You could call them football’s version of Band of Brothers, constructed much the way a sturdy home is built brick by brick. It wasn’t just one man doing the heavy lifting, either. Head coaches, longtime assistants and teenage players – some who went on to fame, most who were overachievers who sacrificed their bodies for… Read more »
News
Year: 2016
Jerry Armstrong
To Jerry Armstrong, the cause was bigger than one individual. Decades after he was part of the 1966 Texas Western team that used the first all-black lineup to win an NCAA Tournament – Armstrong never got in the game that night — the Missouri native received an apology from coach Don Haskins. “I said, ‘Well,… Read more »
Randy Ball
It’s the stuff of storybooks. As a teenager, he played high school football at Columbia Hickman. In his 60s, he became a National Football League scout, assisting in the Kansas City Chiefs’ turnaround. And, in between, Randy Ball lived a dream as a football coach and enjoyed incredible success in colleges. Put it this… Read more »
Gene Bess
To some, maybe it raised eyebrows. A successful high school basketball coach leaving to become an assistant at the junior college in Poplar Bluff? And after just leading the Oran boys to within a whisker of the Class M state championship? In March 1969, it made perfect sense to Gene Bess. “I’d been in high… Read more »
Lance Brown
He could have flung aside his ball glove and walked away at age 18 when life tugged on the back of his jersey. After all, Lance Brown graduated from West Plains High School in 1960 with a bum pitching arm and without so much as a scout or college recruiter on his heels. In fact,… Read more »
Camdenton Lakers Football Program
When the architect who built Camdenton High School football’s state-wide profile looks back on how it all came to be, coach Bob Shore cannot help but beam. After all, Shore is quick to say that he didn’t go it alone, that it has been a community effort. Just look at the stadium. Yes, the stadium… Read more »
Capahas Baseball
The longtime manager of the Capahas baseball program – a man who coached the team for 50 seasons – may have said it best. “I just hope people recognize it for what it is,” Jess Bolen said. “It’s not my team. It’s Cape’s team.” Indeed, Capahas baseball, a semi-pro amateur team for college players… Read more »
Robert Corn
Longtime basketball coach Robert Corn puts it this way: “Sometimes in this business, you have to be lucky.” A case in point is the day his coaching career took its most important step, with a phone call. “I was in my office at Mountain Grove High School and it was coach (Gene) Bartow. He said,… Read more »
Barbara Cowherd
She first set foot on the Drury University campus almost 36 years ago – in August 1980, to be exact – and her numerous roles in the athletics department, particularly for women’s athletics, has been significant. Consider these numbers: two and 11; and 15 and 130. In order, they represent the number of women’s sports… Read more »
Blake DeWitt
In his first few games in the minor leagues, out in the Rookie ball town of Ogden, Utah, Blake DeWitt quickly realized the reality of the pros: Everybody was somebody back home, and failure would knock on the clubhouse door every day. “There were guys who had better talent than me,” DeWitt said. “I decided… Read more »
2016 Class- Diamond Nine
CLASS OF 2016 Marin Whorton Cooney (Ozark) Sophia Alexander Denning (Strafford/Drury) Bob Detherage (Hillcrest/Royals) Bill Helfrecht (Glendale/Missouri State) Brent Maggard (Sparta/Crowder/Southern Arkansas) Kristen Marshall (Glendale/William Jewell) Troy McMain (Willard) Christian Overstreet (Nixa/Missouri State) Tom Wilson (Bolivar/Detroit Tigers)
Elite 11- Class of 2016
CLASS of 2016 Chuck Banta (Springfield Parkview/Mizzou) Ben Nichols (Springfield Glendale/Colorado/Atlanta Falcons/ Denver Broncos/Rhein Fire), Lee Coleman (Springfield Hillcrest/Missouri State/Evangel) Isaac Sooter (Sarcoxie/Evangel) Darrin Newbold (Aurora/Missouri State/New York Jets/Oklahoma Outlaws) Anthony Frazier (Springfield Greenwood/Mizzou) Robert Clardy (Marshfield/Southwest Baptist) Wes Kemp (St. Louis De Smet/Mizzou) Lance Crayton (Springfield Catholic/Missouri State) Steve Mayfield (Aurora) Landon Zerkel (Webb City/Missouri… Read more »
Filbert Five – Class of 2016
CLASS OF 2016 Women’s Team Kayli Combs Price (Branson/College of the Ozarks) Tag Morris (Blue Eye/Evangel) Bethany Creed (Ash Grove/Drury) Casey Garrison Powell (Bolivar/Missouri State) Kami Scrivner Eddington (Mount Vernon/Pittsburg State) Men’s Team Daniel Cutbirth (Hurley/Evangel) Tim Brown (Rogersville/Drury) Corey Stone (Reeds Spring/College of the Ozarks) Junior Roweton (Halfway/SBU/Drury) Tim West (Skyline/State Fair juco/Nebraska)
Tim Grunhard
Tim Grunhard laughs about it now. After all, he was just a rookie. But the first time he walked into the Kansas City Chiefs locker room, he assumed the “old guy” standing next to his locker was just another assistant coach. Turns out, it was his mentor for his 1990 rookie season – future Hall… Read more »
Charlie Henke
Many probably remember the benches-clearing brawl between the Missouri Tigers and Kansas Jayhawks in March 1961 – with Mizzou center Charlie Henke right in the middle of it. Fortunately, that is not Henke’s claim to fame. No, for that, just look at Mizzou basketball’s record book, because his name is all over it – thanks… Read more »
Tom Hodge
In far southwest Missouri, in the quaint Newton County community of Seneca, the townsfolk hard work and love their high school football Indians. To longtime coach Tom Hodge, they are the reason why he enjoyed so much success and why the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame is inducting Hodge with the Class of 2016. “We… Read more »