UPSET WATCH: These three Texas high school football teams could get shocked in Week 6

Is Highland Park in trouble? Could Lockhart pull the stunner? Here are three potential upsets in Week 6 of the 2023 Texas high school football season.

It's the fourth week of the 2023 Texas high school football season, with 500+ games scattered across the state. There are favorites...but who could spring the upset?

Using DCTF's computer projections, DCTF managing editor Greg Tepper identifies three teams that could pull the upset in Week 4.

 

Yoakum (4-1) at Waco La Vega (3-2)
La Vega projected to win by 5 (63.5%)

When is a state-ranked team an underdog against an unranked team? Well, when it’s punching up a classification on the road, as is the case with Yoakum (ranked 8th in 3A Division I) visiting La Vega of 4A Division I. Coach Don Hyde’s La Vega squad has strung together consecutive wins for the first time in seven games dating back to last year, but Yoakum should represent a step up in competition level from Lorena — a good-not-great 3A Division I team battling injuries, whom La Vega beat by a touchdown — and winless and rather woeful Dallas Roosevelt. Yoakum’s offense has caught fire behind dual-threat quarterback Zach Taylor and big-play sophomore Xzavier Barnett at receiver, and that may be enough to put the Bulldogs past a La Vega defense that, uncharacteristically, is allowing 36.7 points per gam to its non-Roosevelt opponents.

Highland Park (3-1) at Dallas Jesuit (3-2)
Highland Park projected to win by 8 (68.1%)

There are few more known knowns in Texas high school football than Highland Park’s dominance in district play — outright district champions in each of the last seven seasons, and winners of at least a share of 24 of the last 26 district titles. But the Scots have shown some vulnerability this year when Lake Highlands shockingly snapped their 41-game district winning streak in Week 3. Now the Scots must travel just north to Postell Stadium to take on a feisty Jesuit squad that is not short on firepower — quarterback Charlie Peters (1,505 yards, 17 TDs passing) and a bevy of weapons make this a very dangerous spot for a Scots defense that got torched by Lake Highlands. And remember: last year’s game at Highland Park came down to the wire, with HP pulling out a narrow victory. Could home-field advantage and a resurgent offense be enough to swing the pendulum in the Rangers’ favor?

San Antonio Veterans Memorial (2-2) at Lockhart (2-3)
Veterans Memorial projected to win by 9 (67.5%)

It’s been a disappointing start to the year for Todd Moebes’ Lockhart Lionswhich started off 1-3 before drubbing Bastrop Cedar Creek in their district opener. You could make an argument that it’s been a disappointing year for Robert Irvin’s Veterans Memorial Patriots, too — they’re officially 2-2, but 3-1 on the field after forfeiting a season-opening win over still-unbeaten San Antonio Harlandale due to an ineligible player. There are serious defensive concerns for the Patriots as they begin their District 13-5A DII campaign, and say what you want about Lockhart, but those boys can score — running back Nathaniel Gonzales and quarterback Ashton Dickens headline an offense averaging more than 37 points per game. Lions Stadium is no picnic to play in, either, which puts the Patriots on Upset Watch.

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