A member of the Illinois football coaching staff was down in the Lone Star State on Saturday checking out what is going on in Arlington, Texas.
Illini head coach Lovie Smith decided to take a trip down to Texas to check out Illini commit Marquez Beason and his Duncanville team take on Allen High School in the Texas Football State Championships.
Beason is a 5-foot-10, 177-pound athlete from Duncanville High School in Duncanville, Texas. He is rated as a four-star recruit who is the No. 84 player in the class of 2019 and the No. 4 athlete in the nation. He is also the No. 14 player in the state of Texas as well.
Beason and his Duncanville team are currently in the 6A D1 Texas Football State Championships. The Panthers earned their way into the playoffs by dominating during the regular season. Leading up to the playoffs, the closest game Duncanville had the entire year was against Evangel Christin Academy where they only won by 36 points. That is how good this team was in 2018.
To further illustrate how great this Duncanville team was this season, the Panthers outscored their opponents 503-34 in the nine regular season games. That is an incredible statistic and one that is likely not to be matched by anyone. It is also, probably, one of the reasons why Duncanville is rated as the No. 1 team in the state of Texas and the No. 11 team in the country.
The competition got a little tougher in the playoffs for Duncanville. They only won their first game by 16 points, 30-14. Their next game, they beat Lewisville 38-0. In the Sweet 16, Duncanville beat Lamar 45-6. In the Elite 8, the Fighting Beason’s beat Carroll 51-7. This set up a matchup with Allen High School in the Final 4.
Allen isn’t just a regular team, though. They are also one of the top teams in the country. They won the state championship in 2017 and hadn’t lost a game entering the Final 4 against Duncanville. This was going to be a really tough matchup for the Panthers.
Duncanville was up for the test, though. They beat Allen in the Final 4 on Saturday to advance to the championship game against another undefeated, top 15 nationally ranked, team in North Shore. This should be another great matchup and one that will go down in the record books.
Beason looks to have a really helped this Duncanville team as they compete for a state title. It seems like most of the Illinois commits for 2019 were able to get deep into the playoffs. I want winners. Beason is a winner. Hopefully, he can come away with a state title.