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🐺 2019 Defending 6A (D-II) State Champion Longview Lobos

LoboFan07

By LoboFan07
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TheTrueKing
TheTrueKing

You know they say writing is therapeutic. I am finding that it is working little by little. Just need to continue before I get banned without legit cause. 

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LoboFan07 Grand Master

LoboFan07

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15 hours ago, kingwolf said:

Exactly....makes no sense to me...would have thought WM or Rockwall had a better chance

I still think there's a good chance a different network picks that one up.

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ANTI Proficient

ANTI

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51 minutes ago, HearEmaGrowlin said:

Longview winning state again this year?

If LV does, they'll be the 1st ETX program to go back to back in the top classification....and the 1st non suburban program to go back to back since Midland Lee did it 99-00.

But, too bad we aint got nuttin.

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LoboFan07 Grand Master

LoboFan07

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I was reading @Mavchamp's blog post over on his Maverick site, and this line stuck out to me...

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But we crave the next step. A 4th round game (Region Championship) would be a huge step forward. Anything beyond that could be icing on the cake.

Does that mean anything less than the third round would be a disappointment? Absolutely not. This is HS football. Anything can happen on any given night.

The “State Championship or bust” ideology is a thought pattern that seems to plague some fan bases across the state annually. While expectations are good to have…. I’m thankful Mav Nation doesn’t seem to be riddled with this.

Obviously this was in reference to Longview's fan base and our high expectations every single year, and of course I think a rebuttal is needed.

There's no doubt we have very high expectations for our players and our staff. Nobody likes losing, but at Longview, for better or worse, we expect to win every game we play in. We've been extremely spoiled with the level of football our program has played since that first playoff season back in 1967, following the 20 year playoff drought. Do I think some in our fan base have unrealistic expectations? Sure. But this State Championship or bust ideology Mavchamp mentioned is only there on a year by year basis. I feel like most of our fan base realizes, we're not going to win State every single season. It's unrealistic to believe otherwise, especially in the class we're currently in. It's too competitive, and really with the landscape of things and the way things are changing with the big metroplex taking over, it's a shocker that we're even still competing. 

But, I do think all of Lobo Nation expects to compete every single year. We've won nearly 40 district championships, we'll be over the 740 win mark by the end of the season, we've suffered just four non-winning seasons in the last 50 years. That comes with the territory of having this much of a consistent run. Our blip in the late 90s, early 00s, reset our program. But even in those down years, we were still competing in games. We weren't losing 56-14 or 60-14 or anything like that against anyone (other than Cedric Benson's Midland Lee). 

Expectations are good to have. Some programs are different than others. The fact that we finally reached the pinnacle, hasn't lessened our appetite for more success. The last 17 years are the best this program has seen overall in our history. Yes, we've had numerous other teams in the past that have found success. But what Pat Collins started back in 2001, and continuing it on to beating #1 nationally ranked Evangel in 2002 led everything up to last year's team finally bringing home the one thing we lacked. 

We expect to compete with every single team we face every single week, that's the real gist of it. We have had teams perform way better than a lot of us expected at the start of the season. We've had teams completely let us down during the regular season after what great expectations we had at the start. And we've had teams perform great all season long only to, better lack of a better word, choke come the time we needed them to step up. A lot of Longview, and I would imagine East Texas, recognizes that we should have more State Titles than we have. But it doesn't matter. We finally got one last year. We've done the district title run, we've done the long playoff run. We're ready for a state title run. 

If different programs want to have different expectations, so be it. I truly believe believing you can compete with any one in the state is the first step to taking that next step. We started it back in 2001 with the Midland Lee win, continued it in 2002 with the Evangel win and quarterfinal run and minus a blip here and there, we've continued to compete with every single team we've played since. And that's all anyone can ask of our boys in HS Football.

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jbabi86 Contributor

jbabi86

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27 minutes ago, LoboFan07 said:

(Edit: No idea how my passage ended up in quotations, tried to take it out but it wouldn't let me)

I was reading @Mavchamp's blog post over on his Maverick site, and this line stuck out to me...

Maybe he has come to the realization that his team cannot compete at that level year in and year out,  therefore tempering his aspirations of what he expects from the season. 

Me as a fan, and I would think any team that plays the game would have championship aspirations every year. 

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LoboBooster73 Enthusiast

LoboBooster73

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It’s not wrong to have aspirations of greatness, as long as it’s mixed with realization of one’s abilities to attain that goal. If you don’t have those aspirations, it’s only because one has come to the realization of mediocracy. Thankfully, Longview has never suffered that realization.

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Mr. P Elite

Mr. P

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55 minutes ago, LoboFan07 said:

We expect to compete with every single team we face every single week, that's the real gist of it. We have had teams perform way better than a lot of us expected at the start of the season. We've had teams completely let us down during the regular season after what great expectations we had at the start. And we've had teams perform great all season long only to, better lack of a better word, choke come the time we needed them to step up. .

This is key right here, and it's something I've observed very closely in my (very recent) ride on the Lobo bandwagon thus far: It's very much a year-to-year outlook.

Some teams, you just know from the get-go that a deep run is unlikely (2014, 2016). Some teams seem to have all the pieces, but just can't put it all together (2015). Other teams are right on the verge of greatness, only to blow it at a crucial moment (2017).

Some of the many things that made the 2018 squad so special is: they showed their potential, fulfilled it, were pressed into clutch situations and rose to the challenge. They didn't coast on a talent advantage or allow the outcome to be determined by luck. They made it happen. That's what's going to have be the difference in 2019 in order to repeat. 

Are we talented? No doubt. Well-coached? Certainly. Do we have momentum? As much as anyone else. Is everyone on our schedule going to be gunning for us? You better believe it. When the pressure's on, the hype is at its pinnacle, and it's win-or-go-home time, will this team rise to the challenge? 


Time will tell...

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LoboFan07 Grand Master

LoboFan07

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1 hour ago, AKA said:

This is key right here, and it's something I've observed very closely in my (very recent) ride on the Lobo bandwagon thus far: It's very much a year-to-year outlook.

Some teams, you just know from the get-go that a deep run is unlikely (2014, 2016). Some teams seem to have all the pieces, but just can't put it all together (2015). Other teams are right on the verge of greatness, only to blow it at a crucial moment (2017).

In regards to 2014, I'm not sure when you stepped on that season, but everyone in Lobo Nation was beyond excited before the season. We just had a great season in 2013, having lost to A&M in one where we beat ourselves again, but we were bringing back everyone almost. Dropping down, and bringing that much back, we just expected to compete overall. And from the get go, it just wasn't there. From the scrimmage on, that team just wasn't what we expected and I think a lot of us expected to lose to Lufkin in round 1. The loss came a week later, but we all knew we weren't State Title contenders. 

2015, we were hopeful, but we just couldn't stop Duffey and company when it came down to it. 2016, I think from the get go we knew weren't going to compete for a Title, but again we were hopeful something would happen. 

2005 and 2009 was really the only years that I can remember flat out everyone expected us to win things. 2005 was a complete dude, but you could see that coming 2 or 3 weeks left in the season. 2009, they got back but just couldn't overcome LT. 

2010 was the most unexpected of the bunch. Starting 1-3, and losing everything from those back to back teams, I think we all expected just to get into the post season. But they took us on a fantastic run that none of us saw coming. 

It's a year to year thing as you said. We have the talent now, coming off that State Title run, we fully expect to make another run. But I consider that run just into December. That, I believe, should be our goal every single season. 

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