DAINGERFIELD, Texas-Daingerfield has always been home for Curtis Lewis.
The veteran basketball coach had about as big a turnover in players as he's ever had coming into the 2017 season, but that didn't keep the Tigers from pushing to excel.
Lewis has been named the Gazette's Northeast Texas Coach of the Year for the boys basketball All-Area team.
Daingerfield graduated nine of 11 from a regional semifinalist team from 2016, and then the Tigers, with so many new faces for the 2016-17 season, repeated as district champions and advanced to the regional quarterfinals. Daingerfield finished 21-12.
"We didn't put together our game in our last game, but if we hadn't put it together before then we would've never got to that point," Lewis said. "I was really proud of them.
"When the season started, I couldn't name five starters; I couldn't put together 10 guys to make up the team. We have a tough non-district schedule, and we started slow. But we still weren't playing like we were capable of playing. We ended up putting it together. These kids played hard. We were down a little on basketball skills, but the kids always played hard."
Lewis has been coaching 33 years at Daingerfield and head coach for 15 years.
"I've been blessed to be back home for my career, and I've been blessed with athletes," Lewis said. "Not only athletes, but they're just good kids. They give you a chance every night. Over the years, I've had some good basketball players and I've had some good teams."
He even admitted when the the season turned to district play, Lewis was surprised by how well the team responded."
"I was kind of surprised by our play when we hit district," Lewis said. "I kept telling our kids that we won't play a district opponent like we saw in non-district, even though our district is competitive and good. We just kept working hard because it was eventually going to pay off. At one point I don't know if they believed that or not, but they kept working at it."