Halsell was a Permian, UT star on the gridiron

Oct. 22—EDITOR'S NOTE — Enjoy this look back at one of this year's Odessa Athletics Hall of Fame honorees. This year's banquet is scheduled Nov. 3 at the Odessa Marriott. Other honorees include track star Kerry Evans, OC rodeo great Jim Watkins, the 1989 Permian High School state and national champion Permian Panthers and Coach Gary Gaines, football star Lloyd Hill and also the 1946 Odessa High Bronchos state championship football team.

University of Texas linebacker Glen Halsell was at the bottom of a sea of sound, the decibels crashing like a tsunami over him and the 21 others players on the turf at Razorback Stadium on Dec. 6, 1969, in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

With the pressure increasing each passing second of the "Game of the Century" between the visiting Longhorns and host Razorbacks, so did the noise coming from the throats of 47,500 rabid Razorbacks' fans ... and President Richard Nixon.

Halsell, a 1966 graduate of Permian and star of the school's first state championship team in 1965, wasn't worried about the president as the Razorbacks were driving down the field.

He was worried that he had gone deaf, or, was having a nervous breakdown.

"It was pretty stressful," said Halsell, one of the Longhorns' captains. "It was the second or third quarter and they were down in our territory, about 30 or 40 yards out and we stopped them.

"They were running right at us and all of a sudden, I was standing back ready for a play and everything went silent. It's the only time it ever happened to me on the field."

Halsell admits to feeling like he was playing in slow motion at that point and the sense of dread that came over him as he knew that Arkansas was going to run the play at him, get a new set of downs and go on to win the game.

Then he saw one of his best friends on the team, defensive end Bill Atessis, crash into the Razorbacks' backfield to tackle the running back for a loss and get the Longhorns off the field.

Running to the sideline, Halsell was stopped by a yank on his facemask by offensive lineman Bob McKay, of Crane.

"I'm running off the field and I run into Bob McKay," Halsell said. "He grabs me by my facemask and starts screaming and yelling at me.

"I'm like 'leave me alone you idiot, I just lost my mind.' I just knew I was going to be the reason we were going to lose the game."

The Longhorns would go on to score a pair of second-half touchdowns to edge Arkansas, 15-14, on that cold, blustery day.

Suddenly, Halsell went from wondering where he was to up on a podium with the Texas coach Darryl Royal and the other captains — James Street and Ted Koy — as Nixon presented the team with the MacArthur Bowl, which is given to the No. 1 team in the nation.

Less than a month later, the Longhorns would defeat Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 1, 1970 to truly win the national championship.

Halsell's path to the national stage started at Bonham Junior High, advanced through Permian and matured in Austin.

Now, 60 years later, he is part of the Class of 2022 of the Odessa Athletics Hall of Fame.

"He was the best player on the team at Permian," said Billy Dale, Halsell's friend since the eighth grade and a member of the Panthers' 1965 title team and the Longhorns' 1969 and 1970 championship squads.

"He was a year ahead of me, but we've always been friends. His teammates were probably his best friends; we know him and respect him."

His teammates were more than happy to go along for the ride when the fledgling Panthers' program, just six years old, made its first run to the state championship game.

The 1965 season, the first under head coach Gene Mayfield, started with a victory against Amarillo Tascosa and then a loss to Lubbock Monterey.

That would be the only blemish the rest of the way.

After defeating rival Odessa High 35-8 (the first of a string of 33 consecutive seasons without losing to the Bronchos), the Panthers would get by El Paso Bel Air (14-7), Lubbock Monterey (29-12) and Texarkana (28-21) before defeating San Antonio Lee, 11-6, on a miserable day in December in San Angelo.

"We lost to Monterey at the start of the season, we certainly didn't want to lose to them again," Halsell said. "Texarkana had a quarterback, Joe Norwood, who ended up at Texas and he was quite a character.

"We played San Antonio Lee for the championship on a cold, winter day and it was a hard game. They had a running back named Pat Sheehan that ended up at Texas."

Halsell sat his first year at Texas as freshmen were not allowed to play on the varsity at that time.

Instead, he immersed himself into the classroom, knowing that he was going to try to be a lawyer after school and follow in his father's footsteps.

Still, this was Austin in the late 1960s, with anti-war protests popping up around the country, marijuana use increasing, Sixth Street starting to become Sixth Street and just being away from home for the first time.

"I think half the class was on scholastic probation the first semester," Halsell said. "My first roommate had like six dogs so I asked them to get the best student for me as a roommate.

"There were too many pretty girls running around there and like 10 or 15 thousand freshmen on campus."

Halsell buckled down with the books as there was another reason to stay in school — the draft.

His older brother, Eddie, had gone to Vietnam and returned and the younger Halsell wanted nothing to do with the conflict in Southeast Asia.

"I didn't have any strong political feelings," said Halsell, who had health deferments. "I didn't want to go to Vietnam and fight the Vietnamese."

After graduating from Texas in 1970, he worked at the capitol, went to summer school and got accepted at St. Mary's, where he graduated with his law degree three years later.

That led to jobs in Fort Worth, Odessa, Andrews and then back to Fort Worth before Halsell returned to Odessa in 1980 and began working for Cullom Milburn, who showed him the ropes on collection law.

Halsell went back to school at SMU to get a master's degree in taxation and has been working out of his office on Grant Street ever since.

He also spends time on his property in Fort Davis, listening when his father suggested purchasing the land in 1982.

Dale calls Halsell's property a fortress.

"It's a huge compound," said Dale, who helped with some of the construction of the five homes on the property.

"There's a library and a commissary and it's all made from used materials. It keeps him busy; he enjoys that compound and teammates come up and visit."

One thing they won't see at the compound is football.

Halsell doesn't watch too much of the game since his playing days.

"I'm not really a spectator," Halsell said. "I enjoyed playing.

"I enjoyed the hard work."

GET YOUR TICKETS

Don't miss the Odessa Athletics Hall of Fame banquet scheduled at 7 p.m. Nov. 3 at the Odessa Marriott. The deadline to purchase a ticket is 5 p.m. Oct. 28.

— Call 432-333-7612 or visit tinyurl.com/ycx2wr7y