Dorothy Estes, educator extraordinaire

Many of my friends and former colleagues are mourning today the passing of Dorothy Estes, a legendary journalism educator at UTA.

Estes was the Student Publications Director at UTA from 1970 to 1996 and oversaw the publication of the Shorthorn, the university’s student newspaper. More than any single person, she is responsible – along with generations of talented student journalists – for the national reputation for excellence the Shorthorn has enjoyed for decades.

But she was more than that. She was a great teacher and a stellar mentor, setting an example for UTA journalists for courage, straight-talk, ethical behavior and dedication to craft that they carried with them when they left campus to join newsrooms across the country.

She was a surrogate mother for thousands of homesick kids facing the first great challenges of their lives away from the nurturing confines of home and hearth. She cared about her young charges, mourning their losses and celebrating their victories, offering a broad and comforting shoulder to cry on or just to rest on for a while.

Estes also was a passionate and eloquent advocate for journalism and its essential role in a free society. She demanded strict and uncompromising adherence to truth, accuracy and precision in the work of her students. But she also understood that students sometimes made mistakes and that they needed space in which to learn from those mistakes and grow as professionals and as people.

I met Estes as a young student journalist at UNT – known then as North Texas State University. She was a friend and colleague of C.E. “Papa” Shuford, the founding chairman of the NTSU J-department, and made regular treks to Denton to consult and commune with him.

At the time, North Texas student journalists were an arrogant bunch, thoroughly convinced we were a part of the top journalism program in the Southwest and one of the best in the nation. We looked down at the world – including the high and mighty UT-Austin – with a blend of unwarranted superiority and vague contempt.

Sigh. We had so much to learn, and the lessons administered by the real world were hard and brutal.

But UTA, smaller in size and stature than it is today, gave us pause. After meeting Estes, we quickly recognized an inspirational leader and a superior educator. I was immediately drawn to her enthusiasm, irreverence and damn-the-torpedoes style.

As for her students, they were quietly competent and sure of themselves. Reading the Shorthorn gave us a shiver of dread and uncertainty. It was good. Damned good. Better than the North Texas Daily? Unthinkable. And yet …

Taking the lead of Estes and Shuford, NT and UTA student journalists formed a bond. We cheered each other’s successes and competed furiously with each other in state and regional contests. When we encountered Estes, she treated us as her own. Once, when I ran into her at a journalism conference in Dallas, she called me by name, and it sent a thrill of exhilaration up my spine. Dorothy Estes knows my name!

Later, when NT and UTA alums met in newsrooms, they became close and trusted colleagues from the start. We shared something that others did not.

The passing of Estes, who died yesterday at age 90, reminds me of the enduring impact of great teachers. If I had to pick the most influential people in my life – the ones who contributed most to making me the person I am today, my parents and my maternal grandmother would top the list. But all the others would be teachers. Erma Stewart and Sharon Ryan at Big Spring High, Dal Herring at Howard Community College, Shuford and Keith Shelton at UNT.

What I learned from those teachers enriched my life and molded me as a human being. My failures can be laid entirely at my feet, but the dedication, wisdom and generosity of those teachers helped pave the way for all my successes. I was lucky to have them. Thank God I had them.

Dorothy Estes was that kind of teacher. And based on the many tributes ringing across social media today, she had that kind of impact on her students’ lives.

Luckily for UTA and its present student journalists, Estes’ legacy of excellence and compassion lives on. My friend Laurie Fox, an Estes student herself, is carrying on in her mentor’s footsteps.

Under Laurie’s supervision, The Shorthorn recently won the American Collegiate Press’ Pacemaker award, the equivalent of a Pulitzer Prize for student publications.

That’s not a bad goodbye present for a renowned journalism educator. Not bad at all.

Journalism and the movies

It has been difficult, after a lifetime of fighting deadlines in newspaper offices across Texas, to sit on the sidelines for the past year and a half and watch the most concerted attack on freedom of the press in the history of the republic.

Trump seeks to destroy the public’s faith in the independent news media in order to consolidate power and to escape accountability for the many sins he has committed in a lifetime of deceit, gluttonous excess and business malfeasance.

It’s still unclear whether he will be successful in his quest. The news media – newspapers and broadcast news networks in particular – have never been weaker and more ill-equipped to counter the assault.

Trump’s efforts to destroy a free press come at a time when the traditional checks and balances on presidential power are being erased – both by a craven dereliction of duty by a subservient legislative branch and by a concerted effort by the Trump regime to stack the judicial branch with far-right zealots.

I believe, because I must, that Trump will fail in his nefarious goal. I believe it when I see the poll numbers, when I see the number of people who marched Saturday in cities across the country.

