Remembering 1983 Daingerfield

[Matthew328]

Here is a really good article written about that team in the FW Star-Telegram a while back...if there is any debate about the best ever 3A team let it rest now....

Shutdown season
In 1983, a championship football team helped Daingerfield through lean times
By David Thomas
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

DAINGERFIELD HIGH SCHOOL
The 1983 Daingerfield football team posted 14 shutouts, including a 42-0 rout of Sweeny in the championship game, to capture the Class 3A title.

DAINGERFIELD - The 1983 Daingerfield state championship team might be the best-known team in Texas high school football history.

The Tigers were the state's first team with a 16-0 record. They were the first to go through the playoffs without allowing a point. They allowed eight points all season and shut out 14 opponents, including 13 consecutive, to set a modern-day national record. Their defense scored 76 points and limited opponents, on average, to less than one foot per play.

Those are the statistics best-known around the state.

The numbers that aren't in the record book are just as well recalled around Daingerfield. The 41.7 percent unemployment rate. The more than 3,000 employees of Lone Star Steel Co. who lost their jobs. And no one can even begin to estimate the number of people indirectly affected.

"I think avid sports people recognize the football team when it's mentioned," said 65-year-old Tigers fan Decker May, who has three scrapbooks filled with stories on the '83 team. "I'm not sure that everybody would have a realization of what else was going on."

Daingerfield residents will never forget the "what else" and the team that helped them through those difficult times. On Friday night, they had one more chance to say thanks, as 16 of the 35 players on that special team returned for a halftime ceremony at Tiger Stadium.

The story of the '83 Tigers begins a year earlier.

On Aug. 17, 1982, bad news hit. Lone Star Steel, the area's leading employer based about five miles from Daingerfield in nearby Lone Star, announced layoffs of nearly 2,500 workers. The previous January, the plant employed 4,370 workers. By January 1983, the total had dropped to 917. Unemployment in Morris County, which had been at 8 percent, peaked at 41.7 percent that month.

"The oil patches started drying up," said Jimmy Walker, a 1952 graduate of Daingerfield who worked 35 years at Lone Star Steel until being laid off in 1988. "Then production dropped way down."

May, then an elementary school principal in the Daingerfield-Lone Star school district, said it was devastating to watch so many of his students' parents struggle financially.

"We had people coming in, most of the time it would be the mother," he said, "and tell me, 'I've never asked for any help at school as far as lunches are concerned, but we need it right now.' "

Employment numbers grew gradually as some employees were hired back, but more lost their jobs in other areas of the plant. The steel industry remained temperamental, and Lone Star Steel, which now has about 1,300 employees, was having to change how it operated. That created a lengthy period of uncertainty around Daingerfield.

"No one knew if they were going to lose their job in the next layoffs," Walker said. "We'd lose 15 to 20 jobs this week, then lose 15 to 20 jobs the next week."

Property wouldn't sell because there were no jobs to attract buyers. The two most common options were to live with family outside of the area until the economy improved, or stay and hope for something good.

Daingerfield needed a source of hope.

It came with the 1983 football team.

"Our football success couldn't have come at a better time," said John Settle, a junior offensive lineman on that team whose mother has worked at Lone Star Steel for almost 30 years. "A lot of people lived and died Daingerfield Tiger football because they didn't have anything else going on positive. That was what they did to get their mind off their problems."

Settle, now head coach at Brownsboro near Tyler, said people all around town would pat him on the back and want to talk football.

"It was a diversion from that toughness that they had to deal with," May said. "They didn't know what the future held. Our success drew the community together. It gave purpose at least once a week in support of everybody."

The support grew as the team's accomplishments grew.

In 1982, the Tigers had reached the postseason for the first time in 11 years. With 13 returning starters -- eight on defense -- and a top-5 in every preseason state poll, there was much anticipation of the '83 season. The seniors had predicted in the seventh grade that they would win a state title before leaving high school. But no one could have predicted how they would do so.

