The football program received the Danny Palmer Community Service Award at the East Texas Kickoff luncheon on August 13. This honor is named after former Tyler Junior College (TJC) head football coach Danny Palmer.

“I’d like to congratulate our student athletes and coaches in football with an outstanding year serving our community,” athletic director Mike Maddox said. “I’d also like to thank all of our student athletes and coaches for going beyond the call and influencing our school and community. We don’t do it just to get recognition, but [we] do it to show our student athletes the importance of helping change lives and the inner reward that it brings to know we have helped encourage someone, brought a smile to their face and traded a valuable time in their life to make a positive impact in someone else’s life.”

The award is named after Palmer because the TJC football team often did community service during his time as a coach there. At the luncheon, Maddox, head football coach Chris Cochran and senior Connor Boyette accepted the award for the program.

“I found out when I was sitting in the crowd at the luncheon,” Cochran said. “It’s a tremendous honor for our program. We talk all the time that what we are doing is so much more than the game of football. We always have an opportunity to put others first and serve so this is a great example of that. I’m just happy that our program is able to receive this honor and represent our high school and community.”

Our football team did a variety of activities in the community. They opened car doors for young students at the elementary school and helped out at the food pantry, among other things.

“[The team] did so many activities, it was unbelievable,” Palmer said. “I congratulate the Lindale Eagles, the coaching staff here, for the tremendous effort they gave and the time they spent representing the community of Lindale.”