And I believe it when I see something that happened on Sunday, a small thing really, not terribly significant in the grand scheme of things, but important perhaps as a small promise that the good guys will ultimately carry the day.

I went to see The Post, an excellent film about the Washington Post’s decision to join The New York Times in defying a Nixon administration order not to publish the Pentagon Papers in 1971.

It’s a rousing story of journalistic derring-do – mostly true, for the saga of the Pentagon Papers case is full of intrigue, secrecy and ballsy, in-your-face reporting. Director Steven Spielberg drives home its over-arching message, which couldn’t be more relevant today: A free press serves the governed, not the governors.

As the lights came on in the theater, the credits were greeted by applause from the audience. Applause. In a movie theater in Northeast Tarrant County, one of the most conservative parts of a very conservative state.

To quote Buffalo Springfield, “There’s something happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear.”

As for the movie, it’s pure joy and immediately makes my list of the best journalism movies ever made, as I expected it would.

Tom Hanks is extraordinary as Ben Bradlee. How an actor as famous as he is can disappear into a character amazes me. I wondered how he would stack up to Jason Robards’ characterization of Bradlee in All the President’s Men. Robards won an Oscar, and Hanks’ work certainly is Oscar-worthy. Wouldn’t it be something if two separate actors won Oscars for portraying the same historical figure?

Meanwhile, Meryl Streep as Katharine Graham is sublime. The moment when she decides to risk everything to publish the papers – against the advice of the gaggle of chattering men advisers who surround her – still gives me goosebumps. She’s that good.

I’m not sure why, but over the years, journalism has served as the inspiration for a number of excellent movies. Perhaps it’s because journalists so often are in conflict with established authority or because their work exposes official malfeasance and human chicanery.

Regardless of the reason, top-flight directors and A-list actors always have been drawn to movies with journalism themes or with journalism backdrops.

My list of favorites appears below. My journo friends no doubt have their own.

There are no wrong answers here. Let the debate begin!

Top 10 Journalism Movies

The Post (2018) – Yes, I know. The New York Times is the real hero of the Pentagon Papers case. Neil Sheehan of the Times got the first copy of the papers and the Times published the first story. The Post was a Johnny-come-lately in the case, albeit an important one. So why is the Post the hero of this movie? Simple. Katharine Graham is a fascinating character. Both newspapers risked a lot by publishing the Pentagon Papers, but hers was perhaps the more difficult decision. Streep’s work here undoubtedly will win her another Academy Award nomination. It’s also Spielberg at his best.

Spotlight (2015)– A brilliantly told story of the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer-winning series about child molestation in the Catholic diocese in Boston. It captures perfectly the culture of the newsroom and the mindset of reporters and editors at a major metro paper in the days before the implosion of the newspaper industry. Spotlight, which won a Best Film Oscar, also portrays better than any movie ever has the methodical, time-consuming and mostly routine process of a major newspaper project. The familiarity of the place and the people brought tears to my eyes at the end.  This movie, along with The Post, illustrates why a free press is essential.

All the President’s Men (1976) – The movie and the 1974 book upon which it is based inspired an entire generation of youngsters to get into journalism. And no wonder. At the time, it was the most realistic portrayal ever of the newspaper industry, and director Alan Pakula and screenwriter William Goldman went to great lengths to insure authenticity, including recreating an exact duplicate of the Post newsroom. The scene of Dustin Hoffman, as Carl Bernstein, trying to convince a source to talk to him brought a shiver of recognition. Taking advantage of her instinctive hospitality, he manages to entice her into providing some information but knows he’ll spook her if he takes out his notebook. So he waits until she leaves the room to get coffee, then pulls out his notebook and scribbles furiously.

His Girl Friday (1940)– Director Howard Hawks had the stellar idea of turning the Hildy Johnson character in this adaptation of The Front Page into a female role. Then he offered the part to many of Hollywood’s top actresses. They all turned it down, but Rosalind Russell jumped at the chance and made the role her own. Cary Grant as crafty, ethically ambiguous editor Walter Burns is a delight, and his scenes with Russell crackle with sexual energy. Known for its rapid, overlapping dialogue, this is by far the best of three screen versions of Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s romp about Chicago-style journalism in the 1920s.

Deadline USA (1952) – Humphrey Bogart is the fighting editor of a New York newspaper about to be sold to a Murdoch-type publisher and put out of business. He decides to go out with a bang by bringing a ruthless mobster to justice. Much of the movie is well-crafted hokum, of course. But there’s a scene in a bar where reporters from the doomed New York Day gather to mourn their paper with cynicism, dark humor and scathing commentary, just as real reporters would do in such bleak circumstances. In the final scene, Bogart is in the press room, watching the pages with the story being bolted onto the press, when he receives a call from the crime boss ordering him to hold the story. Bogart signals the presses to start, then holds the phone to the roaring machines. “You hear that, baby,” he tells the enraged mobster. “That’s the press. The press. And there’s nothing you can do about it. Nothing.”

