Bob Dylan sang “The first one now shall later be last,” and in the world of football it proves to be true.
No matter how good a program is, there’s always that one year when they threw a shoe.
We’re now a quarter of the way through this century and it may surprise you to know that there was a year in the 2000s when the only Henderson County schools to post a winning record were Cross Roads and Trinidad.
That came in 2003. The Cross Roads Bobcats were 6-5 that year and made the playoffs. Trinidad , just five years removed from their 1998 state champion 6-Man team also entered the playoffs and ended the year with a 7-4 season.
The year when Henderson County area teams made the most trips to the playoffs was in 2010. That was the year Athens went to the regionals and posted an 11-3 record. Brownsboro made the playoffs and ended up 6-5. Malakoff recorded their second straight winning season under new coach Jamie Driskell and Trinidad completed an 8-4 campaign.
No one should be surprised that the Malakoff Tigers have rolled up the most winning seasons in a decade during the 2000s, accomplishing that between 2010 and 2019. That stretch included five double-digit win years.
Trinidad completed the 2000-2009 decade with nine winning years, interrupted only by a 5-5 record in 2002. The Trojans had a stretch from 2005-2007 when they went 32-5.
Brownsboro recorded five winning seasons from 200-2009. The Bears finished 10-4 in 2006. After winning District 14-3A with a 7-3 regular season mark, they won playoff games over Kaufman, Atlanta and Pilot Point, before falling to Celina at Texas Stadium.
Athens accumulated five winning seasons from 2010-2019. The Hornets had been blanked in the post season since 1996 going into the decade. Athens has posted back-to-back winning seasons and playoff appearances in 2023-2024.
Eustace reached 10 wins in 2011 and scored a 6-4 mark in 2017.
For Mabank, the best years all topped out at six wins, coming in 2021,2019 and 2006. The 2006 team, coached be Jimmy Cantrell was their most recent playoff appearance.
