A Behind the Scenes look at TXHSFB Sotomayor Wildcats and their 2024 Area Round Playoff Game

“Nothing’s better than hibernate.” These were the words from Sonia Sotomayor High School Head Football coach Juan Morales. We were talking about another special team’s gadget play Sotomayor was running through during their gameday “kick the field.” I was asking if Morales liked this play better than hibernate, and he said, “Nothing’s better than hibernate.” 

What is hibernate? It is a play Morales has only run twice in his coaching career. It is a run out the clock, special teams play that the defense can respond to a few different ways. Because the play ultimately results in a safety, it is only meant to be run as the final play with at least a three-point cushion. That was exactly the situation Sotomayor found themselves in six days prior at the end of their very first playoff game in school history.

Sonia Sotomayor opened in 2022. With San Antonio’s continuous growth and the rapid expansion of the “Alamo Ranch” area, the Northside Independent School district needed another school. Within a short drive of Sotomayor include Taft High School, O’Connor High School, and Harlan High School. With Harlan being the closest, a majority of Sotomayor’s 2025 Senior completed their freshman year at Harlan. 

In 2022 the Sotomayor Wildcat Football team went 1-9. They improved the next year, but still found themselves having a losing record of 4-6. 2024 was poised for a big year. Experts were viewing Sotomayor as a fringe playoff team, likely filling that fourth spot but it wouldn’t be unheard of for them to earn their first playoff berth. 

Sotomayor exceeded expectations. They went into the final week of the season playing for a top two district finish, securing a winning record of 7-3, and a very winnable matchup against Bi-district round opponent, Winston Churchill High School. When I asked Soto Offensive Coordinator Dave Gibbons what made this team special, he touched on the culture and attitude, while also trusting the process. “It’s been three years in the making, we won one game, then 4, then 7, and made the playoffs. Our average points per game each season have increased, and we’ve improved from the start of the season.”

While the offense saw big improvements, the defense led the way. With Defensive Coordinator Josh Campbell manning the ship, him and his staff helped their players produce the 2^nd best defense in the district allowing just 18.1 ppg. Often this season it was the defense keeping the opponent at bay while the offense found their footing. In several games momentum swung with key stops and defensive turnovers. 

If you pay close attention to big school High School Football, you likely knew that Sotomayor would defeat Churchill for their first playoff win in school history. They successfully used Coach Morales’ play hibernate to run out the clock, and despite the safety the final score displayed 23-19 Wildcats. Fast forward six days later and the Wildcats are preparing for their Area round playoff matchup against the heavily favored Vandegrift Vipers. Game location; the Alamodome. 

As someone who grew up in Minnesota but has lived in Texas for twelve years now, I’ve grown accustomed to how much bigger football is down South. There are still new discoveries each fall that manage to surprise me. One of those is the weekly pep rally’s during football season. There is a little more of a buzz for this week’s rally. After all, it is the Area round of the 6A Division II playoffs, but for Sotomayor they are doing their best to treat it as business as usual. 

Following the pep rally the Varsity team rushes outside in their helmet, t-shirt, and shorts for the weekly kick the field walkthrough. The 45-minute practice goes through all phases of the game, focusing on key schemes and plays, one of which is hibernate. Although kick off won’t be for another 10 hours, the final preparations have started. 

While Texas loves their football, this is still a UIL sport and there is still school. Following practice the students disperse for their first academic class of the day. It’s a mix of responsibilities on the coaches side. Some have conference periods set up, others have substitute requests to have time for game day responsibilities, while others have classes. 

There is a wide range of experience for the Sotomayor coaching staff. Head Coach Juan Morales has been around the sport for over thirty years while Defensive Line Coach Xander Yarberough is a young coach and in his first year at Sotomayor. There are also San Antonio connections scattered throughout the coach’s roster. 

One of those local ties is a name that will be very familiar to UTSA Football diehards, Mauricio Sanchez. Sanchez was on the original 2011 roster for the Roadrunners. A Safety while at UTSA, he is credited with the first forced fumble in program history. The Alamodome has a special place for Coach Sanchez. He played his final high school game at the Alamodome, his final collegiate game at the Alamodome, and now he will be one of the coaches for Sotomayor’s first Area round playoff game. 

Sanchez described the forced fumble as his “favorite memory” as a collegiate player. “The moment I forced that fumble, and we recovered it, the dome was one of the loudest times I ever remembered. The way the dome keeps sound in and almost 57K people going crazy, you couldn’t hear yourself think. The game was wrapped up by that point, but nobody wanted to leave the first game. Everyone wanted to be a part of it.” 

Sanchez also talked about what it feels like being back as a coach. He called it a “full circle moment.” In high school he dreamed about one day being a coach. “You get to see it the way your position coach saw things. I can look out on that field and see myself at different points in my career. Spots where I got an interception against Rice. To be coaching the game on this field is special.” 

For other coaches, they may not have played the game at a high level, but the Alamodome is not new to them. Linebackers coach Miguel Rodriguez attended UTSA and was a student analyst for Larry Coker and the UTSA Football team. Rodriguez had more of a lighthearted answer on the difference between being in the box as an analyst vs position coach. “As an analyst, it’s not on you. You do your job, the stress is before the game, and it’s the position coaches’ job to coach.” 

The gameday itinerary resembles that of a wedding day schedule. From the moment students are released to kick off every task, routine, and responsibility has a duration and a time hack. It’s been like that for every game. Routine and structure are paramount. From passing out game day pants, socks, and meals to watching a hype video and one more final walkthrough with the help of the scout team. As Coach Campbell says weekly “Hay is in the barn.” 

