HOUSTON - A video about Tim Buchanan at Saturday night’s Texas High School Coaches Association (THSCA) 63rd Hall of Honor induction banquet revealed the moment Buchanan found out he’d be one of five former football coaches to join the prestigious THSCA Hall of Honor in 2023.
As THSCA Executive Director Joe Martin reached out to Buchanan with the news in mid-December, Buchanan acknowledged during the surprise phone call that he was honored. But in the same breath, he told Martin he was trying to figure out a way to stop College Station’s offense and score on its defense later that week as the Bearcats were slated to face the Cougars in the Class 5A Division I state championship.
Business-like, over-prepared, and focused with a healthy amount of respect for each opponent — just as he was in the previous 341 games he coached in 25 years at the helm of the Bearcats. And then, of course, Buchanan’s Bearcats beat College Station 52-14 later that week for a UIL-program record 11th state football title.
With his eighth state title and final game coaching the Bearcats behind him, Saturday, July 15, was all about Buchanan for what many acknowledged was an overdue honor.
In front of nearly 1,000 fellow and former coaches and sports fans from across the state — many of whom he inspired and mentored in his 40 years in the business — Buchanan was inducted into the THSCA Hall of Honor at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, joining a little more than 300 legends similarly recognized in the last six-plus decades.
Martin recalled that Buchanan had once served on the THSCA board.
“Tim obviously won a ton of games, the most state championships of anybody around. His reputation is the way that he coached his kids, the way that he acted from a professional standpoint, dealt with not only his own kids but the coaching profession. His relationship with coaches across the state is fantastic,” Martin said.
“His impact on high school athletics, when he took the Aledo job, it was a terrible job. They were absolutely terrible, and he turned it into something that it is today. It is phenomenal. That is something that no one else has been able to do. He went from nothing to a lot, stayed there and created a dynasty. He did it through hard work, having really good coaches and those coaches doing the right things by their kids,” Martin added.
“To be honored in this way by my peers in Texas high school football and coaching is one of the greatest accomplishments of my career,” Buchanan said. “And to look out into that room and see all of my family and friends and fellow coaches from Aledo and other stops in my coaching career made it even more special. This will be a night I will cherish forever; I am so appreciative of the THSCA for this recognition.”
Recalling that Aledo had its challenges when he was hired (he was the fifth coach in four years), Buchanan spoke of why he and his wife Rebecca chose Aledo.
“Very seldom do good jobs come open,” Buchanan said. “Typically, if a job is open there is something wrong with it. Aledo was a place that had been successful back in the 1970s; we felt it was a place where we could go and start a family and build a program. You go looking for a great place to build a family — Aledo was that place. We were very fortunate to be able to hire some really good assistant coaches, get kids that really worked hard and go through a heck of a program.”
Buchanan also noted that Aledo was ready to work hard to achieve their goals when he arrived.
Some of Buchanan’s former players were in the audience at the induction.
“There are quite a few of them here tonight,” Buchanan said. “That is why we do this. It is about kids. When I got ready to retire, people asked me what I would miss the most. ‘Are you going to miss the coaches’ — I said no. I can go see the coaches anytime I want. I said that I am going to miss the kids. It is the real reason that you do this.”
Buchanan noted that some of his former players are now in their 50s.
“We had a group meeting with our 1998 state championship team — the first one we had in Aledo — and we were talking and I told them that they are five years older than I was when we won our first championship,” Buchanan said.
“The unique thing about Aledo is everyone is an overachiever,” Buchanan said. “It doesn't matter if you are a great student; if you are an A-plus student, you wanted to be an A-plus-plus. If they were a C student, they wanted to be a B. If they were a football player that ran a 5 flat (in the 40 yard dash), they wanted to run in the 4s. if they ran a 4.4 they wanted to run a 4.3. It was that way across the board. It doesn’t matter if it is band, football, basketball, baseball, one act play, UIL academics — the community is made up of people who want you to work their kids. 98 percent of the community want you to work their kids and that is what kept me there for 30 years.”
He also stressed the importance of being able to teach.
“When I got to be a head coach, when we went out and started searching for assistant coaches, we looked for good teachers,” Buchanan said. “If you can’t teach in the classroom, you dang sure can’t teach on the football field, basketball court, tennis court, or baseball field. So we looked for good teachers. If you look at the majority of our coaches they are math, science, history, and English. There were very few PE teachers on our coaching staff. That right there was number one. You had to be a good teacher to be a good coach in the state of Texas. Then you have to be willing to work. We pay a little bit better today but when I first started in 1983 — I made one dollar a day and that didn’t include Saturday. That equated to $171 for coaching. You don’t do it for the money, you do it because you love kids, competition, and you like seeing how you can help kids.”
Buchanan was one of five former football coaches in the THSCA’s Hall of Honor Class of 2023. Inducted alongside Buchanan were:
Buchanan amassed a 281-58-3 record as a head coach, all at Aledo. Buchanan’s eight state championships ranks him tied for second all-time in Texas with G.A. Moore, who won eight state titles at Pilot Point and Celina; they’re behind Carthage’s Scott Surratt and Gordon Wood (Brownwood/Stamford), who each have nine. His impact was felt way beyond wins, losses and state titles, though.
“It was a wonderful night to celebrate Coach Buchanan as he is so deserving of this honor,” Aledo ISD Superintendent Dr. Susan Bohn said. “What he has meant to not only our football program and athletics department but also our community is immeasurable. You just don’t find the kind of loyalty and dedication to one program or one school very often anymore. We are so fortunate that Coach Buc chose Aledo and spent three decades inspiring our student-athletes to be their very best.”
In addition to the video of Buchanan’s surprise phone call from Martin, Buchanan was featured in a video summarizing his career that included interviews with THSCA Hall of Honor member Ross Rogers who Buchanan coached under at A&M Consolidated early in his career.
Rogers saw back then that Buchanan was something special, saying in the video, “Tim was the whole package; he knew how to handle the kids,” Rogers said. “He knew when to be tough and when to pat them on the back. He brought the whole package.”
After the video, Buchanan was interviewed on stage by Texas high school football guru and announcer Craig Way and officially inducted and presented with a wooden plaque by THSCA Board of Directors President Lee Wiginton from Allen.
“Being a coach and being called coach to me is a badge of honor,” Buchanan said in the video. “It’s one of the most honorable things you can do.”
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