When people think of Uvalde now, they think of the shooting at Robb Elementary. This is inevitable.
But life is resuming for the community, and part of that will be playing high school football.
Wade Miller’s tenure as the Uvalde head football coach has been tumultuous from the start. Miller took over the program in March 2021; Uvalde faced coming off a pandemic season, and had never ended virtual learning. “That first day of practice (that summer), I had kids there I’d never met before.”
In 2022, the Coyotes have a full summer to work together. “You can see their confidence grow and grow and grow, because they don’t even look like the same kids anymore…they’re actually going to be physically able to compete this year.”
Even though the team is returning 7 starters on offense and 6 on defense, the team is still young. Quarterback Brodie played every down in 2021, but will only be a junior in 2022. Uvalde’s two-deep on the offensive line includes one senior and nine juniors; the two-deep defensive line has one senior, six juniors, and one sophomore.
The growth on the field has been impressive, especially in light of the community tragedy.
“I have a couple of my players on my team that lost siblings. It was tough. It’s still tough some days.”
It’s been a sobering reminder that coaching, especially in high school, extends well beyond the playing field.
“I’ve had kids come and sit in my office, sit in the other coaches’ office, and just want to talk about things,” Miller said. These visits were daily at the start, but the kids have advanced to a new phase. ”We’ve noticed as staff that they’re kind of treating the athletic part of it as their sanctuary”
“I had a kid tell me, who lost a sister, `man, for the three hours that I’m up here in the afternoon, it’s the most normal part of my day.’”
“If they want to talk about it, we’ll talk about it, but we don’t bring it up unless they do, because we want them to be as normal as possible when they’re here.”
Carrizo Springs (10-1) will be coached by Gio Gonzalez in his second year at Carrizo Springs. The Wildcats are rebuilding to an unusual extent for a 4A school. Even Miller was impressed by last year’s squads: “That senior class – boys and girls – was one of the best I’ve seen across the board for a school that size in all sports.”
Gonzalez’s squad returns only three starters on offense and two on defense. “We’ve got a pretty young line, sophomores and maybe one junior the line….a junior running back, one senior running back.” Quarterback Evan Castellanos had strong numbers as a sophomore, which Gonzalez attributed to the play action offense that the Wildcats will feature on again this year.
Few coaches have been as happy as Gonzalez to play a schedule with six non-district games.
Carrizo Springs will honor the Uvalde community, but Gonzalez and Miller agreed that the response will be simple. “This is a tragedy for all of us,” Gonzalez said, “especially a neighboring town 44 miles away. We don’t want to forget, but it’s hard to get those (Uvalde) players motivated and then bring them right back down (with a solemn ceremony.)”
For this decision, Miller acted on experience. “My daughter plays on the volleyball team. Their first game this year…it was really nice, the thought was awesome. We went out of town and played, and they had a moment of silence, they gave flowers, they read the names out… you could see some of the girls on the bench were visibly upset. I said, “Thanks for the things, but give us a heads up, and if you want to do something, let’s do it afterwards.”
“Just let them go be kids for three hours. That’s the one time they’re thinking about volleyball, and not thinking about other things.”
Gonzalez understands. “We’ll probably carry a flag of theirs, maybe wear some Uvalde Strong shirts, wear a decal on the helmet, but nothing that’s going to jeopardize the game for them in any way, or bring their spirits down.”
Gonzalez has his own connection to the May event. Gonzalez taught and coached softball at Uvalde for a year, and one of his players was Faith Mata, whose sister Tess was one of the victims in May. The Houston Astros are among many organizations who’ve offered support to the community; members of the Uvalde community were invited to an Astros game, and Faith threw out the first pitch. Gonzalez admires the gesture “but stuff like that doesn’t ever, EVER, fill the void for what she’s going to miss for her little sister.”
Ultimately, there will be a game played in Carrizo Springs on August 26th. Even for a school that won a state championship – Uvalde went 15-0 in 1972 – Friday’s game will be as important as any in the city’s history. ”You don’t want to put pressure on yourself,” Miller told his players, “but we’re going to be the first real show (since the tragedy), and we can help the community feel better about itself. (The players) know that; they can feel it just being around. We’ve talked about that with the kids: just go do your thing, and if you just play and compete, win or lose, the community will feel better about itself.”
For Carrizo Springs’ part, they have their own motivations. The Wildcats are undefeated in the regular season under Gonzalez, and would like to keep it that way. 2021 was the Wildcats’ first undefeated regular season since 1983.
“Uvalde is not used to losing to Carrizo, so after last year, I’m sure they’ll be coming at us with a vengeance.”
“We’re gonna mourn, but we’ve got to do what we’ve got to do, too… we’ve got to keep our momentum, try to stay strong, try to keep going.”
Mark Kusenberger
August 19, 2022
Read more from Mark on his blog at https://mkusenberger.wixsite.com/website/blog