Hal Wasson’s fall from grace

This entry originally was posted Feb. 24 on Facebook. The next day, Wasson accepted an offer from Carroll ISD to pay the remainder of his contract through the 2019 season. He says he plans to pursue another coaching job.

Any day now, word will come down that Hal Wasson, head coach of the Southlake Carroll Dragons, is leaving one of the best high school football jobs in the country.

Officially, Wasson will accept an offer from his employer to buy out the remainder of his contract, and he’ll pack his bags for greener pastures. It’s a fate that awaits most high school football coaches sooner or later. 

But the end for Wasson has been particularly brutal and humiliating, especially for someone who took Southlake Carroll to a state championship in 2011 and rolled up a 121-26 record in 11 seasons as lead protector of the Dragon tradition.

Whether you think he deserves it or not depends largely on where you stand on Wasson, a coach who had the unenviable job of following in the footsteps of the sainted Todd Dodge. Dodge led the Dragons during their legendary – and probably never-to-be-equaled – run of four state championships in five years during the early ’00s and still holds a cherished place in the hearts of all Dragon fans.

How could any mere mortal replace such a towering figure?

Wasson tried, of course, and he wasn’t a complete flop by any means, as his record above proves. But he was no Todd Dodge, in accomplishment or temperament. And that, as much as anything, may be responsible for the messy way in which he departs Dragon Nation.

On Jan. 24, the Carroll school district announced that Wasson had been placed on paid administrative leave while officials investigated his program for possible violations of UIL rules and to determine whether the culture of his program upheld the district’s core values and expectations, the later a nebulous charge that could mean almost anything.

 After four weeks of rumors and speculation – and to the utter delight of Southlake’s many critics – the results of the investigation were released this week and a report sent to the UIL. Meanwhile, Carroll school board members authorized the CISD superintendent to negotiate a contract settlement that would formally end Wasson’s association with the Dragon program.

The list of violations directed at Wasson included holding football camps at times that violated UIL regulations, holding afterschool practices during the offseason, requiring football players to work out on days they had games in other sports and, finally, allowing newly hired coaches to supervise practices before their contracts legally took effect.

I consider that list of particulars pretty thin gruel for the kind of public spectacle the “investigation” produced throughout the DFW area. They’re no better than misdemeanors, the kind of activities you’ll find in many, if not most, high school programs and a far cry from some of the rumored wrong-doing that had tongues wagging furiously among those who follow high school sports. Are they the kind of rule-breaking that should cost a successful, winning coach his job and subject him to the prolonged public shaming that Wasson has endured for the past month? Hardly. If they are, then football coaches all over the state had better dust off their resumes and reconsider their spring and summer practice schedules.

But there is more to this story than that. Of course.

Wasson is a man hard to love from afar. His pre- and after-game interviews, full of platitudes and devoid of substance, were sheer torture, and in 11 years watching him on the sidelines, I never once saw him embrace a player. Perhaps he did and I missed it, but he was not an outwardly emotional guy with his young charges, and that always made me a little suspicious of the man. After all, football is an emotional game, and watching these young athletes give their all on the field for nothing more than a love of the game, hell, I get a little teary just thinking about it.

Wasson was a rigid task-master, by all accounts, heavy on criticism and light on praise. Unlike Dodge, who treated everyone on his squad – from superstar to practice teamer – as valued members of the Dragon family, essential elements of the tradition of success, Wasson was said to favor his starters first, last and always.

Not everyone can be a starter, and the kids who help prepare the varsity for its time under Friday Night Lights play a vital role in the success of big-time high school football, too. Dodge understood that, but Wasson didn’t – at least according to his critics.

Full disclosure: My son is one of those critics. Ethan played freshman football for the Dragons, but then dropped out and took up lacrosse. Much of the reason for that decision was the lingering effects of a concussion he suffered in an 8^th-grade game. But Wasson, who he loathed, played a part, too.

“He’s a phony, Dad,” my son confided to me one day. “He shows up for our practice and struts around. Everything he says is BS.”

Ethan claims, and I believe him, that Wasson was widely despised by many of his players. The parents of some of his friends who stayed in the football program confirm this.

When participation rates in Carroll football dropped, some parents pointed the finger of blame at Wasson. Kids didn’t want to play for him, and parents didn’t trust him with their kids. Increasing concerns about concussions no doubt played an important role, too, but the whisper campaign against Wasson steadily grew.

For many Dragon fans, their dislike of Wasson was formed early – during his first season as Dragon coach in 2007. During the third round of the playoffs that year, the reigning state champion Dragons, helmed by Todd Dodge’s son Riley, played Abilene in Texas Stadium.

With Southlake trailing 9-7 late in the first half, Riley Dodge, who had led the Dragons to their 7^th state title the year before, dropped back for a pass at the Abilene 10. Just as he released the go-ahead TD throw, he was hit hard and left the game with a separated shoulder.

His backup, Kyle Padron, youngest member of a Carroll football dynasty, performed brilliantly, keeping Southlake in the game despite the loss of the exemplary Dodge.

In the closing minutes of the game, Abilene held a razor-thin 22-21 lead when Padron took the Dragons the length of the field, arriving at the Abilene 10 with 10 seconds left and the clock running. The smart play, the play that every man, woman and child on the Southlake side of Texas Stadium confidently expected, was for Wasson to call Carroll’s final timeout and send out his field goal unit.

Instead, Wasson’s staff ordered Padron to spike the ball, thus stopping the clock and saving the timeout for…what? Padron had never received a snap under center during a game, but he hurried to the line nonetheless. He and the center failed to make a clean exchange, and Padron fumbled the ball. Abilene recovered and ran out the clock. Thus ended the storied Run, a five-year period between 2002 and 2006 when Carroll won four state championships.

In post-game interviews, Wasson blamed the loss on a lack of execution by his offense, rather than the coaching blunder that every Dragon fan – and every player – knew it to be.

It was a despicable thing to do. A dishonorable thing to do. A stupid thing to do. Padron and his teammates had played their hearts out and had come very close to pulling off one of the great comebacks in Dragon history. And Wasson rewarded their courage, skill and determination by kicking them in the teeth.

That was more than 10 years ago, and my face still flushes red at the memory of it.

Over the years, my feelings about Wasson softened somewhat. That’s what winning does. And then there’s the marvelous memory of the 2011 season when Kenny Hill and a wild gray fox had starring roles in a storybook season that ended with the Dragons winning their 8^th state title.

At the end of the day, however, I just can’t embrace Wasson. I still can’t get that 2007 post-game interview out of my head, nor can I completely discount my son’s scorn for him as the petty grudge of a pissed-off teenager.

Perhaps he doesn’t deserve the shabby treatment he’s received from Carroll ISD. But in assessing Wasson’s fall from grace, I keep coming back to one thing.

During the past four weeks, not a single one of Wasson’s players, past or present, has stepped forward to publicly defend him, to attest to his character, to his skill as a coach and to his value as a mentor. Not a single one. That fact speaks volumes to me. It is a bitter and awful rebuke.