Bragging rights battle

The Tiger football team is coming into the sixty-fourth annual Battle of the Bell with a sense of urgency.

“This is my thirteenth time coaching this game, and we still try to approach it as another district game,” said Jeff Miller, Rockdale High School head football coach and athletic director. “But the thing is, now we’re in a bind in regards to the district standings. We have to win this game.”

Going into Friday’s matchup, Rockdale High School was ranked seventh in class 3A Division I standings in Dave Campbell’s Texas Football Magazine, while Cameron Yoe was in the eighth spot.

Miller told his team after Friday’s loss to Troy that the RHS, Cameron game was “the biggest rivalry in the state of Texas.”

Cameron leads the bell series 42-21. The Battle of the Bell series began in 1954 when the Sandow & Southern Railroad donated a brass train bell as a prize for the annual showdown.

Rockdale and Cameron faced each other 28 times before the Bell series dating back to 1911. The pre-Bell record was lead by Cameron 20-6-2.

“This is a big deal. Big part of the season,” Miller said. “ It doesn’t need to define their season, but it’s obviously a big part of it. These kids have been to school in these communities, and they start going to school here and they learn about this at an early, early age.

“It’s one of the biggest games of their life,” Miller said. “It’s one of the things they look forward to forever. I think it’s pretty healthy, and there’s obviously been a lot of great games, and a lot of fun.”

The Tigers took possession of the bell in 2016 and kept it in 2017. In last year’s contest, Rockdale got to keep the Bell for consecutive keep the Bell for consecutive years for the first time since 1977. The Tigers defeated their Milam County neighbors 63-34 after putting up 32 points in the third quarter in 2017, and beat them 80-54 in 2016.

This year’s Yoemen are 6-1 overall and 3-0 in District 10-3A DI, which includes a 39-26 win over Troy. When the Yoe faced the Trojans earlier this season, Troy was missing several players, including quarterback Riley Cosper.

In last week’s Cameron Yoe road game against Little River-Academy, Anthony Steamer and Nico Vargas combined for five touchdowns and 225 yards in the 35-16 win over the Bumblebees.

The previous week against Jarrell, it was sophomore quarterback Braden Brashear’s 201 passing yards and Kadrian Hammond’s 114 receiving yards that were key in the Yoeman’s 54-7 victory over the Cougars.

The Tigers will play Cameron at 7:30 p.m. on Friday at Yoe Field.

“It’s really one of the reasons we do what we do,” Miller said. “The kids in these communities are very fortunate to play in a game of this magnitude every year. You know, that’s pretty cool.”