MaxPreps Oregon Team of the Week: Dallas football

It’s not exactly America’s team, nor even Oregon’s.

The Dallas High School football team had won a measly 10 games the previous 10 years combined before 2013.

But the Dragons have almost equaled that title in one season.

Behind second-year head coach Tracy Jackson, Dallas (8-3) went on the road last week to upset seventh seed Hermiston 41-35 in overtime on a 1-yard touchdown run by David Rebischke. An interception sealed the victory.

For their banner season and upset win, the Dragons are the MaxPreps Oregon Team of the Week, presented by the Oregon National Guard.

"We have some experienced players who wanted to do the extra work that needs to be done in order to improve and get to that next level," said Jackson. "They have been in the weight room since last December and over the summer we gave our team demanding workouts. This has allowed our bodies to perform better and then confidence comes from realizing that we have done all the hard work.

"This game has a physical, mental and emotional component and we have the knowledge that we have been doing the right things and, yes, we can do it and we deserve it."

Dallas got off quickly to start the game with a 10-yard touchdown run by Tim Smothers and a Ryan Spencer interception return for another score making it 14-0.

After Hermiston closed to 14-7, a long kickoff return to the Bulldogs’ 9 set up a short TD run by Rebischke. The teams traded two touchdowns before Smothers recovered a fumble in the end zone to go up 35-21.

Hermiston (6-4) eventually tied it before the Dragons, who finished with a remarkable 414 rushing yards according to northeastoregonnow.com, and won it in overtime.

"We had a big lead early, three important kids went down, we were 5 hours away from home, and we could feel the momentum turning," said Jackson. "Sometimes games happen like that and you have to be able to fight through it, and we fought through it.

"The players got together in a huddle right before overtime started, without the coaches, and they looked each other in the eyes and said we have payed the price and we don't want to give up now. This was a defining moment for our team."

It was Dallas’ fourth straight win and sets up a rematch with No. 2 seed West Albany, which defeated the Dragons 14-7 on Oct. 10, on Friday in quarterfinal action.

"In situations like this, some players would give up and say, 'it's not our night,' but we didn't do that. Our team was not willing to give up," said Jackson. "We came away from this experience saying we are better than we think we are.

"We had brought 500-700 fans to the game who were there supporting us. After the game they waited for us and as we started walking out — our team could hear the uproar of screaming and cheering from our fans. The emotion was surreal and as a coach it was a beautiful thing to watch."

The Dragons have been rushing by committee all season — through 10 games, five different players had rushed between 226 and 875 yards.

Leading the way in the regular season was Rebischke with 874 yards, followed by Smothers with 615, Caleb Naughton (592), Spencer McCarron (279) and Chase Mauk (226).

Senior quarterback Josh Kibbey manages the offense and has thrown for 657 yards and six touchdowns. Smothers is also the leading receiver with 11 catches for 234 yards and two scores.

One of the big strengths on the team is swarming to the ball and tackling. They’ve been led in tackles all season by McCarron (90 tackles, 10 per game), followed by Naughton (87, 8.7) , Jacob Bowman (71, 7.1) and Kaj Christensen (47, 6.7).

The Dragons attack from all angles and have recorded a whopping 49 sacks, led by Bowman’s 13. Nobody else has more than five.

Unlike Dallas, Friday’s opponent West Albany has a strong recent history of success as Randy Nyquist has led the Bulldogs to 85 wins since 2006 with perfect 14-0 records and state 5A titles in 2007 and 2008.

"We are going to make a couple adjustments. West Albany is awesome and their personnel is strong so we will have to prepare for that," said Jackson. "We will have to limit our turnovers and mistakes and we will have to play a tough game to beat them. The cool thing about our team is that every week we are learning more and more about ourselves and each other."

MaxPreps editorial assistant Kirstin Beal contributed to this report.

Do you know a team that deserves consideration for Oregon Team of the Week? Email us with your nominations at ORteamoftheweek@maxpreps.com.