Texas Titans – Lake Travis High School has built a winning tradition from the ground up.

The Lake Travis (TX) High School athletic program is blessed with a huge enrollment, college-caliber facilities and an abundance of next-level talent, especially at the quarterback position. With those types of advantages, the Cavaliers are expected to have success.

But, with four straight 4A state titles and a shot at an unprecedented fifth, Lake Travis football has exceeded even the highest expectations and stands out as a prime example of an administration and coaching staff that has maximized the program’s potential.

That wasn’t always the case, though. The Cavaliers went 50-110-2 from 1988 to 2003, including a 1-19 two-year stretch in 2001-2002. Things were so tough that it took the current prolific run, which features a 48-game win streak, just to get the program’s overall record back to .500.

After the lackluster decade, things began to change in 2003, with the arrival of coach Jeff Dicus. Now head coach at Duncanville (Texas) High School, Dicus jumpstarted the Cavaliers’ rise and energized the community in the process. The affluent community about 15 miles outside of Austin went from being described as a retirement area to more of a booming suburb that attracted successful families.

“It was a wealthy area, and the rumor was that you couldn’t get wealthy kids to develop the discipline and desire that is required to have success,” said Dicus, who engineered the turnaround after taking over as head coach in 2003. “But all kids want discipline; they want to be loved and shown how to have success. And the community was hungry.”

Dicus and his staff went to work, instilling discipline in players with positive reinforcement. He instituted voluntary after school workouts. He brought in successful people to speak to the team like Heisman Trophy winner Ty Detmer, among many others. He taught his players to accomplish small goals on a daily basis and then showed them how it led to accomplishing bigger long-term goals.

The program’s culture began to change, and the enrollment surged. Lake Travis is now one of the biggest 4A schools in the state and is expected to be reclassified into 5A, the largest classification in Texas, next year. There are more than 300 players currently involved in the football program. As the numbers have grown, support has poured into the program. Dicus remembers parents spending a Saturday repainting the entire field house. The facilities were upgraded to the point where some have joked that the Lake Travis weight room is the best in all of Austin. Glance through the pictures of the Cavs’ majestic weight room online (www.samsonequipment.com), and you’ll see that here’s some truth in that remark.

Dicus’ efforts weren’t focused solely on the high school level. He got involved in the local Pop Warner leagues. He offered coaching clinics to the middle school coaches. “We taught them the systems and fundamentals we were teaching, and I can’t tell you how crucial that was,” emphasized Dicus. “I mean, [SMU quarterback] Garrett Gilbert and his group had been together running our system since the seventh grade. When you run something that long, you get pretty good at it.” Gilbert, who started his college career at Texas before transferring to SMU, led the Cavaliers to the 2007 state title, the first of four straight.

Conditioning to run the up-tempo offense

Current Clemson offensive coordinator Chad Morris followed Dicus, going 32-0 with back-to-back titles in his two seasons at Lake Travis, before jumping to the college ranks. Morris added his up-tempo, no-huddle scheme to the spread passing game Dicus had utilized. The biggest hurdle in installing the attack was conditioning, Morris said.

“Our off-season was geared to conditioning our players to run the up-tempo style,” said Morris. “We did everything on a clock in the off-season. Players would have to do a certain amount of reps in a certain amount of time. Everything was timed and up-tempo.”

The intense practice pace has continued under Morris’ successor, Hank Carter, who actually played quarterback for Morris in high school. Carter also believes strongly in conditioning while you practice. “We want our practice to flow and to bounce from place to place,” Carter said. “We want to keep the tempo quick offensively and defensively, just to try to keep the kids locked in. We don’t want them to be standing around; we want them to be moving. Running to the football, running back to the line of scrimmage and getting lined and the ball snapped, that’s how we get our conditioning.”

During the season, Lake Travis strength and conditioning coach Jarrett Lambert believes in continuing to build strength instead of focusing on maintaining it. Lambert fluctuates lift percentages, going from 70 to 90 percent of each players max on all lifts. In November, when the Cavaliers were in the midst of their playoff run, Lambert had players lifting at 85 percent of their max. “We all believe that we can get stronger during the season,” he said. “We all believe that it’s a big part of our success. Some people believe that you should maintain your strength during the season, but for us, it’s been beneficial for us to keep lifting throughout the season instead of just maintaining.”

Innovative philosophies have always been a part of Lake Travis’ athletic program. In fact, it’s something Gary Briley, Director of Extracurricular Programs, encourages all his coaches to do. Carter and his staff have become regulars at Texas Tech and Texas Christian, among other coaching clinics.

“I want all our coaches to be looking for the best way to train our student-athletes,” said Briley, who is in his fourth year fulfilling athletic director duties at Lake Travis. “We want to be using the same techniques and methods that the colleges where we hope our young athletes will be playing at in the future, not only on the field, but also off the field. We want our student-athletes to be trained like and supported like they will be in the future in college. It just helps prepare them.”

