker, their extra point guy, had never missed, either a field goal or an extra point. He stepped up right before halftime and shanked the extra point and we led 14-13 at the half.

Coach Wood told me many years later that he thought the turning point in that Estacado game was the missed extra point. “You could just see them deflate a little bit and it was almost like they were mere humans and not supermen like they had been playing for two years.”

Brownwood, whatever the reason, played absolutely great football in the second half, especially on defense, where Ricky Stokes and company dominated. When the final horn sounded, the Lions had shocked Lubbock Estacado, 29-13, and there wasn’t another blip on the radar.

They played good teams the rest of the way but played great in each one and brought the big trophy home. I think the main reason they won state was because of the confidence they played with after they beat Estacado, which was one of the great games in the history of the Brownwood Lions.

So, if your team is 0-2 right now, don’t panic. Have faith. That team I’ve been talking about started out 0-3 and turned out OK.

Until next time, so long everybody.

‘Out of the Box’ with Dallas Huston is published each Monday morning at BrownwoodNews.com