GRANITE SHOALS, Texas — Granite Shoals police chief John Ortis was dog tired by mid-afternoon on the Saturday of the Texas High School Barbecue State Championships.
The heat – and the fact that he’d been at Quarry Park since 3:15 a.m. to set up the event – was only half the story. Three days ago, this entire place was underwater after three days of torrential rain. As a city, Granite Shoals had shut down and banded together to tend to Code Red: saving the BBQ State Championships. Roads were blocked off because the street crews were using asphalt-digging equipment to turn Quarry Park’s dirt over and let the water drain out. Fire Chief Tim Campbell coordinated the audio and electrical equipment for a new PA system. City councilmembers like Steve Hougen and Judy Salvaggio stepped in as two of 175 volunteer judges to cover for out-of-towners who couldn’t make it.
From the outside looking in, it seems like there were so many reasons to just cancel. Quarry Park is hosting the Howdy Roo BBQ next week, and the three-day Granite Fest music concert the week after. Why not just throw in the towel – or napkin – and live to fight another weekend? After all, the city doesn’t take a host fee.
Honestly, all the work won’t make sense to you for a couple more hours. Not until you stand beside Chuck Schoenfeld, the president of High School BBQ Inc., as he emcees the award ceremony. Schoenfeld and his wife, Marnie, serve on the board with other founding members Russell Woodward, Marcus McMellon, and Jan Elliott. They've since added Alec Knight and Jerry McPherson as the event has expanded to 92 high schools from across the state of Texas. With five cooks per team, combined with parents and friends supporting each, at least 1,000 people are hanging on Schoenfeld’s word. Only at that moment will you realize that canceling this event was never in the cards.
“When you stand down there, looking back this way, it’s a sea of people you would not believe,” Ortis said.
The Texas high school state championships in football and basketball are undoubtedly a spectacle. Take a time-lapse video over three days, and you’ll see cowboys from a town of 200 people be replaced by blue-collar trade workers from a tight-knit community who are then replaced by financial analysts from the biggest metro areas. But nowhere else do you see all those people in the same park at the same time. Texas is one of the most diverse states in the country. A road trip in the northeast that would take you through four states wouldn’t even cover half of Texas. But your eyes could span over the entire state standing under the awning at Quarry Park. Class 6A Southlake Carroll’s barbecue pit was next to Class 2A Nocona’s. The Lancaster contingent from South Dallas pulled up lawn chairs beside Laredo ISD students and parents. Three schools that would normally never cross paths – North Texas Prosper Walnut Grove, Central Texas Giddings, and South Texas Laredo Nixon – all tied for second place.
Everyone had the same task to prepare five dishes: dessert, barbecue beans, chicken, ribs, and brisket. But they all had different ways of inheriting their recipes and love of the sport.
Some, like state champion-alumnus Dylan Dodd, hardly knew how to cook ramen noodles before he started culinary classes at Reagan County High School. Now a football player at Wayland Baptist, he’s majoring in chemistry and minoring in cell biology, thanks in large part to the interest sparked by competing at the state level.
“Anytime there’s a get-together – a pre-season cookout or a post-spring ball cookout – I’ve become the cook. It’s such an awesome skill that I got from (State BBQ),” Dodd said.
Others, like Somerset all-state offensive lineman Jake Seay, were born into barbecue through their family business. Seay is one of three football linemen on Somerset’s barbecue team. Somerset agriculture science teacher Cody Riojas started the group at his alma mater after seeing how it could help kids find a career - or simply a new life skill - while teaching at Cotulla. But even he never would’ve guessed that football players like Seay would give as much effort in the pit as they did on the field.
“Jake is very blessed,” Riojas said. “He’s been able to visit other colleges and see where his future might be as far as football. The fact that we’re able to combine the two has been the coolest thing on earth. If you would’ve told me I’d have football players this involved in meat science and barbecue, I’d have been like, ‘Nah, I went to school here!’”
And then there are those who followed in their siblings’ footsteps, like Laredo Nixon quarterback Mauricio Lugo. He originally got into barbecue because it reminded him of his family cookouts. Lugo realized he’d found a new family by the time he reached his first state championship at Granite Shoals.