A Texas Football Team Will Travel 1700 Miles For 3 District Games

We are now a month into the Texas high school football season and many teams have just started or are about to start district play.

Anthony Wildcats

I always thought that El Paso was as far west as you could go in the state of Texas, but I recently learned that was incorrect.

Anthony, Texas is located just northwest of El Paso and shares a border with Anthony, New Mexico. I guess you could call it the Western version of Texarkana.

The town of about 4,000 people is home to the Anthony Wildcats. Their football team plays in District 3 - 3A along with Alpine, Crane, and Compass Academy in Odessa.

Since there are only four teams in this district, each school plays each other twice, alternating one game on the road and the other at home.

This means that Anthony will be making three road trips for district football games, and those three games, round trip, will add up to around 1700 miles.

Austin, Texas to New York City is around 1750 miles.

Anthony at Alpine (September 27)

The Wildcats will kick off district play on the road against the Alpine Fightin' Bucks. This will be the shortest district road trip for Anthony.

That's around 480 miles round trip which adds up to about 7 1/2 hours on the road. I don't know if they use charter buses or go with the yellow dogs, but I would imagine traveling in a standard school bus will add at least another half hour to the total.

Anthony at Compass Academy (October 4)

The Wildcats will be on the road the following Friday with a trip to Odessa to take on Compass Academy.

610 miles...yeah, 610 miles round trip from Anthony to Odessa. Thankfully, this trip will be primarily on Interstate 10, but the team will still be on the bus for at least 10 1/2 hours.

Anthony at Crane (November 8)

The Wildcats will allow their buses to get some rest before their next road game. Anthony's final district game of the season will be at Crane, a little south of Odessa.

This game will match the game in Odessa for miles (610 round trip) and time on the bus (10.5 hours), although the trip will require some time on a two-lane highway from Pecos to Crane.

Adding Up The Miles

So, that's the 'short' trip to Alpine for 480 miles, a trip to Odessa for 610 round trip miles, and then another 610-mile trip to Crane.

That adds up to 1700 miles or about 27-28 hours of total travel time.

Back when I played for the Lockhart Lions, I think our longest road trip was to Lampasas. That was a 2-hour trip (one-way) on Highway 183. I guess it could have been a lot worse.