Inductees

Along U.S. Highway 65 north between Springfield and Sedalia, on a meandering two-laner cutting through farm country of Hickory County, the big box-office draw is not at a movie theater but at an R-I school district.

That would be the girls basketball program of Skyline High School, and think the locals are proud of it? Wait till you see the trophy cases and the gym touting all the success.

That success? Try 14 Final Fours, including six state championships – a resume that’s certainly why the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame proudly inducted the Skyline Lady Tigers Basketball Program with the Class of 2020.

As current coach Kevin Cheek put it, “We’re in a unique spot because elementary kids see our high school kids almost every day in the hallway. The little girls get to see high school basketball players, and you see them at basketball games and can tell they are paying attention.”

Without a doubt, inspiration is easy to find.

Skyline won Class 2 state titles in 1996, 1997, 2003, 2004 and 2017, and when it detoured to Class 3 in 2008? Yes, they won it all that year, too.

The Lady Tigers also were state runners-up four times (1998, 2009, 2014, 2015), earned a trio of third-places finishes (2013 2016, 2018) and placed fourth in 1982.

It’s quite a history, which began in the fall of 1972, or months after passage of federal Title IX legislation that required public schools and universities to create girls athletic teams.

From that season has risen a giant, and it’s no wonder grade schoolers want to build on the tradition.

Put it this way, the trophy cases in the north lobby are a rare, custom-made design complete with tiny handles and thin panes of glass – think of east-coast china cabinets – and they’re already out of real estate to house anything more.

Inside the gym, red chairbacks angle up the west side, while billboard-size state championship team photos hug the south wall and banners hang from the east-side rafters. In fact, an east-side wall was blown out several years ago in order to create room for more bleachers.

Along the way, coaches have been Gary Boggs, Joe Teague, Herb Bybee, Peggy (Smith) McGuire, Barb Woodruff, Lynn Long (MSHOF 2018) and Cheek.

Skyline has won 23 district titles and 21 conference championships.

The program earned 139 wins in five seasons (1994 to 1999) under Long and, since then, 524 wins under Cheek.

Additionally, the school has an unofficial historian in Janet Edge, a scorekeeper for every level of basketball here since 1978.

Skyline’s first five conference titles from 1978 to 1982 were under Bybee.

“They were all very good students, pretty easy to get along with. There weren’t any of them super-talented, but they loved to work,” Bybee said. “I think maybe we (in 1982) smoothed the runway for all the rest of teams since then. A lot of the parents decided this is something they liked. We started a tradition that is still carrying on today.”

The next Golden Era began in the mid-1990s.

The 1996 team (29-1) beat Palmyra 56-43 to win the school’s first state championship weeks after ending Marshfield’s long home-court win streak. The 1997 team (31-1) handled Cape Giraradeau-Notre Dame 61-45 in the finals.

The 1996 team’s T-shirt read, “Run The Floor, Hit the Door.”

“Our basketball program was up and coming in 1995,” said Kelli Bybee Cheek. “We were kind of surprising people by beating some good teams and showing we could compete with bigger schools. We started playing together in third and fourth grade and built that up with a team that liked to run the floor.”

The 2003 team (29-4) and the 2004 team (30-2) won state titles by beating Clopton by scores of  61-44 and 59-46.

The 2008 team (29-3) beat South Shelby 44-43. The 2017 team (31-2) beat Adrian 69-42. The 1998 team (27-4) was only seven points away from winning it all. The 2009 team lost only 50-49 to Cardinal Ritter.

Skyline has filled 39 All-State slots over the years, 38 since 1995. Madison Brethower and Kaylee DaMitz were All-State in each of their four seasons, respectively.

“Whenever I was younger, we’d always come to games. You’d be looking up and say, ‘I want to be her someday,’” DaMitz said. “It’s pretty amazing to play here. We are small, but our community support is amazing. Every night it’s pretty much a packed house.”