The season opened at Class 4A Kilgore. Daingerfield won 35-2, allowing the safety on a bad snap on a punt. After defeating Gilmer 14-0, the Tigers finished nondistrict with another road game against a 4A team, defeating Carthage 10-6. The Bulldogs, who would reach the 4A state semifinals that year, became the only team to reach the end zone against Daingerfield when a tipped pass turned into a long touchdown.

They were last points the Tigers would allow.

Daingerfield won its seven District 14-3A games by a combined 326-0. The shutout streak continued through the postseason. The Tigers won their six playoff games by a cumulative 246-0, including a 42-0 rout of Sweeny in the championship game.

And as then-coach Dennis Alexander said, those were the days when there was one state champion in each classification and two teams, not the current three, made the playoffs out of each district. Clarksville, which Daingerfield defeated 43-0 in the first round, was the Tigers' only playoff opponent that did not win at least 10 games that season.

"It was really good teams every week," Alexander said. "It wasn't somebody that slipped in there. Nowadays they might get in there -- just looking at the past couple of years -- there might be a great team in the other bracket. Crud, we were facing everybody, and they were all top teams."

That was the first of three consecutive state-finals appearances for the Tigers. They went 14-1-1 in 1984, losing to Medina Valley 21-13 in the final. The next year, they were 16-0 with another big victory in the title game, defeating Cuero 47-22. Those were the three big years of an eight-year run, from 1982-89, that saw the Tigers go 102-8-3.

Although Daingerfield had made the playoffs 11 times before the '80s, including winning the 1968 Class 2A state championship, those teams of two decades ago are the ones most people think of when they hear the name "Daingerfield."

"It's amazing," said Alexander, whose last season in Daingerfield was 1988. "I still hear about it and see so many people that the first thing they mention is those years or that '83 team."

There are plenty of reminders of that great Daingerfield tradition around Tiger Stadium. The scoreboard sports the years of the three state championship teams. A large sign behind the opposite end zone recounts all 26 playoff seasons. Markers on the press box boast of the school's nine state championship teams in all sports, plus two others that also reached state finals.

Every day in the locker room, players dress under a row of 13 signs that pays tribute to the football team's postseason success. Only teams that win a playoff game, not merely playoff teams, earn a coveted place on the wall. Daingerfield fans have high expectations.

"They expect you to win," said current coach Randy McFarlin, whose teams have made the playoffs each of his five seasons in Daingerfield. "The veterans, some of the old fans, they get mad when you lose a state semifinals game."

McFarlin knows that because that's what his Tigers did last year to end a 12-3 season. With Friday's 28-16 homecoming victory over Lindale, his fourth-ranked team is 5-0. McFarlin joked that Tigers fans believe there are 11 games left on the schedule.

But McFarlin embraces the expectations. He touts the tradition to his players.

One of his first moves when he became coach in 1998 was to bring back the style of home jerseys the 1983 team wore -- blue with red and white inserts on the sleeves. He considers the jersey one more link to the Tiger tradition.

"We talk about it all the time," he said. "Every time we go out on the field, we talk about how important it is."

He believes his players' turn to uphold the Daingerfield tradition is something they won't fully appreciate until after they have left the school.

"Even at this point, they don't understand it," he said. "It's more magical than they can comprehend right now because of all of the people who have been through here. Later on, they'll understand."

Perspective broadens with time.

"As kids," Settle said, "I think we didn't really understand just how important we were. I do now."

1983 game-by-game results

Nondistrict

Daingerfield 35 Kilgore 2
Daingerfield 14 Gilmer 0
Daingerfield 10 Carthage 6

District 14-3A

Daingerfield 27 Linden-Kildare 0
Daingerfield 42 Omaha Pewitt 0
Daingerfield 32 Hughes Springs 0
Daingerfield 76 Queen City 0
Daingerfield 48 DeKalb 0
Daingerfield 45 Hooks 0
Daingerfield 56 New Boston 0

Playoffs

Daingerfield 43 Clarksville 0
Daingerfield 22 Robinson 0
Daingerfield 46 Kaufman 0
Daingerfield 51 Gladewater 0
Daingerfield 42 Post 0
Daingerfield 42 Sweeny 0

[Gobbler Fan]

IMO oppinion the best team ever in the State and thats all classifications better that the Houston Yates team of 85' and the 92' Temple Wilcats

This team with an offenseive line that averaged 270 , a secondary that went on to win the State Championship in the Mile Relay and 3 RB'S who would play Div. 1 ball on schollies .

