{"id":33317,"date":"2023-06-22T00:17:43","date_gmt":"2023-06-22T06:17:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/aztec-high-school-football-looks-to-keep-moving-forward\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:08:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:08:15","slug":"aztec-high-school-football-looks-to-keep-moving-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/aztec-high-school-football-looks-to-keep-moving-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Aztec High School football looks to keep moving forward"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Aztec's
Aztec's Baylor Seabolt (6) fights for extra yards while being tackled by Valencia's Daniel Jaramillo (58) in the first quarter of their state football playoff game, Friday, Nov. 4, 2022 at Fred Cook Memorial Stadium. (Steven Bortstein)<\/span>Steven Bortstein<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

AZTEC \u2013 Coaches are expected to look for the positives in most situations.<\/p>\n

Aztec High School head football coach Hank Strauss has plenty of good reasons to find the positives as he heads into his second season at the position.<\/p>\n

With a record of 5-7 last season, including a 2-1 mark in District 1-4A competition and a postseason victory over Valencia, Aztec Tigers football appears headed in the right direction.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe teams we lost to last season all went on to have postseason success,\u201d Strauss said. \u201cWe lost to Bloomfield, they won the Class 4A state title. We lost to Silver, they played for the state title. We look at those as quality losses.\u201d<\/p>\n

And it doesn\u2019t stop there. The Tigers lost its second game of the season to Montezuma-Cortez by a score of 17-8. The Panthers reached the Class 2A semifinals in the Colorado High School Athletic Association\u2019s state football playoffs.<\/p>\n

\"Aztec
Aztec High School football logo (Courtesy Photo)<\/span>Aztec High School<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango, which beat Aztec just two weeks later by a score of 55-0, also would go on to reach the semifinals in Colorado\u2019s Class 3A state tournament. Taos, a winner over Aztec last season, reached the Class 4A semifinals in the New Mexico Activities Association\u2019s state tournament before losing to Bloomfield.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to be of the mindset that we were in a lot of those games,\u201d Strauss said. \u201cJust knowing that we\u2019re really close is really a testament to these kids. There could have been a lot of other teams that tapped out and not kept fighting the entire year and not win a playoff game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Strauss, who also coaches the Aztec High School track and field team as well as serving as an assistant coach for the school\u2019s wrestling team, is encouraged by the turnout the football team is getting for summer workouts.<\/p>\n

\"Aztec
Aztec High head football coach Hank Strauss (Courtesy photo)<\/span>Courtesy Photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cFrom my years of coaching, to have successful teams, you have to get crossover kids, kids who do love their first sports, whether it be wrestling, track or whatever, but where they are also playing that other sport,\u201d Strauss said. \u201cThis is what we need to do at Aztec because we\u2019re a smaller school. I\u2019m into crossover sports whether it\u2019s players or coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tigers will be looking for its first winning season since the 2019 campaign, when they finished 8-4 and advanced to the second round of the NMAA Class 4A tournament before losing to Lovington. Helping the Tigers reach that status will be returning playmaker Baylor Seabolt, who will be coming back for his senior campaign.<\/p>\n

As a junior, Seabolt caught 58 passes for 643 yards and six touchdowns according to MaxPreps. Seabolt also scored six touchdowns while rushing for more than 330 yards for the Tigers last season.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Seabolt) has really taken on a leadership role and is a really good student-athlete,\u201d Strauss said.<\/p>\n

Senior Landan Frost, who was a force on both sides of the ball last season for the Tigers, is also expected to be a major factor for his final season. Frost passed for three scores, caught a pair of touchdown passes and amassed more than 430 yards in total offense according to MaxPreps.<\/p>\n

On defense, Frost was one of the team leaders with 39 tackles and a pair of interceptions.<\/p>\n

The Tigers are also expected to be strong up front when the offense is on the field.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m real excited about the offensive line. We have lots of talent that are coming back that I\u2019m super excited about.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tigers will open the 2023 season with a pair of home games starting on Friday, Aug. 18 against Miyamura before hosting Montezuma-Cortez the following weekend. Aztec has an 11-1 record against Miyamura dating back to 2011.<\/p>\n

Competing in District 1-4A alongside state champion Bloomfield, as well as Kirtland Central and Gallup, the Tigers have a mark of 39-10 against its district rivals dating back to 2004.<\/p>\n

Aztec Tigers Football 2023 Schedule<\/strong><\/p>\n

Home games in ALL CAPS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Friday, Aug. 18, 7 p.m MIYAMURA<\/p>\n

Friday, Aug. 25, 7 p.m. CORTEZ<\/p>\n

Friday, Sept. 1, 7 p.m. @Bayfield<\/p>\n

Friday, Sept. 8, 7 p.m. @Durango<\/p>\n

Friday, Sept. 16, 7 p.m. @SILVER CITY<\/p>\n

Saturday, Sept. 23, 1 p.m. @St. Michael\u2019s<\/p>\n

Friday, Sept. 29, 7 p.m. TAOS<\/p>\n

Friday, Oct. 13, 7 p.m. @Gallup<\/p>\n

Friday, Oct. 20, 7 p.m BLOOMFIELD<\/p>\n

Friday, Oct. 27, 7 p.m. @Kirtland Central<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Strauss optimistic program headed in right direction<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1707,1871,2429,592,1816,2693,1870,642,1815,3531,36,1709],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-33317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-aztec-high-school","tag-bayfield-high-school","tag-bloomfield-high-school","tag-durango-high-school","tag-gallup-high-school","tag-high-school-coaches","tag-high-school-football","tag-high-school-sports","tag-kirtland-central-high-school","tag-maxpreps","tag-montezuma-cortez-high-school","tag-new-mexico-activities-association"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33317"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33317\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82148,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33317\/revisions\/82148"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33317"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=33317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}