Small schools play football six to a side
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Texas has many attributes which, over time, change small rural communities to small towns and small towns to small cities. Those transformations can take decades to occur, but when they do occur, it …
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Small schools play football six to a side
Texas has many attributes which, over time, change small rural communities to small towns and small towns to small cities. Those transformations can take decades to occur, but when they do occur, it usually seems like it happened too fast.
Conversely, there are yet cases where small towns – for reasons usually related to the economy of the local region – wither.
One thing which many of these communities have shared, or yet continue to share, is a unique brand of scholastic football: six-man football.
Those involved in six-man are akin to super-football fans. The game draws some passionate and life-long supporters, who champion this game far above the traditional 11-man version.
One of those men is Union Hill Bulldog Head Coach Josh Bragdon.
“Six-man football is an extreme type of mano-a-mano,” Bragdon explained.
For the uninitiated, it may at first glance appear to be a glorified 5-on-5 passing competition. That thought is quickly dispelled within seconds after kick off.
At a recent Union Hill home game in late October, there were more bone-crunching tackles and violent collisions in the first two series than are usually seen in four quarters of a traditional Friday night affair at larger schools.
This compact violence has many fathers, but it all starts with the size of the field. The official six-man field is 40 yards wide and 80 yards long. As the name implies, each team fields six players.
That translates into a lot of open space and requires a unique set of physical talents to compete.
As all players are eligible receivers on every play, the physical attributes of quickness, speed and strength dominate, but teams are not chockfull of fleet, agile players. Rather, six-man football players are more likely to be rangy, well-muscled and extremely well-conditioned.
Bragdon explained, “A prototypical six-man football player would be 6’ tall, 165-175 pounds and have a balance of strength and athleticism.”
At Union Hill, the Bulldogs rotate 9-10 players throughout the game. “You gotta be in shape,” quipped Bragdon.
There are a handful of six-man specific rules which differ from the traditional game. Among them are that the player receiving the snap cannot carry the ball across the line of scrimmage. That player normally laterals the ball further back in the pocket to a second player who plays a quarterback role.
A first down is 15 yards, not 10, although first downs do not play nearly as large a role in the game. Rather, this game is about scoring.
A point after touchdown (PAT) is worth two points, while a conversion tallies only a single point.
“That is significant, as three PATs is like scoring a fourth touchdown. It can add up fast,” Bragdon advised.
Possibly the biggest difference between the two games is psychological not physical. As Bragdon explained his Bulldogs are challenged to score on every play.
“We stress beating one’s opposite number, man on man, on the next play and if we all do that, we score. If we score, we win.”
There is no setting things up for a big play or playing for a first down at Union Hill. As evidenced in their 65-0 drumming of the Savoy Cardinals on Halloween night, the team takes this challenge of scoring on every play seriously.
The Bulldogs do it in a number of ways. They use a standard pro set, but they also use triplets set wide, a single fullback and two blockers and two wide-outs. The array of means by which they attack is impressive and limited only by Bragdon’s imagination.
Defensively, the Bulldogs simply attack. Their standard line up is two rushers, two outside linebackers and two safeties. Part of the reason for the number of booming tackles are that the defenders must be very adept at closing quickly and with enough energy to assure the tackle.
At Union Hill it is a prized skill.
The Union Hill Bulldogs have a proud gridiron history in 11-man and six-man football. Adorning the press box at Billy Bass Field are placards honoring the 1948 six-man bidistrict championship team, state titles in 1978 and 1982 in conference A and class B divisions respectively, and area championships in 2003 and 2006.
In 2014, Union Hill – just northwest of Gilmer on Farm to Market 2088 – transitioned back to six-man from 11-man football.
Bragdon, a Brownsboro native, has led the team since 2018.
Across the state, and at Union Hill, the six-man game is thriving. There are 78 Division 1 and 76 Division 2 teams in regular UIL competition, and another 144 teams in charter, Christian, private and homeschool divisions. In addition to Union Hill, there are local teams in Longview, Tyler, Leverett’s Chapel and Campbell.
According to Bragdon, the many challenges of small rural schools and the extraordinarily-long travel to away games (it is not unusual for Union Hill to travel 4-5 hours in a big yellow school bus for an away game to Central Texas) are nothing when compared with the value of the six-man game.
Bragdon explained, “There is something special about kids who play six-man football. The game is a brotherhood of players and coaches who learn one most important life lesson – never give up, you never give up!”
In an odd quirk of geography, there is a small sliver of the Union Hill school district which falls within the eastern edge of Wood County. Should one catch a Union Hill score while checking the results of playoff action, remember to pull for the home team.