Kevin Kolb was in the stands, watching Stephenville High’s Class 4A Division I state semifinal against Highland Park, but he kept checking his cell phone, trying to keep up with the college scores.
He was monitoring distant games, especially the Conference USA championship in Orlando, Fla., hoping the right combination of outcomes would land the Cougars a bowl invitation. And when Tulsa defeated Central Florida in C-USA’s first conference title game, the dominoes began to fall.
So even though Stephenville, his former team, suffered a 41-38 loss, everything else went Kolb’s way, and he walked away with at least a hint of a smile.
The Houston Cougars were going bowling. And they would stay close to home — Houston and Stephenville — when they played.
All-district MVP
Kolb and the Cougars were in Friday’s Fort Worth Bowl, just a football’s throw from Stephenville, his old stomping grounds. Well, it’s about 75 miles away, but it’s close.
Kolb is a junior quarterback with the Cougars, but he’s remembered in Stephenville after twice being named District 8-4A Offensive MVP, so the locals were salivating over the thought of being able to see one of their own do his thing against Kansas in the Fort Worth Bowl.
“Everybody and their dog was asking me about whether we were going to get to go to the Fort Worth Bowl,” Kolb said. “It’s going to be pretty exciting. Any time you get to play in front of old friends, family and fans, it’s going to be pumped up a little more.
“You want to reward everyone, so this is a good way to do that, right here at home in Texas. We have a lot of fans in the Metroplex since we have a lot of players from there, and then of course you have the Stephenville connection.
“It’s going to be good just for those guys to be able to experience it with us instead of it being so far away.”
Like the last time the Cougars went to a bowl. Not that they are complaining about their 2003 trip to the Hawaii Bowl, but being able to play in front of the home fans is a big deal for a team that is rooted in Stephenville soil.
In addition to Kolb, wide receiver Kendal Briles, center Sterling Doty, defensive end Scott Lee and kicker Ben Bell have Stephenville letter jackets.
“I’m excited,” Doty said. “I get a chance to go back and play a bowl game about an hour from my hometown. There should be a good crowd there from Stephenville, so it’s going to be a lot of fun.”
Several members of the UH coaching staff also have called Stephenville home: Randy Clemens (offensive line), Philip Montgomery (offensive backs), Eric Slaughter (outside linebackers), Colin Shillinglaw (director of football operations) and Jon Loudermilk (graduate assistant on defense).
And, of course, head coach Art Briles.
Briles led the Yellow Jackets to four state championships, including back-to-back titles in 1998 and ’99, and the fans there appreciate how he built the program into the power it has remained to this day.
Briles typically low-keys his return to the area where his career took off, preferring a “shucks-we’re-just-happy-to-be-playing-anywhere” attitude.
“In all sincerity, it’s good for us to get back there because of the players,” Briles said. “We have a lot of players from the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and I think it’s really neat that they’re going to get an opportunity to go back and spend some time in an area they grew up in.”
That’s it? What about the crush of interview requests from the Metroplex papers? No phone calls from well-wishers?
“Well, I’ve had a few (ticket) requests,” Briles said, laughing.
Briles won’t allow outsiders a glimpse of what’s inside. But those close to Briles know how excited he is about returning.
“I think if the Stephenville faithful show up it would really tickle him,” said Shillinglaw, who has worked with Briles for more than a decade. “I think that if we gave them a good showing, he’d really get some joy from seeing all the Stephenville people who came to the game. But that’s the key with coach — he’s such a perfectionist that the results are all that matter to him right now.”
Determined to win
And that’s all that matters to the players.
“We want to win,” Kolb said. “I want to win these bowl games. I think we let so many close games slip away this year that everybody looks at it and says, ‘Man, look how much better this season could have been.’ I do, too. But if we win this bowl game all that will be forgotten. It will wash away all those games we let slip away over the course of the year and this season will be viewed as a success.”
And the Cougars want to make this bowl a success.
After UH’s exhilarating yet deflating 54-48 triple-overtime loss to Hawaii in the 2003 Sheraton Hawaii Bowl, Shillinglaw knows Briles would love nothing more than to deliver a victory, especially with so many familiar faces at Amon G. Carter Stadium.
“Right now he’s just thinking about winning the game,” Shillinglaw said. “Down the line, though, I think it will mean more to him. I know that if we win, it will be special. Just to look up there (in the stands) and see all those people from Stephenville, it will be really be a special moment.”
