Sealy Tigers???

[Supertilley]

I remember sealy a few years back being the great 3A power house. 4 Titles in a row, i believe. I was just wondering what the reasons were for their downfall? Or if there was one at all. Shed some light my way.

[Pudlugger]

Well if nothing else the laws of probability finally caught up with the tigers. BTW in their 63-1 run who had the one?

That's right it was La Grange! Go Leps beat Sealy!:D

[Specklebelly]

They won 4 in a row because they had a run of talent unlike any I have ever seen in a 3A program. They just dont have the talent at every position that they used to have. They are still a tough team to knock off though.

[WOS1]

They also lost their coach to Odessa Permian which I think had a lot to do with it as well.

[sinton66]

It didn't hurt their cause any that there weren't many teams in 3A that were all that familiar with the wing-t at the time either. Not so anymore.

[BrahmaMom]

That Law of Probability is a killer! But never, never underestimate the Sealy Tigers; in their worst season they are an awesome team. They have strong coaching and tradition and local expectations that don't allow for an average team. We in their district are just glad to have a chance to compete. They are Bellville's big rivals, so we know how tough they are and respect their final product every year.

[Tiger Turtle]

The Sealy teams of '94 through '99 (they made their 5th final out of 6 seasons in '99 when they lost to Commerce) were a rare combination of talent, dedication, focus, execution and especially coaching. The coaching staff put together by TJ had a lot to do with their success. As one opposing coach said during they playoffs, "You look at the point totals and think offense, then you play them and their defense just beats you to death..." One often overlooked point about those teams is that they produced only four Division I-A scholarship recipients and of those four, only Chase Schavrada at SMU had any real success. Team speed and flawless execution were at the heart of their success. That rare combination of all the required elements just hasn't come together in the succeeding seasons. Honestly, there may never be another string of wins and championships like they put together, especially when you consider that there was only one playoff division in those days.

[Supertilley]

Well I am glad that I was able to witness it during my life time. I agree it was a great rarity. Very great memories for the kids that were involved.

[Tiger Turtle]

It's hard to describe, but those teams were almost like a collective consciousness. It was as though they all knew what everybody else was doing at the same time. The preparation was incredible, they took no team for granted, working just as hard for the worst team in district as they did for the state championship games. The hardest thing for me to believe when I started watching them play was that they never celebrated or showed any emotion during games. The staff had a saying, "We'll do our celebrating after game 16 is over." I think the cold, business-like demeanor those teams displayed psyched out a lot of opponenets who had the talent to go toe-to-toe with them.

[scotty]

