For him, it was Freshman Year or Bust. That was the scary reality. You see, the college track and field coach offered only a token scholarship and, more worrisome, the finances back home likely weren’t enough for anything beyond if it all didn’t work out. Christian Cantwell loves telling the story from the spring of… Read more »
She still remembers it like yesterday: A basketball in her hand, dribbling and shooting baskets, and competing in summer camps. And this was years before she starred for West Plains High School and the University of Missouri basketball teams. Yes, Kerensa Barr Cassis breaks into a smile just reminiscing about it all. “I was probably… Read more »
To coach Scott Bailey, those who have watched the rise of the Lamar High School Football Program should know one thing: It wasn’t his doing alone. “In our town, the school is important, and our town supports all the things that our kids do, with football being one of them,” Bailey said. A turnaround known… Read more »
For 51 years, it was easy for Rick Todd to leave the house every morning and head off to work. And not simply because of his roles for the Herschend Family Entertainment Inc., which owns Silver Dollar City. Certainly, growing the company’s success and entertaining families was fun. However, along the way, he came to… Read more »
Doug Elgin, who in 30 years has brought a firm and steady hand to the Missouri Valley Conference as its commissioner, is quick to share the credit for MVC success with others within the organization. Elgin salutes the MVC Presidents Council for taking ownership of league membership issues, and also points to the remarkable continuity… Read more »
There is an old saying that, if you are living your dream, you’ll never really work a day in your life. That’s true for Martin Mac Donald, who since his college days has championed the outdoors and, even better, found a tremendous platform 24 years ago to showcase his passion. That’s when he accepted an… Read more »
It’s almost as if a Hollywood script writer delivered it right to Frank Capra himself. How else to explain the career of Jim Otis? There he was at age 7 in a photo beside 1955 Heisman Trophy winner Howard “Hopalong” Cassady of Ohio State. As a high school junior, with the headlights of teammates’ cars… Read more »
Contributed by Mark Stillwell The Mahaffeys are a baseball family. Professional career paths for family members have focused primarily on dentistry and medicine, but, make no mistake about it. The Mahaffeys are a baseball family. And so it is that Dr. Brian Mahaffey, a star baseball player for Missouri State University and then a… Read more »
The decorated walls and shelves of his rarely seen basement home office show a career defined by success. See the aged but colorful photo of football players hoisting him on their shoulders? That’s from his first state championship at Rockhurst High School. Not far away are framed newspaper stories, including one with a Kansas City… Read more »
The Missouri Sports Hall of Fame joins with the family of Mike Shanahan and the National Hockey League’s St. Louis Blues in mourning the passing of its former Chairman. Shanahan passed away Monday at age 78. Shanahan was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 1997, the second induction class under President &… Read more »
The Missouri Sports Hall of Fame is proud to announce that a combination of nearly 100 student-athletes, coaches and teams will be honored with Special Achievement Awards during the 2018 Enshrinement presented by Killian Construction. Special Achievement Awards are bestowed on national champions, First Team All-Americans and others who received national recognition while competing for… Read more »
When he was younger, he grew up looking up the family tree at Uncle Ernie McMillan, an offensive lineman of the National Football League’s St. Louis Football Cardinals from 1961 to 1974, even though he loved baseball more. For Howard Richards, however, everything changed in the mid-1970s when Leon Anton, the football coach at St. Louis’ Southwest… Read more »
Long before his TV sports broadcasting days, he developed his reporting chops as a free-lance writer the old-fashioned way: A student by day working his way into the University of Missouri School of Journalism. A beat writer at night covering the 1983-1984 Mizzou basketball team, even lugging around a portable typewriter and dictating two stories… Read more »
Whenever Rick Grayson ultimately sinks his final putt, those eager to follow him as one of Springfield’s next great golf gurus probably will feel like the act after Elvis has left the building. Certainly, his resume wows, given Grayson has been a Professional Golf Association (PGA) teaching professional for 33 years. But that’s just skimming… Read more »
Former University of Missouri standout Doug Smith, longtime high school basketball coaches Terry Writer and Lynn Long, and the Kickapoo High School Girls Basketball Program were inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame Wednesday in front of a crowd of 750-plus at the Oasis Hotel & Convention Center. In a ceremony led by President… Read more »
Mike Garrett, the 1965 Heisman Trophy winning running back who played on the Kansas City Chiefs’ two Super Bowl teams, will headline the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame’s Enshrinement Ceremonies of 2018 presented by Killian Construction, set for Sunday, January 28 in Springfield. President & Executive Director Jerald Andrews announced Tuesday the Class of 2018,… Read more »
