Midnight coin toss decides Oklahoma high school football playoff spot: 'Never been that nervous'

SEMINOLE, Okla. — Three Oklahoma high school football teams tied for two playoff spots, so their seasons came down to something no one trains for: a midnight coin toss in a restaurant parking lot.

In Class A-2, District 3, three schools — Liberty, Gore and Central Sallisaw — finished tied for third place. With four teams from each district making the playoffs, that left three teams fighting for two open spots.

To break the tie, the Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association turned to its tiebreakers. But the teams were even at every level. Their district records matched. Each team had split its head-to-head games. Even their point differential was dead even.

That left one option: a coin toss. So the coaches met at the Catfish Roundup off Interstate 40 near Seminole at midnight, where months of work and 10 games came down to a single flip.

Central Sallisaw head coach Jeremy Thompson said he could hardly believe it would come to that.

"Coin toss, is that really going to happen? I called Mr. Johnson and he confirmed it," Thompson said. "Yes, that's how it's going to go."

As the clock struck midnight, the flip sent Liberty and Central Sallisaw to the playoffs. Thompson said he had never felt so nervous over a coin.

"I can't tell you I've ever flipped a point and been that nervous. It's a tough way to do it, but that's the way it is," Thompson said. "We're excited it went our way."

For Liberty, the trip to the postseason was a rare one.

"You never know what's going to happen when you get in a situation like this, so it's a big deal for us, our school history," Liberty head football coach Nate Green said. "We don't have a lot of trips to the playoffs."

The flip meant the end of the season for Gore and head coach Nathan McCurley.

"You just hate to see it for the seniors, especially how we've rallied these last four weeks to put ourselves in this position," McCurley said. "To have it go away on a coin flip, I'm not upset over that. It's just, I hate it for the kids more than anything."

Thompson said the whole scene — settling a football season outside a small-town seafood spot — felt like pure Oklahoma.

"Sitting here in front of the Catfish Roundup, getting to flip a coin to see who goes in," Thompson said.

Thompson said he was feeling so lucky after the flip that he joked about heading to the casino down the street.

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