Coach Claude Mathis
Photo by Kyle Dantzler
DeSoto
(Texas) football coach Claude Mathis wasn’t particularly pleased with
his team’s 46-27 win over Oklahoma and Perennial Oklahoma power Jenks on
Saturday in the Southwest Showcase.
The late-afternoon game was
marred with turnovers, penalties and some special teams blunders. DeSoto
won despite fumbling eight times.
“We’re by no means clicking on
all cylinders right now,” Mathis told the Dallas Morning News. “We
overcame that adversity, so I’m OK with that.”
Despite all the
miscues, Mathis held the Eagles together and won the game going away in
an emotional showdown of cross-state rivals.
For it he was selected the Dallas Coach of the Week presented by Comerica Bank.
Dontre
Wilson rushed 22 times for 132 yards and two scores and Nick Orr
blocked two punts and added an interception and a touchdown in the
victory at Pennington Field
“The (players) were so hyped for Texas versus Oklahoma that they were just playing too fast,” Mathis said.
Mathis
knows about playing fast. He was a football star and track sprinter at
Bartlett High before setting career and season rushing records at Texas
State University.
As a junior in high school, he rushed for 2,199
yards and 31 touchdowns. He led Bartlett to a pair of state
championships as an All-State defensive back and running back.
His
coaching career started in 1998 at Austin Anderson High, where he was
offensive coordinator from 2000-04. He got his first head coaching job
at Sommerville, but taking the same duties at Austin LBJ High School,
where he went 21-16 in three season.
In 2008, he took over at
DeSoto and was voted District 11-5A Coach of the Year his first season.
His team’s have steadily improved while going 41-14 in his four seasons
plus.
He was coveted and actually accepted a job in January to
become the running backs coach at the University of Houston. In Feb., he
returned to coach the Eagles, stating the timing just wasn’t right for
him to leave. The Eagles and DeSoto community were glad he changed his
mind.
College coaches have flocked the DeSoto program since
Mathis arrived. Roughly five to 10 Eagles from each recruiting class
eventually make it to Division I programs. Mathis told Austin Statesmen
columnist Cedric Golden that his players work just as hard off the field
as on it.
“I know my kids work their butts off in the classroom,
then come out to the field and do the same thing,” Mathis told Golden.
“When you have great kids and great coaches doing the right thing ... it
just burns me up when guys say we're just all about talent. We put in
the work here.”
