Fannin County, Texas -- Kristen Catalane, Donnie Duncan, Steve Hembree and the 2013 Leonard Tigers football team will be inducted into the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame Saturday, January 25, 2020.
The banquet is set for 6:30 p.m. Saturday at Bailey Inglish Cafeteria. Tickets are $15.00. Children under 6 free.
Kristen Catalane
Kristen Elise Catalane was born January 14, 1989 to Bill & DeLisa Catalane. Her siblings are Kandace and Klint Catalane.
Kristen transferred to Bonham High School from Allen High School in the fall of 2003 after volleyball season. She played basketball at Bonham her freshman year and ran track that spring.
As a sophomore in 2004 she dedicated her full attention to volleyball year round playing club ball in Dallas.
She was named District 9-3A Most Valuable Player and 1st Team All Texomaland as well as All Tournament teams. She helped guide Bonham to the Regional Final game.
In 2005 she was District 9-3A Most Valuable Player and 1st Team All Texomaland as well as All Tournament Teams. She helped guide Bonham to Regional Semi-finale game.
In 2006 she was 1st Team District 9-3A and 1st Team All Texomaland as well as All Tournament teams. She helped guide Bonham to the State Semi-final game. She was named to the TGCA All State and TGCA All Star teams in 2006.
Kristen started her collegiate career in 2007 at Arkansas State University. She was a two-year starter in 2007 and 2008 before a serious injury ended her career.
She was among team and Sun Belt conference leaders in kills, digs, and service aces per game. She transferred to TWU and graduated with a BA degree in business.
Kristen was hired by Blount Fine Foods as a receptionist while she still attended TWU. She is now a Senior Buyer with the company and will be pursuing a company sponsored MBA degree in 2020. Kristen currently resides in McKinney, Texas.
Steve Hembree
Steve was born October 19, 1948 in Bonham to Paul and Lela Mae Hembree. He attended school in Bonham, grades 1-12, graduating in 1967. While in high school, he served as Senior Class President and participated in athletics. He played five sports including football, basketball, baseball, track and golf. Steve earned thirteen varsity letters and several honors including All-District awards in football, basketball, and baseball.
Upon graduation from high school, he received scholarship offers in football and baseball. He accepted a baseball scholarship from Navarro Jr. College in Corsicana. At this time, he was drafted by the Atlanta Braves baseball organization. The baseball team at Navarro earned a Conference Championship in 1968 and a play-off appearance in the junior college division.
After receiving a degree from Navarro, Steve accepted another baseball scholarship from Southeastern Oklahoma State College in Durant. While attending SOSU, the baseball team advanced to the NAIA play-offs in 1970. In 1971 Steve finished his college degree at East Texas State University.
Steve began his coaching career in Ector ISD, 1971-1972 as a junior high boys and girls basketball coach. He moved to Bonham L.H. Rather Junior High and coached all sports for eight years. During this time, he married Candice Smith from Beaumont, Texas. In 1977, he started coaching Varsity Boys Golf and remained in that position until retirement. During this time, the boys team won fifteen District titles, five Regional titles and advanced to the State Tournament six times. The girls golf program also produced four District Championships and six trips to Regionals. At the beginning of 1981-1982 school year, Steve as assigned to coach varsity football and be the head boys basketball coach. For the next twenty years, he coached varsity basketball winning 374 games including six district or co-district titles and four runner-up finishes. These were the first play-off appearances for Bonham basketball since the 1950’s. Steve stayed at Bonham High School coaching varsity athletics for over twenty-five years before retiring in 2002.
"I would like to thank all the players and assistant coaches for their time and effort that was needed to make each program successful for over twenty years," Mr. Hembree states. "This award is special because the school and community appreciated what we were able to achieve. It was our purpose to build a program that the players would want to be a part of and proudly support. Special thanks to my family and friends for their support during my career. It is an honor to be placed in the Fannin County Sports Hall of Fame."
2013 Leonard Tigers
The 2013 football season was an epic journey full of ups and downs for the Leonard Tigers. This season taught a group of young men from Fannin County character, courage, resiliency, toughness, and what it meant to be a family of brothers.
The season started off with a bang seeing Solomon “Ray Ray” Titus return the opening kickoff for a touchdown against the Community Braves. Despite losing that game, this team learned a lot about each other. They learned that they would all have to contribute in all three phases of the game and we would have to be in top physical condition to accomplish our goals. We went in the locker room after that game and vowed to be the most conditioned, coachable, and tough football team that Leonard has ever seen.
