Plano East’s unexpected turnaround resembles other Dallas-area comeback seasons

Tony Benedetto remembers how difficult it was to go seven straight Friday nights with no wins last football season.

He was in his first year as head coach at Plano East, which finished 3–7 overall and winless in District 6-6A to miss the playoffs.

“It’s hard to come back after you work 90 hours a week and you come back with a defeat,” Benedetto said. “That was not easy.”

But this season, Plano East defied expectations by finishing 6–4 and clenching a playoff spot on Friday after a 30-18 upset win over Flower Mound Marcus.

Plano East meets Prosper on Friday for the first round of the postseason.

“I get emotional thinking about [the players],” Benedetto said. “There were tears on Friday night. There were even tears earlier in the season when we won games that no one thought that they could.”

Plano East is one of several teams in the Dallas area that turned things around this season to make the playoffs and change the narrative about their programs.

Area coaches attribute the shift to developing new strategies for success, building team morale and maintaining patience with younger players still in development. Others say they had to hold themselves accountable as well.

“I had gotten comfortable,” North Forney head coach Eric Luster said. “‘I’m a good man. I’m a good husband. I’m a good dad. I’m good.’ 3–7 wasn’t good.”

Similar to Plano East, North Forney lost all of its district games last season. North Forney finished 8–2 this season and is playoff-bound.

To compete with the big guys in Class 6A, Luster knew his players needed to get stronger, so they hit the weight room.

Luster also invited local pastors to meet with his team and encourage them so that, as the coach described it, they could go from losers to winners.

While last season hurt, it put North Forney on a positive trajectory.

“When your body hurts, it’s telling you something’s wrong,” Luster said. “You’ve got to feel some pain in order to fix things.”

To start its playoff run, North Forney will meet Garland, which went 4–4 in District 9-6A to miss the postseason in 2022.

“We were pretty bummed out about that, but we were a young team starting lots of sophomores,” Garland head coach Danny Russell said.

Admittedly, this year’s Garland team is still pretty young with 18 sophomores on varsity. Just one senior starts on Garland’s offense and four start on defense.

Despite this, Garland posted a 7–3 season this year with six district wins.

“They’ve really dealt with all that really well,” Russell said.

At Carrollton Newman Smith, head coach Robert Boone felt heartbroken after last football season.

In a decisive game against W.T. White, Newman Smith was ahead but ultimately relinquished the lead in a 3-point loss. Newman Smith finished 6–4 on the season.

“In the fashion that we lost and having a winning record and not getting in … I was just ready to be in the playoffs for those kids,” Boone said. “I knew that going through those situations, we were only going to grow. Only going to get better.”

And Boone was right. Newman Smith clinched a playoff berth this season, finishing 8–2 overall and 6–2 in District 5-5A Division I. Boone’s team beat W.T White, another playoff team, 40-28 in Week 10. Newman Smith will play Frisco Reedy this week.

One key component of Newman Smith’s success this season was Boone getting more time with his players. He saw them everyday during the offseason.

“We wanted to build a habit of winning in everything that we do,” Boone said. “Behavior, grades, being on time. I knew that if we could win all of those things, it could easily translate to the field.”

Hurst L.D. Bell head coach TJ Dibble also changed the narrative about his program this season. When he took over at his alma mater in 2021, L.D. Bell finished 2–8. Last season, L.D. Bell finished 6–4 to miss the playoffs again.

In 2023, L.D. Bell posted a 7–3 record and beat longtime rival Euless Trinity on Friday. That was L.D. Bell’s first win over Trinity since 1997. Yet, L.D. Bell missed the playoffs this year, too.

Fort Worth Boswell, which beat L.D. Bell 29-27 in Week 8, grabbed the fourth District 3-6A playoff spot. That win over Trinity was sweet, but Dibble wished his team could be competing this week.

He’s not letting that disappointment get him down though.

“I’m an eternal optimist. I’m proud of where our program is at, but the people that we surround ourselves with here on our coaching staff and our kids, I think, are probably more motivated now than they ever have been,” Dibble said. “There’s a lot of positive things happening at Bell High School, and it’s not just about football.”

Find more high school sports coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.

Sign up for our FREE HS newsletter