The question about the Sealy Tigers during the 1990's brought up so many fond memories that I was just forced to reply. All along Sealy had been pretty much a football doormat other than the years that Eric Dickerson and crew led the Tigers to a championship in 1978. Other than that it's been pretty dismal for Tiger fans.
However when they hired T.J. Mills — confident to the extent of being cocky — as coach to direct their program things started changing. He stepped down from 5A so he could direct his own program as athletic director.
Mills had a great staff of coaches and they were allowed to coach. He has a brilliant football mind but he is also smart enough to hire great assistants and he allows them to coach.
That combination along with a fine group of football players made the Tigers the winningest 3A team in the 90's with four state championships and a finalist team from 1994-1999. That's going to be very hard to surpass simply because there was only one championship in each class during those years.
Those teams were built around speed, quickness and a great desire to win. And defensively they seemed to know exactly what was coming on the next play. Mills never referred to his offense as a Wing-T because it had so many wrinkles and he called it a Bohemian Bone. But whatever it was it worked.
If you were to look at the rosters there surely wasn't anything special about their size and one of the best running backs to come out of Sealy was Fred Smith who weighed maybe 160 pounds if someone else put his foot on the scale. Smith broke Dickerson's SHS rushing record and it looks as though it will stand for quite some time.
Former Columbus coach Tommy Bludau once told me that he had never seen another back who could make more yardage after the first contact by a defender the way Smith could.
Sealy overcame great adversity during those Mills' seasons and still won championships. A great running back was killed in an automobile accident and a fine tackle drowned.
They were also able to overcome injuries. Examples are when their quarterback Brad Burttschell went down with a torn ACL it forced the second quarterback to step in. The game was a district contest in Hallettsville and I believe Brad Dumont was their defensive coordinator. He had a great game plan. They were going to force the new quarterback to beat them with the pass as he stacked the line of scrimmage with defenders.
It was tough going for Sealy for a while, but they started passing and the second quarterback threw for more than 300 yards setting an all-time Sealy passing record that continues to stand today. They ended up winning pretty handily.
During their run, Sealy defeated some teams who had great talent. Looking at what they had before the contest you just wouldn't believe that the Tigers had much of a chance.
Take for instance the game against Cuero in the Dome. The Gobblers had something like seven or eight youngsters to go on to division 1 scholarships. One was Clint Finley the coaches son… what an athlete. But somehow Sealy came out on top in a fiercely fought battle and won the state championship the next week.
Another memorable game was the one against La Grange also in the Dome. The Tigers lost their all-state quarterback Robbie Bozeman in the first series of the game, again a torn ACL.
La Grange running back Lawrance Dobbins broke a couple of long runs and it was getting late as the Leopards had a 14-10 lead with just a bit over 3 minutes left in the game.
Bozeman told Mills he was ready to go into the game. Mills gave him special orders to hand off the football and get your tail end out of tail end out of the way.
Bozeman agreed, but when he went into the huddle to call the play, he told the running back Kelvin Tarver to follow him through the hole as Dobbins was also the safety and he knew where he would be on the play.
Bozeman got enough of a block on Dobbins to clear the way for Tarver and he broke it for around 70 yards and the go-ahead touchdown. Sealy score once more to win 24-14.
The next week Sealy defeated Commerce 28-21 for the state championship.
This was the second time they had defeated Commerce in their four-year run. And after the game Commerce Coach Steve Lineweaver was asked what made Sealy so special. He said that his kids told him that they had never lined up against a team that played so hard from whistle-to-whistle.
It was fun while it lasted and those of you who are in a program that's having a lot of success…enjoy it because it won't last forever. Good examples other than Sealy are Columbus and Schulenburg.
The Tigers continue to be respectable like Brahma Mom said earlier, but those of us who were fortunate enough to witness those great seasons during the 90's must realize that the chances are good that we will never see them again.

[WOS1]

Nice term paper!! Can I have that 10 minutes back? :p j/k

That's the second time I saw someone mention that sealy's run was when there was only 1 champ, DI and DII started in 1996 in 4A and I thought that's when it started in 3A too. Help me out here, did 4A go to 2 champs before 3A? If so, when did 3A start having 2 champs?

[mwynn05]

good post scotty

[Old Green]

3A did not start the two division championships till 1998
Aledo and Cuero in Division I
Newton and Daingerfield in Division II

[PhiI C]

Hey Old before that time didn't they allow two teams to get into the playoffs starting about 1982 or '83. I know there was no division 1 or 2 but still two teams from a district would get to advance. I kind of liked that old way better but you have to go with the flow.

It was 5A but Austin Raegan had some success in 5A football in the late 60s I think. I remember reading about them that they didn't have the complete respect of their opponents. They would somehow win the games which got the job done for them but opponents felt that one break and they would have won. Still a successful two year run at state championships in football.

[Old Tiger]

Originally posted by Old Green
3A did not start the two division championships till 1998
Aledo and Cuero in Division I
Newton and Daingerfield in Division II that was the year Rockdale came back in the second half to beat Marlin. Then the next week they played Newton in the d2 bracket and lost by 14. Helluva game!

[Old Tiger]

I think that was the semi finals or something? Anyone from Newton remember?

[Old Green]

You're right Phil. 1982 two teams from each district started going to the playoffs.

[Gobbla2001]

I wouldn't say it's a downfaill, they're just not kickin' as much rear-end as they did back in the day... Doesn't help much when you don't have TJ there to establish his discipline....

Law Caught up with 'em?

I can remember when my cousins went to school there, didn't hear about any law problems until after the last one graduated (2000)...

That's just me though, others may have heard...

Name a school who has never had any law problems involving athletes in their sports programs...

Cuero's headin' back to Sealy this year, they always treat us well considering it's a rivalry... Can't wait to go back...