Talihina drops football for 2022 season, creates scheduling changes for several others

TALIHINA, Okla. — Talihina football will not play during the 2022 season due to lack of participation.

The program plans to resume play in 2023 and does not view the decision  as permanent. This season, Talihina will try to "play as many freshman and jayvee games as we can," said coach Kelly Gravitt Thursday.

Talihina has a record of 458-245-2 since 1957 and has made the playoffs 39 times. The Golden Tigers have reached the state semifinals 12 times. In two state championship appearances, it won the 1966 Class B title game 19-6 over Watonga and lost the 1980 Class B title 13-6 to Kingston.

From 1980-2000, it made the playoffs in all but two seasons and more recently, reached in every season from 2012-18. As recently as 2017, the team was ranked No. 1 in Oklahoma Class A and finished 10-2.

During Gravitt's 16-year tenure, the program has gone 127-49, although that includes a 4-17 mark since 2019. In that difficult stretch, COVID-19 limited the team to just four games in 2020.

"It's unchartered waters and we have good junior high numbers," Gravitt said. "We will be back; it's just that our numbers are down. COVID hurt us and some virtual school hurt us and then just our numbers being down hurt us and football is a tough sport for tough people."

While dropping a season is unfamiliar, Gravitt said that the program, despite its tradition, has dealt with low participation in the past, citing his first season there as an assistant in 2001 and 2004. He said that the team typically has about 35 players each year but feared for this season with last year's team beginning with 13 players and rising to only "16 or 17."

From there, Talihina lost six players and only received four incoming freshmen.

According to Gravitt, Talihina superintendent Jason Lockhart said that members of the team wanting to play will be eligible to play as immediate transfers. Rising senior Blaze Baugh, who has college football aspirations, is exploring school options.

In Oklahoma, Classes B and C offer eight-man football but Gravitt said that Talihina will not be able to drop to eight-man under the OSSAA with its average daily membership being too high. Talihina attempted to enter a cooperative agreement that would allow the team to combine with another but Gravitt said that other schools declined to take them in.

Going 4-5 last season, Talihina was placed in Oklahoma District A-8, originally an eight-team grouping that includes other area teams in Sallisaw Central, Gore, Panama and Pocola.

Members of the district will now play six district games instead of seven with the change.

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On Wednesday, Pocola announced that it will play an away game at Arkansas 4A Mena on Sept. 16. The home game against Talihina, now an open date, was originally set to be played on Nov. 4 as the last district contest and game of the regular season.

Mena coach Craig Bentley contacted Pocola coach Jason Parker on May 20 about scheduling a game, with its own 4A-7 conference foes Genoa Central and Fountain Lake moving to eight-man football in March and May, respectively.

"We're really happy to pick it up because they are going to be a challenge," Parker said. "They're a bigger school. Their numbers aren't as great as they normally are, but that's going to be a great environment out there and what that is going to do, that is going to give us a tough opponent. 

"We'd like to go down there and win or lose, going down there and playing tough against a bigger school like that, that is just going to make us that much better coming out healthy heading into district play and the playoffs as well."

This past spring, the Talihina and Whitesboro baseball programs combined as one team under a cooperative agreement. 

In Oklahoma, a cooperative agreement can be made between schools if an OSSAA member has individual students who would like to participate in that sport, subject to approval by the Association. For this to happen, unless given OSSAA exception, "no more than two member schools can combine," the schools "must have contiguous boundaries" or be in the same independent school district and the agreement must be for a one-year period for activities with one-year classification and two years for activities with two-year classification. One of the schools must be defined as the "host" school.

The co-op application must be on file in the OSSAA office by Aug. 15 for fall sports such as football. Upon approval, the schools' average daily membership is combined for classification purposes and the agreement can apply for a particular activity and not necessarily all activities.

You can follow Bryant Roche on Twitter @BRocheSports and you can email him at BRoche@gannett.com.