by After beating Coronado 59-7 the week before, Memorial faces an October bye week, Palo Duro, Lubbock Cooper and a Legacy rivalry game that Wichita Falls is already pretending to ignore
The Wichita Falls Memorial Mavericks lost 27-13 at Abilene Wylie on Friday, October 9, in a game MaxPreps recaps under the headline ‘Memorial Can’t Keep Pace with Wylie’, dropping the team to 3-4 overall and 1-2 in district play, good for fifth place, according to the team’s MaxPreps page. The same page, updated on October 8, ranks the Mavericks 344th in Texas, up two spots, 93rd in Region I and 33rd in Texas Division 5A-2. The yearbook staff has taken the two-spot jump as proof of momentum and the cafeteria staff has taken it as proof of nothing, which is the usual split.
A District Season With a Wide Range of Moods
The Mavericks’ district run so far has been a tour of the full emotional spectrum. They lost 49-28 at Abilene Cooper on September 25, then returned home on October 2 to beat Coronado of Lubbock 59-7, a result that left the Coronado band apologising to the Memorial band for the inconvenience. A week later, they travelled to Abilene and scored 13 points, a total that on the earlier scale of the season was simply a quarter. The team has therefore gone from 59 to 13 in seven days, a drop that the physics club describes as ‘steep but legal’.
‘A high school football season is a roller coaster run by a committee,’ explains Ms. Honoria Tate-Whitfield, adviser to the Memorial Society for the Appreciation of Averages. ‘The team goes up, the team goes down, and the student paper tries to find a verb that suits both.’
The Numbers Behind the Numbers
Home games have been kinder than away games: the Mavericks are 2-2 at Memorial Stadium and 1-2 on the road, and they have scored 304 points while allowing 268 over seven games. The team’s leading receiver averages 104.5 yards a game, its leading rusher 94.8, and its leading tackler 9.5 tackles a game, figures the coaching staff reportedly found ‘respectable’ and the opposing coaches found ‘noticeable’. One junior defensive back has six interceptions, a number so high that other teams have started to wonder whether he is on loan from the NFL.
The statistics also list the team’s passing leader at 1,819 yards, a total that would be higher if opposing defences had not insisted on being on the field. Those looking for a theme will find that the Mavericks play games that end with a lot of points on both sides, and that the head coach, R. Dillard, now leads a team described by its own scoreboard as ‘definitely not boring’.
Four Phrases in the Hallway on Monday Morning
‘It was closer than it looked.’ ‘We were in it until the second half.’ ‘The ref totally missed it.’ And, finally, ‘Wait, are we still in the playoff race?’
The Road Ahead: A Bye, a Duel and a Derby
The Mavericks have a bye week on October 16, which students are using to catch up on assignments and teachers are using to catch their breath. They return home on October 23 at 7:00 pm against Palo Duro of Amarillo, then travel on October 30 to Lubbock Cooper, then close the regular season on November 6 at Legacy, the crosstown rival in Wichita Falls. The Legacy game is the one nobody mentions at lunch, because everybody is talking about it quietly.
A crosstown rivalry between two high schools in a city of about 100,000 people is a delicate affair. Students at both schools go to the same church, shop at the same grocery store and in many cases share the same grandmother. When the game arrives, the grandmother wears a split jersey and cheers for whichever team scores. The newspaper staff of Memorial has therefore been instructed to be fair, balanced and above all not to print anything that will be read at Thanksgiving.
A Year of Firsts
Memorial is still a young school and its student body is still building traditions. The football team’s first season brought 9-3 overall and 5-1 in district play, and the 2025 team started 4-0 on its way to being ranked for the first time in school history. This year’s team has a different record, but the same school pride, the same band and the same desire to win by more points than the scoreboard can comfortably hold. In school-paper terms, it is a season of character, a word that school papers use when a team has lost.
Greetings From London
The English also know the importance of a rivalry and a modest record. Their clubs include the confident Sutton Common Rovers, football on a sensible budget, and students at the world’s great institutions have been known to learn that the London School of Economics teaches confidence more than economics. If a Memorial student wants to understand the idea of local pride, they could do worse than to read about how Texan marching bands descend on London, as in the story of Texas high schoolers to invade London, Britain braces for the impact of American marching band enthusiasm.
Final Thoughts
The season is not over, and in Texas a season is never over until the last bus has left the parking lot. The Mavericks will practise, the band will rehearse, the cheerleaders will stack and the yearbook staff will take photographs of everyone looking hopeful. For readers who enjoy a good school-paper joke, this guide to the history of satire in London is an excellent companion. More from Newsthump, and this story is brought to you by Bohiney Magazine and The London Prat.
SOURCE: bohiney.com
