The “Slam Man” is trying to pound the competition and non-believers in the state.
Marana coach Phillip Steward—nicknamed “Slam Man” because of his physical tackling style as a linebacker during his senior season in 2008 at Missouri City (Texas) Fort Bend Hightower—has led the Tigers to a No. 1 rating heading into this week’s start of the Open Division playoffs.
Marana (10-0) of the 5A will host No. 8 Chandler Hamilton (9-1), a 6A school, in a first-round game at Marana on Friday at 7 p.m.
Steward mentioned he has read naysayers from the Phoenix area post on social media commenting that Marana is undeserving of the No. 1 seed because of the Tigers’ schedule playing mostly Southern Arizona schools.
“I’ve been seeing that, and to me, I don’t really care for it,” Steward said. “Since I’ve been here at Marana, we’ve been underdogs, and this is not nothing new for us. They have doubted us once again; they’ve given us a hard time.
“The AIA gave us the schedule. We played what’s on the schedule. We won those games. That’s not our fault that we are No. 1. I try to tell the boys not to pay attention to stuff like that and just play the game.”
.@MaranaFB @CoachSteward__ talked about the Tigers’ Open Division first-round game against Chandler Hamilton as the No. 1 seed after cheering on Marana’s flag football team to victory in their playoffs. He touched on criticism mostly from the Phoenix area about Marana being the… pic.twitter.com/semEMh2T7w
— Javier Morales (@JavierJMorales) November 19, 2024
During his “Slam Man” days with Fort Bend Hightower, Steward lived through the hype of a substantial playoff game in the Houston area.
The 5A Division I state championship between unbeaten Fort Bend Hightower and Allen (Texas) had more than 20,000 in attendance at Reliant Stadium in Houston. Allen won the game 21-14 and Fort Bend Hightower ended the season 13-1.
“(Friday’s game) brings back a lot of memories because we were undefeated going into the playoffs,” Steward said. “I told our boys the one thing we did as a team is we became closer. That helped us get through some of these tough rounds.”
Steward, his coaching staff, and the Tigers took advantage of a week without a game before the start of the Open Division.
Many of the starters — including Division I prospects Colten Meyer at quarterback and Dezmen Roebuck (Washington commit) at receiver and safety — have basically not played the last three weeks because the regular-season finale on Nov. 1 at Desert View was lopsided.
“I think we all have been just bonding these last two weeks, and it’s going to help us,” Steward said. “We’re going to need all that coming on Friday. I think it’s been good for us having this time off.
“It’s been bringing us together as brothers.
Friday’s game with Hamilton won’t draw 20,000 like that at Reliant Stadium in Steward’s last high school game, but Marana’s stadium will have an overflow crowd that will not only include fans of the Tigers and the Huskies.
Many from Southern Arizona will attend because of the magnitude and novelty of the game.
Salpointe and Bijan Robinson qualified for the Open Division in 2019 and lost to Chandler and Gunner Maldonado in the semifinals. No other Southern Arizona team has competed in the Open Division.
Given that fact and Marana’s being the No. 1 seed, Friday’s game will be the highest-in-magnitude game to ever be played in Southern Arizona.
“We can’t wait to get them back into the Tiger Stadium and bring the noise,” Steward said of Marana’s fans. “Hopefully they bring up all the sound they can, because we’re going to need it. The boys feed off the energy from the crowd, so we’re going to need it this Friday.
“I hope it’s a big game. There’s always a big turnout. I think they’re gonna travel well, too, Hamilton. I just can’t wait.”
Steward was an all-district and all-state selection who finished with 150 solo tackles, 12 sacks, and three forced fumbles in his senior season at Fort Bend Hightower before he played at Houston under Kevin Sumlin.
He went on to almost play for the St. Louis Rams in 2013 as an undrafted free agent. He made it to the final cut.
He came to Tucson not because of Sumlin but because his fiancée was attending pharmacy school at Arizona. He met her while serving as an assistant coach at Willcox, where she is from. He left Texas for Willcox because his former Fort Bend Hightower teammate — Alonzo Highsmith Jr. — took the head coaching job there and persuaded Steward to join his staff.
“I looked at it as a good way to break into coaching working with Alonzo and helping young guys develop into good football players by teaching them,” he said in a previous interview. “I also ended up being the girls basketball coach and track coach there. That was all beneficial to my growth as a coach and a teacher.”
Steward met his fiancée, Monique Cazares, at a card game at a friend’s house in Willcox.
Cazares became a freshman at Arizona in 2020-21 and Steward came to Tucson with her and his daughter Annika.
Highsmith left Willcox after the 2019 season to become the defensive coordinator at Phoenix North High School. Instead of trying to become the next head coach at Willcox, Steward decided to look for a position in Tucson to remain close to Cazares.
The late Louie Ramirez, head coach at Marana at the time, hired Steward to coach the outside linebackers and running backs.
When Ramirez was enticed to become an assistant coach at powerhouse Scottsdale Saguaro in 2021, Steward became Marana’s 16th head coach.
In his fourth season as head coach, the Tigers are making history.
Their unbeaten run through the regular season is the first time the program has achieved such a feat since the 1968 state championship team went 11-0 under Don Hawkins.
Steward is not entering the Open Division reserved in his comments about playing a traditional powerhouse like Hamilton.
He is making an impact on his players by embracing the challenge.
Hamilton won state titles in 2003, 2004, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2012. They also had a 53-game winning streak, the longest in Arizona history, until 2011.
“They’re big and physical,” said Steward of Hamilton, which includes Arizona Class of 2025 commit Dajon Hinton, a cornerback. “I feel like we’re big and physical. We’ve been in the weight room a lot this last few weeks. They play fast, but I feel like that’s what we do.
“Watching a lot of their games they played, they haven’t seen a defense like ours, or they haven’t seen an offense like ours. We run a lot of different concepts. We can get vertical, we can go short, throw a 3-yard pass and take it 60 yards. Nobody has seen that dynamic of offense and defense put together. I think it gives us the edge to this game, and our boys are feeling confident.”
Steward calls his fast-paced, no-huddle offense “NASCAR,” because of its speed that keeps defenses off balance.
“One thing we’re gonna try to do is, work on NASCAR,” he mentioned. “I don’t think they have ever seen anybody that goes real fast. We’re gonna continue to work on NASCAR, hopefully they are conditioned, because we are gonna try to go fast. We’re excited. We can’t wait until Friday.”
Observing his energy as he talks about his team, it’s no wonder Steward was called “Slam Man” by his teammates at Fort Bend Hightower.
He does not hold back and his players have taken on that persona.
“We’re doing this for the whole Southern Arizona,” Steward said. “If we can win this game and get into the next one, I think we’re gonna grab a few more fans that we haven’t had all year. I’m excited for it.”
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator in 2016 and is presently a special education teacher at Sunnyside High School in the Sunnyside Unified School District.
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