1,868 miles. A Panhandle legacy. Hooker's trip to Class A football finals has it all.

Shane Metcalf hitches an enclosed trailer to his pickup truck and hauls the essentials for a live high school football broadcast to each road game.

The Hooker Bulldog Network crew has microphones. Four cameras capture different angles of the field.

Then there’s one item Metcalf deems the most important: the train horn.

Wherever he travels, the unmistakable sound blares through the venue as an attention-commanding signifier of the visiting football team’s presence.

“We found out real quick several years ago that it doesn’t matter if you’ve driven 250 miles for that game,” said Metcalf, a farmer who launched the network. “Once you sound that air horn off in pregame, it kind of is a level playing field. That brings the home-field advantage with us.”

Metcalf and that rowdy train horn have traversed the state throughout the Oklahoma high school playoffs, venturing out of the flat panhandle into the Oklahoma City metro and sometimes returning home at 3 a.m. He’s a seasoned traveler who hasn’t missed a Bulldog football game in over a decade, but this year has involved some extra drive time.

That’s because Class A Hooker has reached the state finals for the first time in program history. The Bulldogs’ playoff path, featuring four road games after they were fortunate enough to host one, covers 1,868 miles. That’s one day and six hours of driving – enough time to watch all 11 live-action “Star Wars” movies with a few hours to spare.

Football coach Trevor Powers has logged the mileage. He or one of his assistant coaches usually drives the team charter bus, which is equipped with TVs to make the long trips more bearable for players.

There have been several stops along the way, but the Bulldogs’ extraordinary expedition will finally reach the ideal destination Saturday afternoon: Chad Richison Stadium in Edmond, where fourth-ranked Hooker faces top-ranked Fairview at 1 p.m.

Although no team is making a farther trip to the state finals, a massive group of fans in Bulldog blue is planning to descend upon the University of Central Oklahoma’s campus. The Bulldogs are hosting a pregame tailgate at 10 a.m., and Hooker locals aren’t the only ones invited.

Their community stretches beyond their town.

“When you live in the Panhandle, it’s like your neighborhood is 160 miles long and 30 miles wide,” Metcalf said.

Hooker’s football milestone is a win for all of the towns in that rectangular strip of land, all of the athletic programs bonded by the challenge of unusually lengthy road trips to reach the rest of the state.

Leading up to Saturday’s championship, a Gatorade gift package arrived at Hooker from nearby Tyrone. Students at Texhoma, typically a rival school, sent congratulatory messages to Hooker football players. “Go Bulldogs” signs are posted in Guymon, the largest Panhandle town.

“If you’re not from here, you don’t understand it and you probably won’t stay if you ever come out here,” said Hooker superintendent Todd Kerr. “But if you’re from here, you’re deep-rooted into the Panhandle, and we’re super-proud to be from the Oklahoma Panhandle.”

That way of life is instilled in Powers, the Bulldogs’ seventh-year coach and athletic director. Because of his leadership, football success has become a key component.

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The way back home

Powers grew tired of his corporate lifestyle.

About a decade ago, the Texhoma High School graduate was working as a banker in Oklahoma City.

Then he decided to trade a business tie for a coach’s whistle.

“I got bored and just told my wife I wanted to coach,” Powers said.

He started his career at Sayre, but soon, home was calling.

Powers and his wife, Shayla, couldn’t abandon their deep roots in the Panhandle. They both went to Panhandle State University in Goodwell, and their families still lived in the area. So, despite his background at rival school Texhoma, it just made sense for him to accept the job at Hooker.

The locals know it wouldn’t be a choice destination for just any coach. The town draws its unusual name from John “Hooker” Threlkeld, whose moniker alluded to his roping skills, and it has maintained its identity as a remote farming and ranching community. A drive to Oklahoma City is nearly as far as a snow-skiing trip to Red River, New Mexico.

“When you’re hiring people in the Panhandle, a lot of people almost look at it like you’re going to the Panhandle on a mission trip,” Metcalf said. “You’re gonna spend a few years there, and you hope you get a stepping stone job out of here to get a better job. But I know when we’re hiring Panhandle people that want to be here, they’re gonna be here for a lot longer and they’re coming back here for the right reasons.

“He was coming here for the right reasons.”

With that motivation, Powers quickly rallied the Bulldogs.

In 2017, his first season, Hooker reached the state semifinals. The Bulldogs have made the playoffs in six of his seven seasons, significantly improving from the program’s past. Metcalf, a 1991 Hooker graduate, said he played through two winless seasons.

Powers wasn’t about to let that happen.

“A lot of the kids we have on our field this year are what you call legacy kids, kids that have grown up around here, grown up in the program,” Powers said. “And their parents are getting to watch their kids do some stuff that they never got close to doing.”

