TEPPER: There's something special about crosstown rivalries

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Say you have an annoying neighbor. Pick your pet peeve — loud parties, not-loud-enough parties, unkempt lawn, what have you — and they’re guilty of it. If they lived four doors down, it’d be pretty irritating. Two doors down, even moreso. But if they lived right next door? Excruciating. Such is the idea behind crosstown rivalries in every sport — familiarity and proximity breed contempt. But nowhere is that more evident than in Texas high school football, where crosstown clashes represent the fiercest of them all. That’s not to say that other rivalries aren’t great, especially those that pit neighboring towns against one another. Port Neches-Groves vs. Nederland, Canadian vs. Stratford, Marshall vs. Longview, Bay City vs. El Campo…there are countless must-see rivalries that feature squads from different mailing addresses. But there’s something special about a crosstown rivalry, wherein a city is temporarily plunged into a civil war, and the most important question of the week is “What side are you on?” Take, for example, Midland vs. Midland Lee, who have been going at it since Lee opened in 1961. There are other rivalries involving these two squads — most notably Lee’s iconic clashes with Odessa Permian — but there’s something personal about the Bulldogs versus the Rebels. It feels like the winner owns the town for the year, and one side of the city will have the upper hand on the other when the scoreboard hits zero. The same can be said in Amarillo, where last week’s Tascosa vs. Amarillo matchup lived up to the hype. Amarillo came in winless; Tascosa came in unbeaten; and, of course, Tascosa escaped by the skin of its teeth. Or in Abilene a couple of weeks ago, when then-winless Abilene gave unbeaten Abilene Cooper all it could handle. The same goes as you move farther east, from Wichita Falls (Rider vs. Old High) to Waco (Waco High vs. University) to Pearland (Dawson vs. Pearland) to Tyler (John Tyler vs. Lee) to Corpus Christi (Ray vs. Carroll) to any number of rivalries in the Valley (like McAllen vs. Memorial). They have a single through-line— they’re crosstown rivalries, and that makes them especially personal. Because when your annoying neighbor lives next door, there’s no escape when he has the bragging rights.