The rebuild: How the Thornton High School football team looks to overcome a 17-game losing streak

WESTMINSTER, Colo. – Dominic Tillmon proudly watched as his team scored the first touchdown of the season. The 56–6 loss hardly mattered in that instant – Thornton celebrated their lone score like it was a championship. For one fleeting moment, they stood on top of the world.

However, the Thornton High School football team has not had it easy. After finishing the 2024 season 0-10, the team has officially recorded ten losing seasons in a row. Throughout last year, it became evident that change needed to happen. They needed a new head coach.

“I wanted somebody who could fix the culture here,” said Jeremiah Johnson, the director of Thornton’s athletic department. For that reason, finding a head coach proved to be a challenging task. “We interviewed a lot of candidates. It's a pretty popular position.” 

Thornton’s athletic department did a thorough job of screening candidates, to try to identify the best option available. After several interviews, meetings and conversations, they ended up selecting Dominic Tillmon, former defensive coordinator at the Academy of Charter Schools in Westminster. 

Tillmon was no stranger to turning things around in a football program. At Westminster – a team that had a 0-9 record in 2023 – he helped implement a winning culture, leading the team to an improved 6-4 in 2024. 

But Tillmon was not satisfied with being a defensive coordinator. He aimed to have more control over the cultural shift in a team. For that, he needed to be a head coach.

In the interviewing process with Thornton, Tillmon made his intentions very clear to Johnson and the athletic department. “I asked him: are you here for a change, or are you here to continue down the same path? If you’re here to continue on the same path, it's not gonna work.”

Little did he know, that attitude was exactly what the school was looking for. 

“After meeting with Dominic so much and talking strategy and kind of what he wanted to bring here, he definitely shined through.”, Johnson said. 

With the new head coach, came a new coaching staff, assembled by Tillmon. A difficult task lay ahead of this group: meeting the players, connecting with them, and training them to win football games.

However, winning takes time. “You may not win right off the bat, in terms of the scoreboard,” Tillmon said. “We’ve got to make sure that the kids see the little things that improve from week one to week two.”

Throughout training camp, the staff focused on teaching the players to be patient. “I think the students expected a very easy and quick transition,” said Adonis Brown, the team’s offensive coordinator. “The coaches were more aware of the fact that this may be a process.”

At moments, this process has been painful. In 2025, the team started the season 0-3, after losses against Skyview, Westminster and Northglenn. But for Thornton, the scoreboard rarely reflects the true outcome of the game. Every little detail that the team gets right is a small victory. 

That’s why even after losses, the atmosphere in the locker room is positive. The players understand that things are changing – and they know it takes time. 

This excitement is a symptom of the mentality shift within the program. With each player taking pride in the little things, they are destined to find success soon. 

Win or lose, the athletic department still takes great pride in teaching Thornton students the benefits of practicing team sports. “You learn a lot by being part of a team,” Johnson said. “Whether it's learning how to deal with difficult people or learning how to be a part of a group, you learn how to put in your work so you're not letting the person next to you down.”

Whether or not the Thornton Trojans find their way to the top remains to be seen. In the meantime, head coach Dominic Tillmon, his staff and the athletic department are making sure that kids seize the opportunity of simply playing football – and the life lessons they can learn from it. 

“Football teaches you a lot of life lessons,” Tillmon said. “It teaches you discipline, work ethic, the importance of effort and the importance of being able to overcome change. Football's a game that changes. And in life, things change all the time.”