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Know Your Enemy: A look at how McKinney, Boyd's new district foes faired last season
Photo courtesy of NeilFonville.com
By Andrew Snyder, asnyder@starlocalnews.com
McKinney and McKinney Boyd will be leaving the friendly confines of their former districts to join Plano Senior, Plano East, Plano West and Allen this coming season in what promises to be one of the more challenging leagues around. In anticipation of that transition, here's a look back at how their new rivals performed on the gridiron last season:
Plano Senior
A promising start turned disastrous for the Wildcats with the onset of district.
Plano finished the year with a 4-6 record despite holding a fourth-quarter lead in half its losses. Against intra-city rival East, the Wildcats held a 17-0 lead at halftime before being outscored 4-to-1 across the second half to lose, 28-24. In another heartbreaker, they allowed Flower Mound Marcus to drive the length of the field and score the go-ahead touchdown with under a minute on the clock in an identical 28-24 loss.
Plano's lone district win came against last-place Lewisville, who they beat 27-14 in the second-to-last game of the season before closing the year with a 24-10 loss to West to finish well out of the playoff picture.
Plano East
A year after missing the playoffs, East seemed set on a similar course this past season when it opened district with three consecutive losses.
But after opening with a 20-10 loss to Marcus, the Panthers improved in defeat with a four-overtime loss to West (44-36) and a near upset of Allen (42-38) in a nationally-televised game.
Close games turned their way the rest of the year, as the Panthers rallied to win their next four district contests, beating Hebron (20-17), Flower Mound (49-28), Plano (28-24) and Lewisville (52-28). By doing so, they forced a three-way tiebreaker with Hebron and West for 8-5A's final two playoff spots. They edged West by just one point to qualify.
The Panthers entered the playoffs as the district's fourth seed, but their dramatic season quickly came to an end when they were eliminated by the eventual state champion, Southlake Carroll, in a 23-16 loss in the opening round. They finished the season with a 6-5 record.
Plano West
Despite missing the playoffs, West outperformed expectations after being pegged as one of the weaker teams in its district at the start of the season. The Wolves had their best regular season record in four years, 6-4, and missed the playoffs by the slimmest margin available: one point in a three-way tiebreaker with East and Hebron.
After opening the season with a blowout loss to Arlington Martin, 45-7, the Wolves strung together four consecutive victories, including wins against Lewisville (24-21) and East (44-36) to open district.
The Wolves almost made it five in a row but lost in four overtimes to Marcus (51-48) to drop their first district game. Where one streak ended, another picked up as they went on to lose their next two games, against Allen (40-28) and Hebron (37-17), to fall behind in the standings and hurt their playoff hopes.
Even though the Wolves won their final two games, beating Flower Mound (55-42) and Plano (24-10), the damage had been done and they saw their season come to a close at the end of district for the second consecutive year.
Allen
It's a testament to the strength of the Allen football program that a prefect regular season still didn't feel like enough of an accomplishment. The Eagles entered the playoffs with a 10-0 record and their sixth consecutive district title in hand after spending multiple weeks ranked as the top team in the nation, but a 28-21 loss to perennial rival Euless Trinity in the second round left them wanting more.
Allen's season began with a thorough domination of its pre-district competition. The Eagles steamrolled Cedar Hill (28-13), Justin Northwest (59-0) and Longview (42-23) before continuing that pace into district with wins against Plano (44-7) and Lewsiville (45-13).
Perfection didn't come easy for the Eagles the rest of the way, though. In their third district contest, a nationally-televised game against East, they had to come from behind to secure a narrow 42-38 win. That kind of performance became the norm for their district campaign, as they trailed at some point in six of their seven wins.
While their season fell short of the stately expectations they set for themselves, the Eagles put together another impressive season. Expect them to remain the undisputed district favorite heading into next season.
Kevin Hageland and Matt Welch contributed to this story.
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