THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Odessa High School Athletics

Trey Smith and his teammates stepped off a chilly, windy practice field earlier this week, shaking the cold off their bodies at the season’s bitter end — but with plenty of fire left inside them. Yes, the Bronchos’ season ends tonight. Yes, the team is out of playoff contention, and yes, when the sun rises over the west side Saturday morning, it’ll be time for the Odessa High football team to focus forward to 2018. But it isn’t that time yet. The season isn’t over yet. And, in one last go-round, these Bronchos have plenty left to play for. “We’re trying to send our seniors out with a bang,” the junior quarterback said. Odessa High will finish its season against its oldest rival, Midland High, at 7:30 tonight at Ratliff Stadium. Midland High will be fighting for a spot in the playoffs, in position to play its way into the postseason with a victory. Odessa High is out of that running, but that doesn’t mean the Bronchos don’t have their own motivation. The Bronchos are bent on sending their graduating seniors, who’ve been so crucial to the program’s turnaround, out on a fitting high note. For players like Smith, set to return for another campaign next year, that forward focus can wait another day while they work on a making it a sweet senior night for their departing teammates. “The seniors mean a lot, man,” Smith’s fellow junior, offensive lineman Ke’Evan Majors said. “We’re just trying to make it memorable for them.” It’s easy for any onlooker to see why the underclassmen are so desperate to offer a big parting gift. Odessa High’s seniors gutted out an agonizing 15-game losing streak going back to their sophomore year, finding resolve from seemingly nothing to help guide the Bronchos to a turnaround campaign this year, and help guide the underclassmen into position for a successful 2018 and beyond. With those seniors pulling the wagon, the Bronchos not only snapped that losing skid on the first night of the season back in August, but they’ve picked up three wins which top the program’s win totals from 2016 and 2015 — and 2012 and 2011, to boot. Odessa High still has a chance to finish 4-6, which would match 2014 for the program’s second-best record since 2010, behind only a 6-6 mark in 2013. Odessa High earned its first district win since 2014 this year, and its point differential going into tonight tops the averages from both seasons since 2014, too. “For them as a junior and me as a sophomore — it was real bad, we all know that,” Smith said, looking back to a dreary, winless 2016. “We set a goal out. (The seniors) told us, and we listened. “They told us that we needed to change the culture. They didn’t want to have to sacrifice this season to do it a later year. They wanted to do it now. I feel like that’s a big thing, a big goal of theirs, and I feel like we followed through with it — and we’re going to keep that going next year.” With lots of key returners following in those footsteps, including those who’ll make up what will be one of the district’s most experienced offenses led by Smith next year, some of the Bronchos already have high expectations for 2018. But whatever steps forward they continue to take, they know it’ll have started with this year’s crew. Tonight, the underclassmen know their seniors deserve to go out with a win. “They’ve worked too hard, coming off of last year,” junior wide receiver Zeke Garcia said, after the team’s last workout on Wednesday. “I feel like they left their mark. So I just feel like it’s their shot to really go out on a bang.” Tonight, the Bronchos can make that happen. “It’d mean the world, to get a ‘W,’ to have them go home happy,” junior running back Josh Lara said, before he turned his thoughts back to the bitter end to last season, against Midland High. “I don’t want to see what I saw last year — everyone crying. I want to see them walking off that field, with tears, but tears of joy.” It’ll be an emotional last ride for a tight-knit group that turned ‘winless’ to ‘wonder’ — but the Bronchos underclassmen want to make it a fun one. “I definitely want to send them out on a good note, and just enjoy those last moments with them,” sophomore running back Senjun McGarity said. “They’ve definitely taught us a lot of stuff, and motivated us,” he added. “We’ve just got to carry that on to the generation below us and keep building that program, little by little.”

THE OFFICIAL SITE OF
Odessa High School Athletics

BRONCHOS' UNDERCLASSMEN WANT TO SEND SENIORS OUT ON A WINNING NOTE

JUSTIN LEE

Odessa American | 11/9/2017

PHOTO CREDIT: Edyta Blaszczyk