Broadcast News (1987) – Holly Hunter is wonderful as the brash and brilliant Washington producer of a major network. William Hurt is the dim-witted but telegenic reporter she takes under her wing. And Albert Brooks is the nebbish super-reporter who knows everybody and knows everything but can’t connect with his TV audience or the girl he loves, Hunter. Key scene: Hunter is having an argument with her boss. Says he: “It must be nice to feel like you’re the smartest person in the room – to feel like you’re always right and everybody else is always wrong.” “No,” she quietly replies. “It’s awful.”

The Paper (1994) – I never worked for a tabloid, but this movie made me wish I had – sort of. The New York Sun – a hybrid of the real-life Daily News and Post – is a crazy place, filled with crazy people. An editor obsessed over his chair. A drunken columnist who packs heat for protection. A fistfight between editors in the press room over front-page headlines. A never-ending parade of the bizarre and the unhinged. The place fairly buzzes with an intensity and energy that grabs you by the lapels and carries you along for the ride of your life. Is director Ron Howard’s newsroom fact or fiction? A bit of both, probably. I know the newsroom depicted in the movie was nothing like the one I worked in. At The Dallas Morning News, decorum and order were paramount and shouting matches were rare and usually resulted in disciplinary action. Still, no movie does a better job of capturing the unique dynamic of a big-city newspaper on deadline – the adrenalin-pumping excitement of chasing stories, the exhilarating rush of getting something no one else has. But alas, newsroom “characters” like those in The Paper are a thing of the past. Too bad.

Ace in the Hole (1951) – Billy Wilder wrote, produced and directed this movie about “fake news” almost 70 years before the phrase was invented. Although the movie was one of Wilder’s few commercial flops, it’s a gem. Kirk Douglas is Chuck Tatum, a former big-city reporter fallen on hard times of his own making – drink, women and an unscrupulous approach to work. Exiled to a small newspaper in New Mexico, Tatum encounters what could be his ticket back to the big time. A relics-hunter has become trapped in an abandoned mine, and efforts to remove him are immediately launched. But Tatum understands the story needs time to develop in intensity and drama if he’s to attract the notice of his former metro bosses. So he engineers complications in the rescue efforts. Instead of the necessary hours, it takes days to reach the trapped man, with predictable results. Thank God I never encountered a Chuck Tatum in my long career, but there was this one guy… Umm, no. That’s a story for another time.

Shattered Glass (2003) – Another movie about a disgraced reporter, this time a real one. Stephen Glass achieved a certain level of celebrity by writing edgy, cutting-edge stories in The New Republic until his editors discovered his stories were too good to be true. In fact, the charming Glass had been making things up for years. The scandal almost destroyed the magazine and everyone connected to the fabulist. Initially, the staff rallies around Glass against the allegations, but that support soon evaporates as they begin to understand the depth of his betrayal and the impact of the damage on them. Hayden Christensen, who plays Glass, is extraordinary. His work here makes up, almost, for his excremental portrayal of Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars saga.

Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) – A movie for our times, if ever there was one. Actor David Strathairn channels journalistic icon Edward Murrow perfectly, right down to the nervous way he takes a drag on his cigarette. George Clooney directed and plays producer Fred Friendly. But he resists the temptation to take a star turn, keeping well in the background and focusing the spotlight on Murrow and other members of his CBS team. Fear is a major character here, the fear that permeated the newsroom in that sad era, when careers were wrecked with heartless abandon by unscrupulous politicians playing to a credulous public. Considering the treacherous landscape, and Joseph McCarthy’s mastery of the process, the decision by Murrow and his team to take on the demagogue is nothing sort of breathtaking.

On the right day, they make the list

Citizen Kane (1941) – Some will be surprised that this movie, which is widely considered one of the best movies ever made, didn’t make my list. Personally, I’ve never been able to warm to it, although it does have a certain majesty about it. Orson Welles was a deeply flawed genius, and if you want to put it on a best-of-all-time list, I won’t argue. Ultimately, however, it’s not a journalism movie at all, but a morality lesson about the corrupting influence of power. OTOH, you can’t deny that at its heart, it’s a crackerjack newspaper tale.

Come Fill the Cup (1951) -- I can’t help but love this movie. When I was a young reporter for the Denton Record-Chronicle, the city editor loaned me the book on which the movie is based. Written by a former Louisiana newspaperman named Harlan Ware, the book is about an alcoholic newspaper man who successfully whips his addiction and resurrects his career. It was the first novel I’d ever read with a newspaperman as a protagonist, and I was completely entranced. Much later, I came across the movie on late-night TV. The opening scene is classic. James Cagney, as the alcoholic reporter, dashes into the newsroom, sits down at a typewriter and quickly bangs out a story about the sole survivor of a plane crash. He hands the story to an editor. The editor reads it and admits it’s the best lead he’s ever read. There’s only one problem. The plane crashed three days ago.

