KINGSVILLE, Texas — The Texas A&M University Kingsville Javelinas were at home on Saturday night for their last game of the regular season.
It also marked the end of a local player's career with the Javelinas—the son of well-known late Sinton High School football coach Tom Allen.
Allen was the Sinton head football coach and athletic director for 12 years. He died last year after retiring in 2018. It came following a Multiple Systems Atrophy diagnosis—a disorder affecting the nervous system.
Allen won 106 games and led the Pirates to back-to-back state semifinals in 2013 and 2014.
His son Jackson Allen played for the Sinton Pirates and continued his football career at TAMUK. As his college football career reached an end on Saturday, he reflected on continuing to play the sport he and his dad loved.
"It's the best way that I could repay everything that he did for me and everything he did for so many other people," said Jackson Allen, Javelinas wide receiver and TAMUK graduate student. "Just going out every day trying to make him proud, that's something I take pride in, and it's just a blessing to be able to keep playing."
Allen said that playing in college is something that he always dreamed of doing as a kid, and it was great playing close to his family and the Sinton community.