Eleven players went on to play college ball of those 11 , five went on to play in the NFL and all five made a career of it . FB David Whitmore one of Parcells favorites (he was drafted by the Jets), was the other player traded by SF to KC with Joe Montana . He was a SS by then .Thomas Everett started for the Steelers and the Cowboy's during the JJ years and was all-pro . His brother Eric played for the Eagles and Vikings .

It isint always the size of the school that makes a difference .They still have to put 11 men on the field , same as everyone else .

No Doubt Yates (85') and Temple (92') are considered by most to be the best 5a teams ever to play in Texas .BUT , 3A Daingerfield would have given them the game of their lives .

[etbu]

I was in East Texas around that time when all of the layoff's came. Plus you had the shooting at a local church that claimed three or four lives. What a bright spot the football team was during some tough times in the area.

[Hupernikomen]

armstead carter team and the north shore team of two years ago are my nominations.

[lostaussie]

this is a great article. brings back so many memories of growing up in etexas. this was the most dominant team i ever saw. in a couple of games as i recall, the only first down the opposing team got was on penalties of the automatic type. to show how well respected this team was, in 1984 dfield was ranked #1 in the season opening polls. gilmer was ranked #8. we played if i recall correctly in the season opener. we got beat either 21-7 or 21-14, i don't recall. the next weeks rankings had us at #4. moved up 4 spots because we scored. in those days d'field ruled.

[West22]

I watched 1983 champship game along with a couple of other playoff games they played .Many times they played with ten men on the line of scrimmage on defence . Nobody could get past the line of scrimmage.They were so quick and physical the plays could never get going. I discussed the game with Coach Talbert who was coaching a 4a school at the time and asked him just how good he thought the team was after watching them,he stated that he felt that they were 5 a schools that could match up offensively but defensively he felt that few if any could score on them.The teams reaction to a first down was similar to most schools reaction to a score .In the champship game Ithink it was the 3rd quarter before their opponent got a first down.

[PhiI C]

A great article. The one very close game Daingerfield had was with Carthage which at that time was a 4A powerhouse that year and in the 4A playoffs Carthage reached the semis in state where they lost 20 to 16 to Lubbock Estabado.

[Leopards,class of 75]

That was probaly the best team with an awesome defense! I don't see how anyone can match those numbers ever. Thanks for posting this info. on the 1983 Daingerfield football team.

[Phil C]

Only 8 points allowed on them the whole year. Incredible!

[Phil C]

From the first of the year it appears that the defense really dominated. Two of the first three games were fairly close with Gilmer and Carthage but the defense and just enough offense won it. After that it looks like the offense really got its' act together for the rest of the year and really dominated. Incredible record in the playoffs and when you get down to the final 8 those are usually tough teams and it is incredible how they dominated.

[BeastoftheEast]

They had about 6 kids who would have been 1000 yd. rushers at any other school and they just platooned them in. Of course they played defense. I don't think there will ever be another high school team dominate like that again.

[gobbler grad]

they were one heck of a football team during the 80's...

[MARLINDOGS]

Thanks for posting this article.I played on that team back then.We really had a great team that year and to in 84.We could have beat some teams worse then we did but our coach wouldnt let us run up the score like some teams do today.

[WOS1]

Fourteen shutouts in a season is just mind boggling. That's an unreal feat at any level.

[Phil C]

Originally posted by WOS1
Fourteen shutouts in a season is just mind boggling. That's an unreal feat at any level.

I agree with you WOS1. Sometimes you have a year when a class has lower team quality but that team really dominated it's district and then the playoffs. Usually there are always at least one of two teams in the playoffs that give you a tough battle and play a good game against you. I don't know if that team is the best 3A team ever but they did dominate that year.