Guilty pleasures

“30” (1959) – With little doubt, this is a stinker. As the best worst movie about journalism ever made, it contains every newspaper cliché in the book. Every one. The script is appalling, and the acting is amateurish, particularly by Jack Webb, who plays the managing editor at his wooden-Indian best. It’s not intentionally funny, but trust me, it’s an immensely entertaining hoot if you’re a journalism junkie, practicing or not. I showed it once at a Society of Professional Journalists soiree in Austin, and it was a smashing success.

The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1955) – This is a British sci-fi treasure. Here’s the set up. A reporter for London’s Daily Express discovers that simultaneous nuclear tests by the U.S. and Russia have thrown the earth out of orbit and sent it hurtling toward the sun. He covers the story as temperatures soar, rivers and lakes dry up, cities empty of people and scientists scurry to find a solution. The movie was filmed with the cooperation of the Daily Express, and many of the scenes were filmed in its Fleet Street building, including the final sequences. When scientists re-enact the nuclear blasts that created the crisis in a desperate bid to reverse the process, reporters gather to await results in a bar across the street from the newspaper office. The camera then travels outside, moving along the deserted streets of an abandoned London. It travels inside the Daily Express building, across the cavernous newsroom, through the empty corridors and finally arrives in the press room. There a pressman waits with mockups of two front pages hanging on either side of him. The camera moves in closer to first one, then the other front page. One screaming headline reads, “EARTH SAVED. Experiment successful.” The other says, “EARTH DOOMED. Experiment fails.” Deadline approaches. Get it?

A new beginning

My son graduates from college tomorrow, a day that marks the official end of child-rearing for Marice and me.

We surrendered front-line parental duties some time ago when our daughter and son stopped needing our constant attention and began regarding us with the sort of benign neglect in which young folks interact with their parents.

For us, the disengagement process began when my daughter left for college in 2010 and now ends when her younger brother walks across the stage at UNT tomorrow morning.

We’ll still be Rachel and Ethan’s parents, of course, but those are formal titles with no real power and few responsibilities, except those assigned by the kids and carefully regulated to keep our interference at a minimum.

Nothing tragic about any of this, understand. It’s a process that’s been repeated millions of times before and will continue, I suppose, until the sun is a cinder in a barren sky.

It seems only yesterday that I wiped a smear of jelly off Ethan’s face before he toddled off to the first day of kindergarten at Johnson Elementary School. The last 16 years have passed in a blur, as they do for every parent.

There are plenty of moments in Ethan’s life I’d like to replay, if only the world worked that way.

n  Infant Ethan struggling unsuccessfully to crawl and thwarted by his chubby little arms and legs.

n   Ethan, in a makeshift robe made of one of my white shirts worn backwards, sitting proudly with other day-school graduates as an auditorium full of parents snap photos.

n  Ethan, face radiant with triumph, holding up his trophy after his flag-football team won the rec league championship.

n  Ethan speeding down the sideline to a touchdown after intercepting a pass during one of his 7^th-grade games. Later, the game photographer tells me as I walk in his studio, “Yes, I got it!”

n  Ethan at his bar mitzvah party – dressed in boots, cowboy hat and western shirt – riding the mechanical bull he insisted we rent for the occasion.

n  Ethan, with quiet pride, showing me the team video he was commissioned to make of Carroll High’s boys soccer squad, and my astonishment at how good it really was.

n  Ethan meeting me after a blowout his lacrosse team suffered against Dallas Episcopal and displaying the angry black, blue and green bruises he received playing goalie. “They must have been throwing the ball really hard,” he says laconically. “Bruises usually don’t turn this color for a few days.”

n  Ethan informing me that he was moving out of the Denton apartment he shared with a couple of high school friends because he was bored of “just sitting around and getting stoned all day.” One semester later, he makes the Dean’s List.

And so many more. Life with Ethan has been an interesting ride, and now that I’m coming to the end of an important segment of the journey, I think often of how my son developed from the cheery-faced youngster with a mischievous grin to the solemn, thoughtful young man who drifts in and out of my home today.

When I look at him, I’m reminded of the old saying that “still waters run deep.” He is not who he sometimes appears to be – a feckless 20-something more interested in video games than current affairs, a self-centered, self-satisfied member of his generation.

He is a serious person, this handsome, well-mannered son of mine, a fact reaffirmed this summer as I looked through photographs he and his friends took during a trip to Germany and Switzerland.

