400 Pounders, an Undefeated Record, and the Sipi Tau. How Can Central Compete?

SAN ANGELO, TX — Euless Trinity is well known throughout the Texas high school football community as a perennial power.  Since 1997, its last season with a below .500 finish, the Trojans are 234-40 with three state championships. 

Head Coach Chris Jensen took over as head coach in 2015 and kept the winning tradition going.  He has posted a 43-10 record as he tries to get his boys back to AT&T Stadium for the first time since 2010.  This year’s team has followed the previous trend of dominance, and is the early favorite to win its district. That is, if they can beat San Angelo Central.

The Bobcats have had moments of greatness and moments that make you wonder what they were thinking.  Last week’s performance against Weatherford had a lot more of the former than the latter. Coach Davis praised his kids’ effort as they jumped out to an early lead and stole the victory after Weatherford battled back in the second half. 

Trinity is a completely different beast, though.  They are one of the few big schools in Texas that still operates a power run game from under center that is not option oriented.  They are big, they are strong, and they wear defenses down.  

WATCH: Inside The Undefeated Euless Trinity Football Machine

The Trojans don’t score a ton of points but that is partly by design.  Their play calling focuses on getting first downs instead of big plays, and they drain the clock with long, time consuming drives behind an enormous offensive line.  For them, an eight minute touchdown drive is standard.  

“They eat clock.  They huddle. They take as much time as they want to, and they’re looking for first downs,” Central Head Coach Brent Davis said Monday.  “[In the game against LD Bell] the first half took a total of real clock time of 45 minutes… There was probably 2 or 3 passes in the whole first half.  That’s their plan. They’re going to take it. They’re going to eat clock and keep the ball away from you.”

That style of attack not only puts pressure on the ever improving Bobcat defense but also on the offense.  The margin of error shrinks significantly when the number of possessions go down. Central has to capitalize on every opportunity they have, because they might not get many.  

Defensively, Trinity is athletic and recovers very well, according to Davis.  They have held all opponents to under 21 points. Malachi Brown and company will be up for the challenge.  Like the defense, they have improved every week and are starting to get in a consistent rhythm. The key word there is consistent.   

Against Weatherford, they were almost perfect, except for the third quarter.  In that twelve minutes, turnovers and empty possessions allowed the Kangaroos to crawl back from a 21 point deficit.  They will have to play all four quarters against Trinity like the first half of Weatherford to have a chance. Central scored on every possession in that half.  They won’t have to score 31 like they did, but empty possessions will make the game look like last year’s 70-28 beating.

This will be Central’s chance to turn some heads and gain even more confidence.  They have a good chance at doing so.