The cream of the high school football crop in the area covered this 1973 season by Terrell Tribune personnel has been converted into the first All Area High School Football Squad.

Seven Tribune staff members, all of whom became well versed in the abilities and capabilities of young men from Terrell, Kaufman, Forney, Quinlan and Wills Point high schools, joined together to come up with the mythical team. Sixty-six games were seen by these people.

The 47 young men honored on this squad represent the best from those five schools.

Twelve men were selected for the offense, including a placekicker and 12 were picked for the defense, including a punter. In addition, 25 got honorable mention. The Terrell Tigers led the way in placing players on the big squad that would make any coach's mouth water, so great is the talent. Fifteen Tigers were chosen.

Nine Kaufman Lions, nine Forney Jackrabbits, eight Wills Point Tigers and six Quinlan Panthers.

What coach in the state wouldn't dream of having a set of running backs like Forney's Steve Collier, the 6-2 and 210-pound senior, or Kenneth Sabella, Quinlan's outstanding fullback, a strapping 185-pound senior.

Terrell's senior quarterback Lance Vincent got the edge over other quarterbacks for that important position.

Punter, Kicker

To supplement the backfield, the panel chose a punter and a combination extra point kicker and kickoff man.

Phil Evans, who has averaged about 40 yards a punt this season for Wills Point, was chosen as the squad's punter.

Terry Wooten of Terrell became the only member of this elite squad getting double designation. He was chosen as the kicker, and prior to that was tabbed as one of the offensive tackles.

Johnny Briscoe, the best football player pound by pound in his class, and Terrell's Rick Norris, 170-pound senior, are the offensive guards. Briscoe is a 181-pound senior from Forney.

Center for this great line offensively is Robert Woods, the 210-pound junior from Terrell. Woods, in his first year ever as a center, was the big reason the Tigers' ground game averaged 256 yards a game.

Harold Jones, the gifted junior receiver at 160 pounds for Terrell and Bob Long, the glue-fingered 190-pound senior of Kaufman, were picked as the ends.

Tremendous defense

While the offensive potential is outstanding with this group, even more so is the defensive talent.

To front this fine defensive platoon, four down linemen, four linebackers and three deep backs were selected.

It was the belief of the panel that the linebacking foursome of Terrell's Ron McGowan, 215-pound senior; Kaufman's Jimmy Dan Elzner, 195, senior; Will Point's Tom Malouf, 175-pound senior and Forney's Willie B. Thomas, 167-pound senior, could make most college teams now.

The defensive platoon missed some great performers because the panel chose not to pick men for both offense and defense.

The down front four for this outstanding aggregation is made up of Dean Knauss, 180, senior from Terrell; Tony Jackson, 210, senior from Forney; George Matthew, 180, senior from Quinlan and Walter Pettigrew, 200, senior from Kaufman.

The three deep backs for this defensive unit are in classes by themselves. There is Frank Hinton, 145-pound senior from Terrell; Jackye Shouse, 165-pound Quinlan senior and Robert Runnels, 164-pound Forney senior.

The Honorable mention

Players who missed out on the all-area offense and defense by narrow margins were delegated to the honorable mention designation.

The honorable mention backs were Jerry Morgan, Quinlan; Ronnie Pittmon, Forney; Herman Cunigam, Wills Point; Freddie Moore, Wills Point; Phil Loughmiller, Wills Point; John Fineout, Ivory Hunt and Earl Wilcots, all of Terrell; Marshall Collier, John Allen, Gill Smith and Fred Carlisle, all of Kaufman.

Honorable mention linemen chosen were: James Thomas, Martines Smith and Randy Oakley, off of Wills Point; David DeVlaming and Mike Briggs of Kaufman; Doug Strickland and Reg Pegram of Terrell; Dusty Webb, Ronnie Briscoe and Larry Runnels of Forney; and Richard Hass and Steve Lattig of Quinlan.

Special thanks to Tony Jackson for providing this article.