Fred Hedgecoke

Football, fugitives and fading dreams Fred Hedgecoke

Before the Super Bowl... There Was High School Football's State Championships

The first Super Bowl was played January 15, 1967. Long before that first iconic game between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs, and long after the next will be played, state championships were, and are, the Super Bowl of high school football.

It would be better to have died at birth than quit football in Sisco Flats, Texas. To desert Warrior football would be unthinkable, but to keep company with a woman who works in a local bar would shred every page of the moral code that ruled Sisco Flats. In the summer of 1956, Bobby Maynard teeters on the threshold of both transgressions.

Two offenses are sure to get a coach fired in the oilfields of Texas. Above all else, not winning will land a U-Haul in his driveway. A close second, but a sin that might be overlooked by enough wins, is banging the new English teacher. In the summer of 1956, Coach Don Jones teeters on the threshold of both transgressions.

When Bobby and Coach Jones's transgressions become the talk of the town, can sins be forgiven by the hypocrites of Sisco Flats, or will the dreams of two good people be destroyed.