Perceptions of the football program changed, but a state finals appearance continued to elude the rising Bulldogs.

Then the 2023 season arrived.

Powers’ wife, Shayla, gave birth to twins soon before the Bulldogs’ opener. A few months later, the couple had a new reason to celebrate, and this time, their community was joining them.

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Checklists and checkpoints

As the Bulldog faithful flooded the field at Northwestern Oklahoma State in Alva, Trevor and Shayla Powers shared an embrace.

Hooker had just defeated Hominy, 27-24, to reach the state finals for the first time in program history. With thrilled fans surrounding him, Powers made sure to find his family.

“It’s something I’ll really cherish for the rest of my life,” Powers said.

To reach the state finals, Hooker (12-2) shattered three opponents’ undefeated records on the road. The Bulldogs triumphed over Minco, Central Sallisaw and Hominy.

But their historic season wasn’t always a smooth cruise.

Hooker dropped two of its first four games, and after a 56-22 home loss to defending state champion Fairview, the Bulldogs had to do some soul-searching.

Team captains gathered. Powers turned to the dry-erase board and wrote the name of each team the Bulldogs needed to beat. Junior quarterback Kleat Martens could tell his team had reached a crossroads.

“I knew talking to some of my friends on the team that we were either gonna go and make a run at it, or we were just going to kind of check it in,” Martens said. “And with the group of guys that we’ve got, I knew that checking it in wasn’t really an option.”

Each week, the Bulldogs literally crossed a team’s name off their checklist. They dominated Sayre, defeated Mooreland and shut out Texhoma/Goodwell and Burns Flat-Dill City.

Approaching the rematch with Fairview, Hooker carries a 10-game win streak into the state championship, and the list of teams remains on the dry-erase board, a reminder of week-by-week progress.

With a roster of 36, the Bulldogs have leaned on a constellation of stars to reach the finals. Justin Palacios had 18 carries for 163 yards in the state semifinals. Keilan Robinson, a state champion in track, carries his speed to the football field. Omar Gomez and Braxton Burge provide leadership as senior captains. And Martens, the quarterback, has a first name perfectly fit for an athletic career.

The Bulldogs have combined their fortés for a common goal, and the 250-mile road trips have only strengthened their bonds.

“That’s when everybody gets to really know each other,” Martens said. “Everybody gets to be around each other a little bit more, and the bus rides are really cool.”

That sense of community also extends to the thousands of people who tune in to Metcalf’s broadcasts.

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Making a difference

Metcalf dedicated his broadcast network to his mother-in-law.

After she had a severe stroke, Metcalf wanted to make sure she still had a way to watch Hooker football, particularly when her grandsons played.

His solution? Start a live broadcast at games. Now, the network is in its ninth season, and a year after the death of Metcalf’s mother-in-law, the broadcasts have continued to provide others the same joy she gained from them.

“There’s been a lot of people like that,” Metcalf said. “Whether they’re going through cancer or taking care of a loved one, they can’t make (games), but they’ve got something every week to look forward to. That just makes a huge difference in a lot of people’s lives.”

Neither Metcalf nor his three broadcast partners are journalists, he said. They don’t have to be. Their conversational, folksy approach, sprinkled with references to “National Lampoon’s Vacation” and other ’80s and ’90s classics, gives listeners the sense they’re hearing from old friends.

Metcalf said about 8,000 people tuned in to watch the Bulldogs’ state semifinal game. Hooker has a population of about 1,500, but alumni in the Oklahoma City area and beyond have kept up with their school. One of Metcalf’s broadcast volunteers lives in Edmond, he said, and joins the crew for road games.

It takes dedication to follow Hooker football across the state, but Metcalf doesn’t mind the constant road trips. He sometimes stops in Woodward for coffee and Dr Pepper, fueling himself for the final two hours of the late drive home. This season, he hasn’t needed to rely on too much caffeine because the Bulldogs’ success has amped him up.

It’s doing the same for the rest of the community. When the Bulldogs arrive at Chad Richison Stadium and the train horn bellows, it will be a triumphant statement: an Oklahoma Panhandle team can make it here.

Even if it takes more than 1,800 miles.

“Sports are a big part of what we do out here,” Powers said, “and sports are big for how you keep a community going. A lot of the towns out here are big rivalries, but when you start seeing these state championship runs, people really band together in the Panhandle.”

Hallie Hart covers high school sports for The Oklahoman. Have a story idea for Hallie? She can be reached at hhart@oklahoman.com or on Twitter at@halliehart. Sign up forThe Varsity Club newsletter to access more high school coverage. Support Hallie's work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing adigital subscription today at subscribe.oklahoman.com.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Hooker represents Oklahoma panhandle in Class A football state final