After that loss we reeled off 6 straight wins to where we scored 296 points while only allowing 70. We were starting to become a football team and it was showing. After that run is where the character part comes in because we then lost 2 of our next 3 to a very good Gunter team by the score of 19-11 and an undefeated S&S team by the score of 19-16 on a last-second 42-yard field goal for a share of the district title. We ended the season as the 3rd place team in our very tough district, but as we walked by the S&S players on our field holding up the district championship trophy we knew that we were much better than we showed and used it as fuel for our program.
The playoffs
Despite being the 3rd place team, we were awarded the opportunity to play in the Texas State Football Playoffs. In the first round we were matched up against Edgewood who was the runner up out of their district and since Leonard was the 3rd place team and hadn’t won a play-off game since 1986 nobody gave us a shot and we were quickly 14-point underdogs. We won that game in double overtime 43-36; Cody Crane caused a fumble to end the game securing our first playoff win since 1986! We were on top of the world and that made us work that much harder the next week. We then drew Blooming Grove in the 2nd round, again we garnished the underdog role coming in but only by 6 this time. The weather was less than cooperative that night in Coppell with the high never making it out of the 30’s, we struggled against a very disciplined running attack in the first half but came back strong to win the game 35-21. Now we are on to the 3rd round and our chance to get redemption for our district loss to S&S. We played this game on a beautiful Saturday afternoon at the stunning new Allen Eagles Stadium. During the time between our last meeting with S&S we learned that the kicker who beat us was a foreign exchange student from Germany so as a staff we learned the phrase “Vermisse es” which means “Miss It” in German. As it turned out we didn’t need the phrase as we were hitting on all cylinders and won the rematch 55-44. Now on to the 4th round where we drew the #3 ranked and undefeated Cooper Bulldogs and yes we were heavy underdogs again. The game was supposed to be played on Saturday in Wylie but on Thursday of that week a tremendous ice storm blew in causing everyone in North Texas to move their games. We ended up playing on the following Monday in Royce City. It was brutal cold that day with the high only reaching 26 degrees, the game was a back and forth battle that found us ahead 21-20 with just over 2 minutes left in the 4th. We were facing a 3rd and goal from the Cooper 3 yard line. We called a time out and took our tight end out of the game and moved Ryan Nixon who was one of our quarterbacks to tight end and had Justin Bennett throw one of the prettiest screen passes you have ever seen back to Nixon who walks in the end zone. We ended up shocking the world and coming away with a 28-20 victory and the title of Region 2 Champions. We are now in the State Semi-Finals against the Cisco Lobos. Our unbelievable run came to an end that Saturday in Ft. Worth to the eventual State Champions in a hard fought physical matchup for which we came up short. As they say “ All Good things must come to an end” as did our football season that day.
We often think about that magical season with a smile on our face and think to ourselves It’s A Great Day To Be A Tiger!
Donnie Duncan
Donnie Duncan was born August 28,1940 to Elmo & Nadine Duncan and attended school in Celeste, Texas.
Donnie participated in football, basketball, baseball, & tennis all four years of high school, and was named 1st Team All-District Quarterback his senior year.
Donnie attended college at Austin College in Sherman, Texas and lettered all four years in football & baseball. He was named captain of the football team in 1961 & garnered Most Valuable Player & All-Texas College Team honors his senior year in 1962.
Donnie began his football coaching career at the high school level including his first head football coaching job early on at Honey Grove ISD in Honey Grove, Texas in 1965. In his two years there, the Warriors won District & Bi-District losing to eventual state champion Ozona both years. At Honey Grove he compiled a record of 20-2-1 and completed both seasons in the top five in the state rankings.
Donnie then moved quickly to college coaching which included a highly successful stint at Navarro Junior College in Corsicana, Texas including an 11-1 record his first season there.
Donnie began his NCAA football coaching career at the University of Oklahoma in 1973 as an assistant, and he held that job until 1979 when he was named head football coach at Iowa State University. While at Oklahoma, the Sooners won two consecutive National Championships and six Big 8 Championships.
After four seasons at Iowa State, Donnie began the administrative portion of his illustrious career. In 1984 & 1985 he was Executive Director of the Sun Bowl & served in the same capacity in the 1986 Gator Bowl. Within weeks after that Gator Bowl, he was hired back on at the University of Oklahoma as Athletic Director. Donnie retired from that position in 1996, but he continued to serve in the early formation of the current Big 12 Conference as Director of Football Operations. Donnie received both his bachelor's & master's degrees from Austin College, and he had worked on his doctoral degree at Texas A&M-Commerce.
Donnie Duncan passed away on March 12, 2016 after a long battle with cancer. He is survived by his wife of 54 years, Sally Treadway Duncan of Greenville, Texas, as well as his daughter Amy, son-in-law Patrick Reardon, two grandchildren Lexie & Alli, and younger sister Sherry Thacker of Celeste, Texas. Donnie was preceded in death by his mother, father, sister Pam Seals, and son Mark.