KEEP
BUILDING
AFTER DISTRICT TITLE AND REGIONAL SEMIFINAL APPEARANCE, TIGERS RETURN WITH A VETERAN CORE AND PLENTY OF EXPECTATIONS
By Alex Havardansky
The Commerce Tigers are entering this season with big goals. The team’ s expectations for this season were built after a historic 2025 season.
The team won District 7-3A for the first time in two decades, finishing the season with a 5-1 record in district play. The Tigers made it all the way to the regional semifinal round of the UIL state playoffs before losing to Grandview by just a point.
The team is looking to continue to build on the standard set last year and coach John McSheffery believes the team has a lot going for it coming into this season.
It’ s common for teams across Hunt County to come into a new football season with a particular theme in mind that becomes part of the team’ s identity throughout the course of the season. However, McSheffery is choosing to keep the Tiger’ s theme for this season a secret.
While the coach said that the theme would eventually be released to the public, he wants it to become a part of the team’ s identity first.
Another unorthodox practice of McSheffery’ s is allowing the team three weeks of break once school ends before engaging in any football activities.
McSheffery has been the head coach and athletic director at Commerce High School going on seven years and has also served as a defensive coordinator for previous coaching regimes.
McSheffrey hopes to continue the team’ s success this season not just for their sake but also because he feels that he owes it to a district that has treated him well since he came to the team.
“ I love it, it’ s pretty rare, this place has become my second home,” McSheffery said.“ Being an AD at 30 years old doesn’ t happen for a lot of people, I just try to make them not regret it.”
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