WHAT’S CAUSING ALL THIS? | Kilgore-Chapel Hill III? Yeah! Let’s GO, baby!

You knew it would happen.

Come on and admit it. You KNEW it would happen. You knew it would.

Deep down inside, when you left for Houston, when you left for New Caney, or even if you couldn’t go to New Caney to watch Kilgore play Needville last week, and you had to watch or listen to Doug and Jason Smith and Don Hedrick from home last Friday – you just knew that Chapel Hill would beat Iowa Colony last Friday night and Kilgore would play Chapel Hill again.

It’s not well-spoken, but in just plain-ol’, East-Texas slang, there wouldn’t no way some upstart two-year-old, Southeast Texas program nicknamed “the Pioneers” was gonna show up somewhere and take out Demetrius Brisbon, Rickey Stewart and the Chapel Hill Bulldogs, and it didn’t matter if they were 12-0, 16-0, 19-0 or 56-0 against the schedule they were playing. You knew it, I knew it, and everybody else in East Texas knew it. That was one “football fact” the folks in Kilgore and Chapel Hill would definitely agree on: East Texas football gon’ beat Southeast Texas football every darn day of the week, and twice on Sunday. Sorry, Southeast Texas – just the way it is nine times out of 10, 99 times out of 100. I’ve been here a long time, about 22 years now, seen a lot of football. I knew in my heart they weren’t taking Chapel Hill out.

That doesn’t mean I wasn’t rooting for it.

Yeah, I’ll flat-out admit it. I was rooting for it. I didn’t want Kilgore to play Chapel Hill again. I know how tough those boys are. I’ve seen Kilgore play Chapel Hill now five times since August, 2021, and this Friday will be No. 6, and they just keep coming. The game back on Nov. 3 – sure, Kilgore got the best of them, 39-16, in Chapel Hill’s own stadium. But I know they’re gonna bring it Friday night at Longview’s Lobo Stadium. Stewart, he’s a bad, bad man, to quote Stephen A. Smith.

And Kilgore’s gonna bring it, too.

The Ragin’ Red, we’ve got a bunch of bad, bad men.

We’ve got a roster full. And we might have one more than we thought, after what happened last week at quarterback. If the left hand don’t get you, the right one will, so to speak.

I’ll be the first one to tell you, I don’t know if Derrick Williams can go at QB this week or not. Williams, the dangerous senior who has had a hand in 33 touchdowns Kilgore has scored this year, suffered an injury last week in the first quarter against Needville, and didn’t come back in. But Kayson Brooks stepped in and stepped up, going 7-of-8 for 108 yards, a touchdown (13 yards to P.J. Wiley) and a pick, and Kilgore had four different running backs – Sage Orange, Matthew Hardy, Isaiah Watters and Rayshaun Williams – score touchdowns.

The Bulldogs’ offensive line – that’s Emmanuel Young, Braquan Moye, Parker Allums, Rashaud Brown, Braydon Nelson, and also Daniel Garcia, with blocking help from fullback Aubrey Saylor and Josh Parrish – just took control of the game, and Needville couldn’t stop the Bulldogs’ running game or even slow it down.

On the other side of the ball, Kilgore’s defense allowed two first-half touchdowns to Needville but then didn’t give up a second-half score, and didn’t give up a second-half FIRST DOWN, in fact. They held the Blue Jays to 176 total yards. Needville didn’t even want to throw on Kilgore, even when the Blue Jays were trailing by more than two touchdowns in the second half. And Kilgore’s defensive backs – you know who they are – players like Jayden Sanders, Zaylon Stoker, Javon Towns, and Wiley, so much talent out there, they were blanketing Needville’s receivers like white on rice. If memory serves, Needville quarterback Keilan Sweeny completed one pass (that would be ONE, as in single digit) in the entire game.

Let’s journey back just a bit before Kilgore played Chapel Hill, before that Nov. 3 game at Chapel Hill’s own stadium.

In the last four games between the two rivals, before that meeting, the two teams had scored EXACTLY 117 points against each other – as in Kilgore had scored 117 points, and Chapel Hill had scored 117 points in those games.

That’s how even the series was.

But until Nov. 3, Chapel Hill found a way to win. Until Nov. 3, Chapel Hill had a bit of a mental edge over Kilgore.

On that day, things shifted.

Now it’s Kilgore that has the edge, not only because of winning the game at Chapel Hill, but in the way Kilgore did it.

The Ragin’ Red defense forced a punt on the first possession of the game, and then Williams and Wiley put KHS on the board right off with an 18-yard touchdown pass, a quick seven-play drive that ended with points. The other key play on the 78-yard drive: a 17-yard pass from Williams to Sanders.

Chapel Hill’s offense managed a field goal by Aiden Campos on its next drive, but touchdowns – man, they outweigh field goals. And Kilgore got another one just after that, a 71-yard TD pass from Williams to Towns just three plays later. Kilgore held a 12-3 lead, and then on the next drive, after a big pass from Williams to Stoker, then a 3-yard TD run by the senior quarterback, Williams had the Bulldogs – the red-and-white ones – up 19-3 before halftime was even a thing.

But Chapel Hill is going to spend this week watching this tape. They know they didn’t play their best game back on Nov. 3. They know Kilgore won the district title, really won it that day.

Deion Sanders is now the coach of the Colorado Buffaloes, right?

Back in the day, Sanders was one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL. He’s a hall-of-famer.

And because of the strength, the depth, the owners, the skill, and the deep pockets of both the Dallas Cowboys and the San Francisco 49ers, Sanders once said this: “There are three teams that play for the Super Bowl every year,” Sanders said. “There’s two teams that win it.”

Sanders meant that Green Bay wasn’t ready, and that Dallas and the 49ers always were.

Regardless of what we think of each other, Kilgore and Chapel Hill do respect each other. These teams have put some bruises on each other. Friday night, they’re gonna do it again, in front of a capacity crowd at one of East Texas’s football palaces.

One will move on to the Class 4A Division I semifinals. One will go home.

Somebody’s pride is gonna be hurt. Somebody’s gonna have a good chance to play for a state championship.

I’m sure their fans wanted Needville to take us out, as badly as we wanted Iowa Colony to do the same to them. But y’all, it just wasn’t meant to be.

THIS was meant to be. Lobo Stadium Friday night was meant to be. Kilgore-Chapel Hill III was meant to be.

Let’s get it on.