GRAPELAND, Texas — Deep in the Piney Woods lies the small town of Grapeland.
About 1,400 people live there, not even enough heads to fill the stadium of the local high school football team.
But half a century ago, that school became state champions.
“It was just a magical time-it came together for us,” Howard Brown, a member of the 1974 team said. “I still have my newspaper front page of the Grapeland Messenger on the wall at the house and it was just a great time.”
In the middle of that front page is Brown, holding the only state championship trophy the Sandies have ever won.
“We're just all country boys. I mean, we all haul hay together. We load loaded watermelons together," Brown said. "How many thousands of young men play football in high school in Texas every year or the country, and then how many get to participate at that level?"
Fifty years later, he's now watching a new generation of country boys come together to add another trophy to the collection.
“We actually only have one guy on the team that wasn't here since junior high, and so I've known these guys for a long time.” Sandies head coach Jordan Wood said. "We're finally juniors and seniors. We're finally healthy...our guys have taken pride of getting better every week, and it's paying off now in the playoffs, and we hope we're not done yet.”
As the athletes have grown up, so has their record. Back-to-back 2-8 seasons have turned into a memorable 9-3 season, but that all stemmed form a different change.
“It's hard to talk about a switch, but we did have some culture stuff, some culture building, last year that really developed. But our guys never stopped believing," Brown said.
And now the entire town of Grapeland is starting to believe in them too.
“That's the pride in the town, and the people of Grapeland,” Brown said. “It would be a great thing, for them to be able to pull that off and do it.”
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