Yes, there were the expected number of photos of he and his companions mugging for the camera at tables loaded with steins of good German beer – a great deal of bonhomie recorded for posterity.

But the overwhelming majority of the shots were of examples of magnificent medieval architecture and of exhibits in the many art-filled museums Ethan dragged his friends to. Photo after photo of Ethan standing beside paintings, tapestries and sculptures from institutions across the two countries.

And then there were the photos from Dachau. Ethan’s buddies didn’t want to go to the site of the infamous Nazi death camp. They reasoned it would be too sad, too brutal, too much of a downer, better to find a more pleasant way to spend the afternoon.

But Ethan had just taken a class in the political use of genocide throughout history and so understood the true horror of the place. He insisted on the two-hour train ride.

When I looked at the photos these young men took during the tour – of the appalling barracks (mercifully empty now of the shattered men and women who once inhabited them), the horrific ovens (nightmarish even 72 years after the last hellish ember died), all the stark monuments to unimaginable evil, I felt the sting of tears, which mingled with the pride I felt for my son, who demonstrated the substance of his soul and the depth of his character in taking his friends to that dreadful place.

His plans after graduation are fluid. He’d like to live in Israel for a while, the result of a deeply spiritual Birthright trip he took last summer – and perhaps also because of a girl he met there. There’s always a girl, isn’t there?

I’m against the plan, but of what importance is my opinion in the matter? As I said before, my influence in the direction of my son’s life, never terribly strong, is fading, fading fast.

He still yearns to be a filmmaker, although his ardor is moderated by his understanding of financial realities and the uncertainty of creative success. He loves to travel, to drink good wine, to eat fine food and to live the good life, but he knows such things come with a price tag.

Whatever he does, he’ll make out fine. Whether by design or luck, or both, Marice and I have raised a strong and caring man, a person of substance who understands human nature and human frailties, who recognizes artistic beauty and appreciates artistic creativity. He’s the person I wish I had been at his age, filled with the spirit of adventure and a life of possibilities lying before him.

It will not always be easy, with villains and knaves at every bend in the road ready to derail dreams and detour ambitions. But Ethan, in the words of Faulkner, not only will endure, he will prevail.

Congratulations on your wonderful achievement, my son, love of my life, pride of my life, and may you always enjoy fair winds and following seas.

Region I Final: Waco Midway 42, Southlake Carroll 28

I didn’t travel to Baylor’s McLane Stadium yesterday to watch the fourth-round matchup between Southlake Carroll and Waco Midway, wary of a late-night return on traffic-choked Interstate 35. I’m not as young or as adventurous as I used to be.

Shame on me, though, because I missed a real barnburner, one that revealed what a special group of young men this year’s version of the Dragons truly is. Character is revealed both in victory – and in defeat. And the young Dragons now leave the playoffs as winners, heads held high, despite the heartbreaking results displayed above.

In considering this game beforehand – and in contemplating the likely subject matter this report would involve – I thought about Dylan Thomas’ immortal poem – his best – “Do Not Go Gentle Into that Good Night.”

I figured, I hoped, the Dragons would give a good accounting of themselves, that they would “rage, rage against the dying of the light,” in a contest no one believed they could win.

After all, the Panthers were just too strong, too talented, too intensely focused on winning the first state championship in their excellent program’s history. The Dragons, on the other hand, were – in the words of a friend of mine – “playing on house money.” They already had exceeded expectations, performing well beyond the level of their ability just by making the fourth round of the playoffs. Besides, their best player, rusher T.J. McDaniel, was sidelined with a broken collarbone.

In the beginning, things went pretty much as predicted. If you relied on the eye test – or in my particular case the ear test since I was listening to the radio broadcast of the game – you weren’t in much doubt as to who was the better team as the confident Midway sprang to a 21-0 lead over the struggling Dragons.

The Panthers won the contest sure enough. But it wasn’t an easy victory, by any means, and the proud Dragons have nothing to be ashamed of. They fought to the end, and their dramatic 3^rd quarter comeback was a marvelous thing to behold for Dragon fans. They evened a three-TD deficit, and when Midway struck back quickly, they kept the score close until the very end.

The heralded Midway offense, led by quarterback Tanner Mordecai, arrived as advertised at McLane Stadium. Mordecai, who came into the game with 1,000 yards rushing and 3,600 yards passing, is a beast. He’ll do well at the next level, which in his case is Oklahoma.

He and running back James Fulbright (28 carries for 157 yards and 1 TD), performed behind a stout and talented O-line, riddling Dragon defenses for most of the night. Mordecai was equally effective in the air, connecting with receivers Demarcus Degrate (5 for 193, 1 TD) and C.J. Williams (8 for 62) all over the field.

