"It felt pretty nice. After last year losing to Sharon in the District 10 finals, it definitely hurt a lot. It was in the back of our mind all year, since last January. It feels pretty good to bring it home now," said senior lineman Matt Bell.
That pain of walking off the field without a title was a driving force in Hickory's run this year.
"Some of these kids had a little bit of a taste of it last year. They seemed to be excited about being there last year. This year, we expected to be there," head coach Bill Brest said.
"I think we weren't afraid to fail. We gave it our best no matter what, and things that were bad, we put it behind us. We picked each other up always and every game. I think that was a big part of it," said senior wideout Andrew Smith.
With a victory this past Saturday over General McClane, Hickory earned its first District 10 title in 20 years.
"It didn't hit me at first, and then after we all shook hands and walked over, none of us were really cheering or anything, and then they came over with the trophy, we all just started smiling, jumping and screaming," Smith said.
Now they have their sights set on an even bigger goal; hoisting the school's first state title since 1989.
"It was just great knowing that we did something that we finally wanted to do, but we have more goals set so it's time to move on to them," said Bell.
"We want to make a run at the state title. That's been one of our other goals, actually, since the beginning of the year. There'd mean nothing more to us than to win it," said Smith.
Hickory (11-1) will take on Tyrone (12-1) in the PIAA Class AA state quarterfinal on Friday, December 2, 2011 at Altoona. Game time is 7 p.m.