Developing Quarterbacks

Lake Travis has had a great run of quarterbacks, including former Kansas QB Todd Reesing and the aforementioned Gilbert. “If you’ve got a Division-I quarterback, chances are you’re going to have a pretty good football team,” Carter pointed out. The run of great signal callers at Lake Travis isn’t just good fortune, though. It’s a part of quarterback development plan that Dicus implemented and Morris and Carter have continued.

“You have to start them early,” explained Morris. “We started developing quarterbacks all the way down to 2nd, 3rd and 4th grades. We got them involved running the same system and same plays, even if it means just having them run a play off a card.”

Morris spent the entire month of May working with the youth programs, teaching coaches and players the schemes and fundamentals. By the time, the kids reach middle school, there may be 30 potential quarterbacks, each well-schooled in the Lake Travis scheme. Once the quarterbacks reach the high school level, Morris divided up the freshmen into three teams with two quarterbacks on each team. Sophomores were split up into two teams with two quarterbacks on each.

“You’re slowly narrowing down through the process of elimination, and by the end you’re going to have developed a good quarterback who’s well-versed in the system,” said Morris.

The development, of course, is aided by good coaching at the youth levels. That’s something that Morris says is a huge priority. “If you’re just getting into high school ball, that’s the first thing you’d better do – get your system in place at the younger levels,” said Morris. “And your best football coaches had better be at your younger levels. If not, you’re going to lose out. You’re going to get hung up on winning, but that’s not what it’s about at that level. It’s about developing them and keeping them out. We would say it over and over and over to our middle school coaches, “It’s not your job to run them off; it’s your job to get them into high school.”

The Offense

Carter says his team’s ability to throw the ball successfully at the high school level is one of the biggest keys to his success. Lake Travis orchestrates its up-tempo spread attack out of the shotgun. Carter altered the running game slightly after taking over for Morris and now using more zone plays than counters. But the overall philosophy and goal remains the same.

“We want to play fast and want to snap it with just five seconds off the play clock,” said Carter, who led the Cavaliers to the 2010 state title and had them in the quarterfinals of the 2011 playoffs heading into December. “I think our tempo is what really sets us apart. We really try to play as fast as possible on offense and make them run the field. We try to wear down our opponents with our offense and have success doing that.”

The Cavaliers are at the mercy of the pace of the referees, of course, and Carter won’t hesitate to gently mention their up-tempo style to the officials before the game. The passing game features plenty of quick bubble screens, while also mixing in some shots down the field. “Our passing game is the same system as what you’d see Oklahoma State or Texas Tech run,” Carter said. “And I think our ability to throw the football has been something that’s really set the stage for our success. If you can throw the football in high school, I feel like you have an advantage, but you’re really never out of it. That’s something that’s important, the ability to the throw the ball, all the way down to third and fourth-grade level.”

The Lake Travis running game is a mix of zones and counters, featuring quarterback counters and jet sweeps. “We want to level the playing field athletically,” Carter added, “because we’re not always the most athletic or biggest team out there. We’ve been blessed with some great players, but when we get deep into the playoffs, sometimes we’re outmanned a little bit. To compensate for that, we try to make them play up-tempo, and slow down their pass rush because they’re tired.”

The Defense

The Cavaliers work out of a 4-2-5 scheme, based closely off what TCU does under coach Gary Patterson. “Like TCU, we want to be an attacking defense,” said Carter. “We probably pressure about 50 percent of the time, whether it be zone pressure or man pressure.”

The Cavs’ coverage scheme is based around a quarters look, but Carter adjusts quickly to an opposing offense. Against at two-back, tight-end team, for example, the Cavaliers will use a lot of robber coverage. “In passing situations, we’ll mix it up,” Carter said. “We may pressure and run some three-deep or pressure and run some two-deep zone, or we may pressure and run some man. We try to give them multiple looks, but at the end of the day, we want to surround the box with our safeties, while also being vertically sound. We want to try to make people throw short and then get 11 guys to the football.”

Special Teams

Carter spends at least 45 minutes on special teams every day and always has his best 11 players on his special teams units. Defensive starters make up the kickoff and punt coverage teams, while the return teams feature receiver and running backs.

“We’ve been blessed to have great special teams players,” Carter said. “We’ve got long-snappers, kickers, holders and punters that have gone on to the Division I level. If you’re great at special teams, then that’s one third of the game. So if we can win two thirds of the game, we’ll probably win the game.”

The Lake Travis program is now in tune for a long run into the Texas State High School playoffs. Their successful tradition is now almost a decade old and with a strong and deep youth program, it is bound to continue for years to come.