Mordecai, described by his coach as the next Baker Mayfield, “only bigger” – ran for two touchdowns and passed for a third in three of Midway’s first four possessions of the first half. He ended the night with four rushing TDs, completing 18 of 30 passes for 191 yards and rushing for 122.

While the Panthers ripped through the defense, the Dragon offense initially sputtered, going 3-and-out on its first series and watching morosely as Midway surged to a two-score lead. When Carroll finally muscled its way into the Panther red zone late in the first quarter, its drive stalled at the 13. Kicker Neal Koskay then added to Dragon miseries when he muffed a 23-yard field goal.

Carroll managed to hold the Panthers to a 3-and-out on the subsequent series, but despite excellent field position near midfield, it was unable to convert on 4^th down at the Midway 33, setting up the Panthers’ third score.

The radio guys couldn’t remember the last time the Dragons had slipped behind three touchdowns without drawing blood themselves, and neither can I. With 8 long minutes left in the 2^nd period, it looked like a dark, bleak evening stretched before the Dragon Nation – and an even longer drive home.

But instead of surrendering to despair, the young Dragons dug deep and came out swinging. Junior quarterback Will Bowers, who had an excellent night despite the loss, engineered a 10-play, 70-yard scoring drive that demonstrated the Dragons had plenty of fight left.

The drive culminated in a bit of Dragon trickery at the Midway 30, when they lined up in the wildcat formation with sophomore  R.J. Mickens behind center. The sophomore then pitched the ball to Bowers (20 of 30 for 288, 3 TDs, 1 INT), who sailed a high arching pass to Bell in the end zone.

On the next Panther drive, the Dragon defense joined the fray, slowing down Mordecai and blanketing his receivers as Midway neared the goal line yet again.

With 27 seconds left in the half, Mordecai tried three times from the Dragon 11 to hit receivers in the end zone, but his passes were batted away each time. Defensive end Jacob Dodderidge capped the defensive stand, leaping up and blocking Midway’s field goal attempt, and the Dragons cruised into halftime with some momentum to ease the pain of a two-score deficit.

The Dragons scored on their first two drives after halftime, both on Bowers passes to Mickens (4 for 69, 2 TDs), a defensive standout who also plays offense and special teams. In between, Carroll’s beleaguered defense disrupted a Mordecai-led march to TD, forcing a 4^th -and-long at the Dragon 27 that failed when he couldn’t connect with a receiver.

Dragon head coach Hal Wasson told The Dallas Morning News that no one should be surprised at the Dragon comeback.

“It’s in our DNA,” Wasson said. “These guys don’t know how to surrender. It comes from great leadership from our seniors.”

Mordecai said his team expected the Dragon rally.

“They have probably the best tradition in the state so we knew it was not over,” he told The News. “Our thought when they tied it was, okay, we’re starting over fresh.”

And indeed, the Dragon celebration was brief.

On the next kickoff, Midway returned the ball to its 43, and Mordecai took less than 2 minutes to stage a 5-play, 57-yard drive that put the Panthers ahead once again, 28-21. That drive ended in dramatic fashion, when Mordecai took the ball from center, burst straight up the middle and sped 45 yards to the end zone.

In many ways, you could capsulize the game in that single play. Wasson summed it up in a post-game radio interview.

“They are a great team, and they’ve got a great triggerman,” he said. “Whenever we got some momentum, they responded. This is the playoffs and that’s what great teams do.”

The killing blow for the Dragons came immediately after Mordecai’s tie-breaking scamper. On the third play from scrimmage, a Bowers pass was intercepted and returned to the Dragon 20. It took the Panthers only three plays to reach the end zone and extend their lead to two touchdowns.

The Dragons responded with a beautiful 6-play, 81-yard scoring drive. It included a 30-yard pass to Cade Bell (8 for 111 yards and 1 TD) and a 26-yard missile to Eli Fergel, only his second reception of the year, ending when Bowers dived desperately for the pylon from the 5.

Carroll would get no closer, however, and Mordecai tacked on an insurance score as the clock drained to zero.

So it ended. Midway plays Longview in the semifinals next week. The Dragons go Christmas shopping.

“You always hate to lose,” Wasson told a radio interviewer. “But we’ve got a great group of young men, and they’ve got a lot of heart. I love this team.”

As well he should. When the Dragons ended the regular season with three losses, no one believed they would progress much beyond the first round of the playoffs.

Instead, they beat an upstart McKinney in the first round, whipped reigning state champion DeSoto in the second and edged past an excellent Arlington High squad in the third.

But without the services of an 1,800-yard running back, the worthy McDaniel, and O-line standout Henry Mossberg, they had little chance of halting Midway’s determined march to state.

