No one warned Ingram Tom Moore head coach Tate DeMasco to bring a change of clothes to the bi-district playoff game in the event of a Gatorade bath. He was sopping wet, sticking to the bus seat on the 80-mile drive back to Ingram, a ride so uncomfortable it convinced him this couldn’t be a dream — that his Warriors truly won the first playoff game since 2014.
After an upset 24-17 win over Hondo, a normal coach would’ve used the moment to boast to his team that they’d done what nobody believed they could. But DeMasco is not a normal coach, and this is not a normal season. They’d done what they themselves didn’t think they could, becoming the first Ingram Moore football team in 41 years to reach the playoffs in back-to-back seasons, months after the second-deadliest flood in Texas history ripped through their town and lives on July 4th.
“Some of y’all didn’t believe that we could get this done,” DeMasco said. “I’m not BSing you when I tell you that.”
That Independence Day at 4:00 a.m., the Guadalupe River rose 26 feet in 45 minutes. A natural disaster that lasted less than an hour set this community on a years-long recovery process. In the weeks after, Ingram didn’t even know if it would have a football season. DeMasco and the coaches from all the school’s teams pulled off 18-hour days driving boxes of food around the town and cleaning people’s gutted houses. Football was the furthest thing from their minds.
Ingram started 0-4. A daunting non-district schedule combined with their devastated town created a perfect storm, putting the season on the brink. But then they clawed back, just like their community did. The coaches stopped playing athletes both ways so they could focus on one side of the ball and play with more energy. The defensive staff implemented new stunts along the defensive line, which increased pressure on opposing quarterbacks.
But no football explanation does justice to what’s happened on the field. This team and town are battle-tested. This summer they were torn to shreds, and this fall they’re built different.
“It’s just very motivating to know that the team knows how much work went into the flood relief,” Burch said. “They used that same motivation that they used to help people to instead train and get ready for this year.”
Murayama called off work for the first round playoff game, and he insists he’ll do so again next week. He went down to the winning locker room to congratulate the coaching staff. As he watched DeMasco beaming with the trophy, all he could see was his sunburned face back in July, beaming with a box of food and a quick joke that could bring a little light to that dark day.
“Right away, I thought about the Lord,” Murayama said. “I said, ‘Man, is this a team where Tate got blessed for all he did for the community?’”
Ingram was lost amid much of the summer media coverage of the floods. That’s not an indictment on the news media, but yet another example of how Ingram is encroached upon by the larger town of Kerrville. Ingram, six miles west, does not have a delineating town line or town square. It’s easy to mistake it as part of Kerrville, except Kerrville’s city government services do not extend to Ingram. That’s what made DeMasco and the entire athletic department’s response all the more necessary.
DeMasco cringes at the idea that he was the ringleader of the recovery effort. And while he did lead all the coaches in the school as the athletic director, he was one of many who answered the call, not the one shining leader. But given his leadership position as the head football coach, his service, day in and day out, made everyone work harder.
“The community would’ve responded even if Tate wasn’t here,” Burch said. “But I think it helped perpetuate the situation, seeing Tate take the lead without being asked. He was a role model. It spurred me. I’m ex-law enforcement who would’ve been there every day, but it was nice to see Tate and all the other coaches there every day.”
When Dave Campbell’s TexasFootball shadowed DeMasco in the summer, he said that the time Ingram would need the most help was when the news coverage ceased. Ingram will be rebuilding much longer than the media can give it the top story treatment. This historic football season is keeping their town’s fight in the spotlight.
“Our West Kerr community needed that victory last night,” DeMasco said.