Steve Bragg — Commerce High, Football

When Steve Bragg took over as the head football coach at Commerce High in the off-season he knew he didn’t have an easy task ahead of him. But worried he was not.

The coach took over for a team which, in 1999, won its eighth straight District championship and finished with a perfect record (16-0) and a Division II state title. Add in the fact that Bragg is a single parent, who also assumed the responsibilities of the school’s athletic director and the 39-year-old had good reason to feel the pressure mounting.

He wasn’t ready to make excuses before the season started, however.

“I looked at it as a reward for doing a good job,” says Bragg. “The program had such a great tradition and coach Lineweaver did such a super job. It wasn’t a program where I felt like I had to come in and reinvent the wheel.”

Instead, Bragg came in looking to build on the tradition that was already established, making minor changes according to his offensive and defensive philosophies.

As a result, Bragg won’t be needing to make excuses when the season’s over either. By beating Forney High last Friday, Commerce won its ninth straight district title and 25th straight game. And now, according to Bragg, the Tigers are thinking about a second straight season title.

“Winning the district championship was our first goal,” he says. “We shooting for bigger fish now, though. We’re looking at a state title. I don’t think we’ve reached our peak yet.”

Surely Bragg’s decision to leave Pittsburg High after just one year as the school’s head coach and athletic director seems like the right one now. It really made sense all along, though.

Bragg graduated from North Mesquite High in 1979 and four years later, after getting a degree from the University of North Texas, was back at the school coaching the receivers under his mentor, Gary Childress. Bragg stayed at North Mesquite from ’83 to ’89 and then took a job at Poteet High as the offensive coordinator. He stayed there until ’99 and then moved on to Pittsburg High.

While at Poteet, Bragg lost his wife to kidney disease. He has raised his son, Cameron, by himself since.

“It’s tough to maintain the balance between being a father and a coach,” he says.

Which is why moving back home, to the Mesquite area, was all the more appealing. Bragg’s parents, who are still in the area, help out with Cameron, now 6 years old, whenever they can. And with all his responsibilities at school, Bragg needs all the help he can get.

“It’s stressful,” says Bragg.

You wouldn’t know it.
—C.J. Lampman