The good news – and there's always some good news to soothe an aching heart – is that next year bodes well for Dragon fortunes. This year’s squad was filled with talented juniors and sophomores who will enter 2018 experienced and well-tested.

Bowers really came into his own in the playoffs, becoming the difference-maker that his coaches hoped he would be. He’s poised for a splendid senior season. He and McDaniel, along with receivers Carson White and Wills Meyer, will form an excellent offensive core. Mossberg also will return to anchor an O-line that played lights-out this year.

Mickens will continue his phenomenal career at Carroll. Already a standout on defense, Mickens became the complete player this year, performing well as a go-to receiver and a lethal kickoff return man. Just thinking about how much better he’ll be in only his junior year makes the heart go pitty-pat.

Koskay will be a senior, and freshman Joe McFadden was handed PAT duties last night, an indication that coaches wanted to assess his abilities with an eye to next year. McFadden was flawless.

Defensively, the talented Jake Fex is back, as are Fergal and linebackers Michael Parrish, who  a great game last night, and Preston Forney.

On a sadder note, last night was the final game in Dragon uniform for a number of senior stars, including receivers Bell, Hudson Shrum and Darryl Crockett, defensive backs Hayden Hayes and Joe DeVincenzo, linebackers Ryan Thompson and Matty Werner, and O-lineman Jackson Kimble. And of course, defensive leader Jacob Dodderidge, who also played halfback in key series this year, leaves a huge hole in the lineup for some worthy underclassman to fill.

Wasson praised his departing seniors, calling them the backbone of the Dragons’ winning tradition.

Under their leadership, he said, his team “pushed a great team to the limit. We just didn’t get some of the breaks.”

“I have listened to their hearts,” an emotional Wasson said after the game, “and I know how seriously they took the responsibility of carrying on the great legacy of this program.”

In the bitterness of loss, the young Dragons wept in each other’s arms as they gathered for the last time before the Dragon Marching Band to hear the school alma mater. In years to come, when they are old and gray, as I am now, they will remember this night differently.

The pain of defeat will have long faded, replaced by a faint throb of regret. What still will be powerful and crystal clear will be the memory of when they engaged in a great struggle with their teammates, a time of brotherhood, a time of comradeship, respect and, yes, of love.

Until next season, go Dragons!

Regional Semi-Final Round: Southland Carroll 28, Arlington 24

FRISCO – It’s been many a moon since the Southlake Carroll Dragons experienced such a gut-busting, nerve-wracking, breath-taking contest as the one last night against the talented and under-rated Arlington Colts.

But Carroll survived – barely – by demonstrating character, adaptability and sheer grit before an amazed Dragon Nation at the Star’s Ford Center.

 It’s a game we won’t long forget, and my stomach is still fluttering this morning after being twisted in knots by the roller-coaster, knuckle-biting nature of the matchup.

The diminished Dragons travel to Waco on Saturday to face lethal Waco Midway (13-0) in Region I finals at Baylor’s McLain Stadium. They do so without the services of their stellar running back, the worthy T.J. McDaniel, who went down in the 2^nd quarter with an injury and likely is out for the season.

The nature of injuries in high school football are not widely discussed, but the Fort Worth Star Telegram said McDaniel, who was pursuing a 2,000-yard season for the Dragons, may have broken his right collarbone. He appeared on the sideline after the half wearing his right arm in a sling so that seems a fair assessment.

McDaniel was 15 for 83 yards and 1 TD last night and finishes the season with 1,846 rushing yards. What the Dragons will be able to accomplish without the junior transfer from Coppell, who bedeviled DeSoto last week in Carroll’s signature round-two win over the Eagles, is anyone’s guess. But they’ll face an uphill battle against Midway, who dismantled Mansfield 48-17 on Friday to keep a perfect record.

The key play of the game, and easily one of the most dramatic in Dragon history, occurred early in the 4^th quarter. Trailing 24-21, the Dragons faced a 4^th down at the Arlington 2.

With McDaniel out of the game, quarterback Will Bowers engineered the drive that brought the Dragons to that decisive moment of the game, slipping easily into the role of Dragon playmaker.

His hard running and 26-yard and 21-yard passes to Cade Bell had moved the Dragons into the Colt red zone, but things got sticky inside the 5. Rather than settle for a tying field goal, Carroll head coach Hal Wasson chose to gamble on a go-ahead touchdown.

Bowers dropped back and drifted right as Colt defenders fought to reach him. He spotted Carson White speeding left across the goal line, pivoted and threw across his body. The ball sailed high, and White fought off two defenders to make a diving catch at the far corner of the end zone. The extra point gave the Dragons the 28-24 margin they carried to the closing bell.

“We knew it was going to come down to the wire, and someone was going to have to make a play,” Wasson told The Dallas Morning News. “But I think the difference for us, when they made plays or made a drive, we responded. That's playoff time. You either respond or you go home.”

