𝗕𝗥𝗢𝗪𝗡𝗦𝗩𝗜𝗟𝗟𝗘'𝗦 𝗘𝗟 𝗝𝗔𝗥𝗗𝗜𝗡 𝗛𝗜𝗚𝗛 𝗦𝗖𝗛𝗢𝗢𝗟 𝗟𝗢𝗦𝗘𝗦 𝗧𝗢 𝗛𝗔𝗥𝗟𝗜𝗡𝗚𝗘𝗡'𝗦 𝗦𝗧𝗨𝗔𝗥𝗧 𝗣𝗟𝗔𝗖𝗘 𝟴𝟰-𝟯 𝗜𝗡 𝟭𝟵𝟯𝟵, 𝗕𝗨𝗧 𝗥𝗘𝗡𝗘 𝗧𝗢𝗥𝗥𝗘𝗦 𝗖𝗔𝗟𝗟𝗦 𝗜𝗧 𝗔 "𝗪𝗜𝗡!"

 by Rene Torres

They lost the game, but won the hearts of their fans

Fight! Fight! Fight! For the green and white

El Jardin High School Comets Football Team~1939

The year was 1929, only three years after the new El Jardin school building was erected, that its football 11, the Comets, were fighting for their lives on the gridiron. 

The team, which later was known as the Cougars, was coached by J. Harrison Diltz.

The rural school football title was on the line with Stuart Place and El Jardin having two games remaining against each other for the crown.

El Jardin had a formable starting line-up that included: H. Vicars, left end; Frazier, left tackle; Carl Vicars, left guard; Underwood, center; Kemper, right guard; Gendenning, right tackle; Adams, right end; Coy Vicars, quarterback; Lawrence, left halfback; Mathias, right halfback; and Triplett, fullback.

In their first encounter, Stuart Place gained an advantage on the Cameron County Rural title by defeating the Comets in Brownsville 13-12. 

The Brownsville Herald described it as a nip and tuck affair, with neither team holding a decided advantage. 

El Jardin’s inability to score points after touchdowns and a called back score for being off sides was the downfall for the Comets.

The second game was played at Stuart Place— where El Jardin was embarrassed and Coach Ryle’s team ended the season with undefeated record and the Rural Championship Crown.

But wait a minute, according to Bruce Underwood, those three points that the Comets scored, "were the greatest three points in Rio Grande Valley Football."

The following is a reprint of Underwood’s story of that November afternoon game of 1929:

Eleven spirited but rather scrawny El Jardin High School football players were taking the most awful drubbing of their lives on that mild afternoon at Stuart Place High School in November of 1929.

The host team, it was proved later, had brought in five huge, over-aged, ineligible players to help insure a victory in this second of the three game series against El Jardin. Such a victory would enable Stuart Place to win the Cameron County Class “B” Championship.

Stuart Place’s power was evident in the first play from scrimmage when El Jardin guard-center Bruce Underwood was knocked out for this only time in sports competition which would eventually cover 16 years of his life.

Coach Diltz’s El Jardin Comets tried everything they knew to hold the score down, since it seemed impossible for them to score, but the Comets pulled a foxy play when Stuart was four touchdowns ahead.

Tackle Homer Vicars received the ball after a kickoff, but instead of returning it he amazed the home team by holding the ball a second, while the Stuart players thundered toward him. Just in time he punted the ball 35 yards back into Stuart territory.

Even this unexpected reverse didn’t keep the home team from piling up a higher and higher score.

By the time the fourth quarter rolled around, the dog-tired Comets didn’t even bother to keep the score with the home team juggernaut smothering the Brownsville boys with the small handful of spectators losing interest.

After El Jardin received the ball on the next kickoff, quarterback Coy Vicars tried three plays that got nowhere while he routinely called for a punt. (In those days the quarterback ran the game; his team executed the plays he called.) 

Just before the center snapped the ball, however, Coy shouted “Signals check.” 

Quickly, he called the number for scrappy Bill Lawrence to do what he used to a lot on the practice field.

Bill was to try a drop-kick a goal, no matter if the ball was almost 40 yards from the Stuart goal line.

As the viciously charging Stuart line poured toward him, unflappable Bill got off the most stunning drop-kick of his life, a 52-yard beaut. As the ball headed straight toward the uprights and spun end over end high above the crossbar, an amazed referee thrust both of his arms toward the sky. 

The Comets had always liked Bill, but now they revered him. 

The final score of 84-3 was incredibly better than 84-0 would have been.

The moral of the story is that regardless of the score, the game is not over ‘til it’s over. 

When it comes to victories or defeats, we must remember the words of Michel de Montaigne when he wrote, “there are some defeats more triumphant than victories”

Allow me to close with the El Jardin High School Alma Mater, as written in 1939 for those that proudly walked the halls of that once rural school, a school that was then so removed from city life, but so much closer to life and the pursuit of happiness:

1. In this tip of Tex--as where bal-my breezes blow,

2. Our ban-ner is the peer—its col-ors may they shine,

1. Palm trees and poin-set-tas and golden grape-fruit grow,

2. Green for youth-ful vig-or and white for hon-or or fine,

1. The dear-est spot of all, the school we love so well,

2. Now come, let us re-call, those memories so dear,

1. El Jar-din--- High School, your glories swell.

2. Give us now, your class-mates, and a lus-ty cheer!

We’ll fight, fight, and fight, dear green and white,

We’ll give our best to you;

So true to thee, we’ll ever be,

We’ll fight for you