She emerged years ago as one of southwest Missouri’s best tennis players, later competed on championship softball teams and, fortunately, never forgot. That is, Jodie Adams never forgot what it truly meant for her, as a child and then a high school and college student-athlete, to learn the valuable lessons that sports so often teaches.… Read more »
News
Sport: Softball
Mike Alden
Mike Alden has been at the helm of Missouri athletics since 1998, and it’s no shock his tenure has produced the most comprehensive run of athletic and academic success in school history. Through capital campaign efforts, Alden has overseen more than $265 million in private gifts for Tiger Athletics and, in 2014, Mizzou’s Memorial Stadium… Read more »
Jill Angell
Some folks don’t know what they want to do in life until after they reach college age. Others try to map it out even in high school. For Jill Angell, she found her calling in life well before then. “When I was in the fifth grade, I had a P.E. teacher (Carol Gross) I idolized”… Read more »
Sallie Beard
In the fall of 1974, two years after the passage of federal Title IX legislation, the door to Sallie Beard’s office swung open, as several women on the Missouri Southern State University campus sought to start a basketball team. Suddenly, the teacher who had a bias against athletics – those were her own words –… Read more »
Bob Belote
In sports, sometimes meeting just the right person can set you on an incredible career path. During his Missouri State University days in Springfield, Bob Belote involved himself in campus recreation and worked part-time for the then-named Springfield Park Board, where he met his future wife, Deana. He also became friends with Jodie Adams, (MSHOF… Read more »
Erma “Bergie” Bergmann
At age 19 St. Louis native, Erma Bergmann was asked to try out professionally for the All American Girls Baseball League. Ms. Bergmann made the team and was recruited to play for the Muskegon Lassies in 1946. This was the first time in U.S. history that women played professional baseball. Pitching in this extraordinary baseball… Read more »
Randy Biggerstaff
Randy Biggerstaff began his athletic training career in 1973, when he became the District Athletic Trainer for the Granite City Community Unit School District after graduating from the University of Missouri. He has also served as trainer for the St. Louis Hummers women’s professional softball team, the University of Missouri football team at the Fiesta… Read more »
Roy Burlison
It’s amazing if you think about it. In sports, you can be a kid just hanging around a ball field and, years later and thanks to happenstance, you’re traveling across the country getting to play a game you love. Roy Burlison was one of the lucky ones in life. In fact, he still remembers the… Read more »
Charlie Burri
Sometimes, even the grandest plans can turn out to be bigger than you anticipated. That’s part of the legacy of Charlie Burri, the “Godfather” of Missouri Western State University athletics. A former coach, Burri was tapped to start the Missouri Western program back in 1967. He had little more to work with other than his… Read more »
Sharon Buschjost
The great thing about sports is that everybody has a neat story, some more remarkable than others. Consider Sharon Buschjost. Back in 1996, happy being a stay-at-home mom for a third year away from teaching, the phone rang and on the other end of the line was her brother-in-law, the Blair Oaks High School athletic… Read more »
Mick Byrd
In sports, we all love stories about the hometown boy making good. Or the veteran coach who calls it quits but wins a championship on his way out the door. Former Vienna High School softball coach Mick Byrd fits into both categories. A Vienna native, Byrd was a three-sport athlete for the Eagles before going… Read more »
Nan Carter
After earning her degree from Northwest Missouri State, she joined the Trenton Public School System in 1953 as a physical education instructor and then moved to the South Harrison School District, teaching until her retirement in 1982. Having played softball during the 1940’s and 1950’s, Mrs. Carter saw the need for a softball program for… Read more »
Dr. Penny Clayton
Natural ability mixed with hard work and dedication helped turn Dr. Penny Clayton into one of the finest softball pitchers in Springfield history. But it took Clayton a while to focus on just one sport. Growing up in the Queen City, Clayton was involved in nearly every activity or sport offered to a young girl… Read more »
David Colt
For the past 24 years, David Colt has held the position of Head Athletic Trainer and Assistant Professor at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville. Responsible for the health care of 390 athletes in 15 sports, he also devotes much of his time to the classroom teaching various college courses. Colt became a Certified Athletic… Read more »
Larry Cowger
Sometimes, life grabs you by the coattails and pulls you in another direction. And sometimes they aren’t coattails at all but your eyes, ears and voice so that the athletic events of smalltown high school athletes can be broadcast on air. That’s exactly what happened to Larry Cowger. “In 1998, a gentleman from the radio… Read more »
Crowder College Softball Era 1982-1992
In only its fourth season of its softball program, Crowder College put itself on the map as a team to be reckoned with. In 1983, the Lady Roughriders advanced to the national tournament of the National Junior College Athletics Association. It marked the first of six trips to nationals over the next decade. What a… Read more »