So the Dragons will go to Waco, and Arlington goes home. The Carroll defense is a big reason why. It’s operating at maximum effectiveness and kept the Dragons in the game last night as they struggled to adjust to McDaniel’s absence. Moreover, the Dragons rediscovered their passing game, thanks to a magnificent effort by Bowers both in the air and on the ground.

Carroll seemed in full control last night before losing its rushing star. It opened with a seemingly effortless 12-play, 75-yard touchdown drive powered by McDaniel, who began with a 26-yard run on the first play of the game and ended with a 2-yard plunge into the end zone.

But when he left the game, you could almost hear the air going out of the Dragon offense. Arlington kept McDaniel’s backup, senior Tavian Gould, entirely in check, and Carroll’s drive toward a second TD stalled at the Colt 25.

An errant snap interrupted the timing of the usually reliable Neal Koskay, and his 41-yard field goal sailed wide.

Taking over on the 25, Colt quarterback D’Montae Davis handed off to RB Kenland McCray, who drove through the Dragon line and sprinted 75 yards to the end zone, leaving gaping Dragon defenders in his wake.

Carroll went 3-and-out on the next series, and the Colts were driving for a go-ahead TD when the Carroll defense stepped up big. A Davis pass was picked off by sophomore defensive back R.J. Mickens and returned 68 yards down the right sideline to give Southlake a 14-7 lead.

But the Colts showed their explosive power when Davis took the snap on the third play of the resulting series and charged 59 yards to even the score with 2:26 left in the half.

Another Carroll 3-and-out set up an energized Arlington at its 27, but Dragon defender Joe DeVincenzo intercepted a Davis pass to a receiver in the red zone, thus ending a disappointing half for Southlake.

Even the halftime show was full of dark omens. During the Emerald Belles routine, a Belle dancer tripped and fell. Recovering quickly, she smoothly rejoined the line, and the dance number continued without further mishap. It was the first time I’ve seen such a thing in 10 years of watching Southlake half-time shows. It’s got to mean something, right?

As the Belles foretold, Colt dominance opened the 2^nd half, with Davis and McCray engineering a 79-yard scoring drive to give Arlington its first lead of the night.

And that’s when the tempo of the game shifted. Bowers (10 of 14 for 179 yards and 1 TD, 87 yards on 18 carries) came out passing, sending a 57-yard bomb to Preston Forney and an 8-yard dart to Cade Bell (5 for 73). From the 10, Gould surged across the goal line, and the game was tied again 21-21.

The Dragons blunted the Colt express train on the next series, limiting Arlington to a 36-yard field goal. A definitive Dragon response was essential.

That response ended in the gutsy call to go for it all from the 2. But as incredibly exciting and immensely satisfying as White’s desperate heroics in the left corner of the end zone were, they only presented the Dragons with a 4-point lead. That seemed pretty flimsy with most of the 4^th quarter looming. I said quietly to myself, “Now we’ve got to stop them. Can we?”

The answer was yes, at least on the next Colt possession. But given a chance to score an insurance touchdown, the Dragons stalled, facing 4-3 at the Colt 33.

Bowers’ pass was batted down, and the Colts took over, needing 67 yards for the go-ahead touchdown with 2 minutes left.

Davis (11 of 17 for 129 yards, 15 for 139 yards and 2 TDs) and McCray (19 for 137, 1 TD) clawed their way to midfield. With 1:15 left, Davis faced 4-5 at the Dragon 49, but his wide-open receiver at the Carroll 30 saw the pass fly over his head. The Dragons took over the ball and ran out the clock.

After the game, Wasson praised his team for its determination in overcoming the loss of McDaniel.

“I couldn’t be more proud of these young men,” he said in a radio interview. “At the beginning of this season, I knew there was something unique and different about this team. They only needed to discover that. I think they did that tonight.”

Bell told a radio interviewer that the team adjusted naturally to the bitter loss of its best player.

“This is what we practice every day,” he said. “We’re all trained that any one of us can make those plays and handle those assignments. We’re Dragons. That’s what we do.”

That’s brave talk, and I’m sure young Bell believes every word of it. And why shouldn’t he? It’s one of the keys to the Dragons’ success over the years – training, discipline and believing in yourself. That has won more games than raw athletic talent any day. You can look it up.

When the game was over, the players converged to the sideline in front of the student section of the Ford Center. As they sang the Carroll alma mater, many waved four fingers over their heads, acknowledgment that they understand the significance of moving to the fourth round of the playoffs for the second time in four years.

This is a team for whom nothing has come easy. So why should facing a potent opponent without one of your chief weapons be any different? We’ll see how far grit and guts can carry these guys. Don’t bet against them.

Go Dragons!