Just how big of a deal is a playoff win, or advancing to the second round? For San Antonio schools, it’s not a guarantee. Wildcat offensive line coach Mike Motz talked about how special it is to do this. “This is the third school I got to do this with. Two of those schools, they were new schools, and it was their first time. The other, it had been a fifteen-year drought. School spirit and culture go with the team and its success. Good or bad. Football success springboards the rest of the school.” Like Football being the front porch of universities, it is the same with high schools. 

Motz also discussed starting the tradition at Sotomayor. “It’s fun to see. It’s fun that we won our first game instead of losing. Starting a tradition is hard to do, but fun. What Brennan has done, I and others got to help start that. There is some pride involved in the job we did and the roots we laid.” 

And as for that school pride, the Wildcat fans met the task. Despite the weekday start time, by kick off the Soto fans had filled up. A solid crowd on what is typically the UTSA Roadrunners home side, families, friends, students, and fans were excited to cheer on the Cats. At one point during warms ups one of the Sotomayor coaches can be heard saying “same game, just a bigger venue.” In the dome you can hear the pop of the ball as it kicked by the specialists. As Vandegrift is warming up on the other side you can see that the Vipers are bigger, faster, and favored. Online predictions have the score outcome as 40-6, Vipers. 

The Vandegrift side is a fraction of fans as that of Soto. Perhaps a mix of the Thursday kickoff, the drive from Austin, and the plan to wait until the following week’s round also at the Alamodome. For Vandegrift though, they don’t need to crowd as a boost, and with the Alamodome’s acoustics their few hundred fans are plenty loud. 

The game itself goes about how you would expect. Vandegrift comes out fast and hungry. What would be an unfortunate foreshadowing of the entire game, Sotomayor’s improved offense is stagnant. They have very little success moving the ball, however that top district defense does its best to keep it 7-0 at the end of the first quarter. 

After each ensuing drive, Coach Campbell and his staff do their best to scheme, improve, and motivate the defense. Their breaks are short however as the offense continues to struggle. With the physicality mismatch and what seems all the bounces going the Vipers way, it is 28-0 at halftime. All hope is not lost, but it is quickly fading. A few individuals from the crowd voice their displeasure with the results on the field while offering what they feel would turn the momentum. 

While the respective school’s pep, cheer, and band members go through their halftime performances on the field, the tunnel of the Alamodome is the Sotomayor staff summarizing what went wrong in the first half and how the gameplan needed to be changed. 

From there, the defensive squad is giving a wakeup call but also motivating halftime speech from Wildcat Defensive Coordinator Josh Campbell. He focuses on what you would expect facing a deficit of 28-0, while making sure to emphasize that it’s not over yet. 

If this was a movie script, this would be the point where everything shifts. Sotomayor would come out and score immediately and go on to finish off a resounding comeback that pushes the Wildcats to the third round for the first time ever. Unfortunately, that would not be the case tonight. It was more of the same from the first half. While the only points scored in the third quarter was a Wildcat safety, the 30-0 deficit might as well seem like 60-0. The defense is growing tired, the offense despite their creativity remains stagnant and the few opportunities to put points on the board come up short with missed field goals. 

With each Viper touchdown, more and more Wildcat fans begin to disperse from the Alamodome. Friends and family hang over the railing as they tell the player they are there to support that they are leaving. It is still a respectable crowd by the time the final whistle blows, but not nearly what it was just a few hours prior. 

As the scoreboard shows 51-0 as the clock reaches 0:00, the two teams walk across midfield to shake hands. It is a mixed state of affairs on the Soto side of the field. Following the school’s alma mater, there are tears, hugs, some laughs and individuals and position groups getting one more picture.

For the Seniors, this is it. Some have an opportunity to play lower division football at the next level. But for most of the Seniors, their football career is over. The underclassmen will soon turn their mindset towards the offseason and preparing for the next opportunity. 

Wildcat Head Coach Juan Morales speaks with the team. He talks about the “legacy that was created. You all proved that you belong here and proved that you can do this. You Seniors laid the groundwork, now it will be up to us to continue to carry it forward.” During pictures and final moments on the field I ask Coach Morales what this team meant to him. “It was the epitome of getting everything to come together. We turned a corner this year and we continued to trust the process. It was fun to see these Seniors grow up. It’s been three years in the works.” 

It is a quick exit following the return to the locker room and loading up the buses. The ride back to Sonia Sotomayor High School will take about 30 minutes, and there’s no canceled classes on Friday. 

When the Wildcats return, Coach Morales has one more task for the team. With the Seniors lined up outside the school, he instructs the rest of the team to go through and shake each Seniors hand and share what they meant to them. It is the final moment of a season that will be remembered for a long time. 

A Texas High School Football program is run as close to a college program as allows. The position coaches, coordinators, and Head Coach invest countless hours in preparation, analysis, assessment, and refocusing. It is a long three months from the beginning of August when fall camp kicked off. While the final box score may not support it, this Sotomayor team grew up throughout the 2024 season. The leaps and bounds they made from opening week against Clark High School to the Area Round playoffs was a stark difference. 

The Wildcats will turn the page to focusing on the 2025 season. They lose some key pieces in all three phases of the game, while also having some talented underclassmen looking to carry the torch. The goal has now been raised. They have tasted success and will look to build on it. This is Texas High School Football, and the ultimate goal remains, STATE. “Nothing’s better than hibernate.” 

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