Influenced by his dad, who was a teacher, coach and athletic director, Kip Janvrin’s quest to positively impact the lives of young athletes as a coach hit a roadblock in his early 20s. You see, as a decathlete, he also had eyes on the Olympics. So you can imagine how the real world was grabbing… Read more »
News
Year: 2019
Jefferson City Jays Football Program
If sports fans from far away think of the Jefferson City Jays Football Program and its rich tradition, the image probably is that of an old brick high school sitting high atop a hill – a throwback to the 1960s and 1970s – and with the football stadium tucked in at the bottom of the… Read more »
Brian Jordan
He remembers it as if was yesterday: The clubhouse meeting called by the veteran catcher. The maddening spring of a club trying to adjust to a new manager. The sense that everything was going off the rails. There Brian Jordan was in 1996, his fourth season in the big leagues with the St. Louis Cardinals,… Read more »
Barry Koeneke
It’s often said that coaches are the sum of each of their most influential coaches. For longtime Hallsville High School baseball coach Barry Koeneke, that would be Warren Turner, Hi Simmons and Gene McArtor. In order, they are former Joplin Memorial High School and Missouri Southern State University’s coach (852 wins), the University of Missouri… Read more »
Dr. Ed Lampitt
It’s a story that writers for the big screen usually dream of: A freshman strolls through the University of Missouri campus figuring he’ll focus on academics and nothing else, and yet detours to the wrestling room at old Brewer Fieldhouse and becomes a star. Ed Lampitt, of course, can’t help but offer a sheepish grin… Read more »
Dr. Leo Lewis III
For the sons of successful pro athletes, it’s often a challenge to emerge out of the enormous shadows of their dads. Fortunately, Leo Lewis III carved out quite a football career for himself, with a lineage from Columbia Hickman High School, on to the University of Missouri and then the National Football League’s Minnesota Vikings,… Read more »
Leo E. Lewis, Jr.
They called him the “Lincoln Locomotive.” So you can imagine the thoughts of a linebacker or free safety when they saw Leo Lewis, Jr., bursting off tackle and running full steam ahead directly at them on Saturday afternoons. “He was suited to play offense and the position of running back,” said his son, Dr. Leo… Read more »
Becky Lipasek
Talk about soldiering on and fighting the good fight. In the late fall of 1992, there coach Becky Lipasek was, leaving the lonely gym of El Dorado Springs High School with her volleyball program having won a combined 15 games in her first three seasons. Quit? No way. “I have a survivor’s mentality,” Lipasek said.… Read more »
Jeremy Maclin
The assumption is that major college football players see their campus only as a springboard into the National Football League. However, Jeremy Maclin proved that he cared deeply about the University of Missouri. When he announced that he would forgo his final two seasons and enter the NFL Draft, Maclin couldn’t hold back emotions at… Read more »
Bryan Magers
When Bryan Magers shares favorite memories of the way sports played a positive role in his life, it’s easy to imagine watching it all on one of those old 8mm film reels with the color faded, the light on the slides popping every so often. It’s Americana. “My dad refereed most of the games in… Read more »
Joyce Mahoney
Thumb through the faded and tattered press clippings from the 1960s and on, and it will leave almost anyone in awe of Joyce Mahoney. One carries a headline that screams “Mahoney makes final in state golf tourney” in what was her first Missouri Women’s Amateur. There’s another of Mahoney smiling, surrounded by news text in… Read more »
Dr. Troy Major
It would be no surprise if fellow sporting clays shooters happened to spot his prowess, looked at his remarkable scorecard and assumed he had had been around since the first shotgun was forged from steel. However, the story goes that Dr. Troy Major, despite growing up hunting and fishing and enjoying all that the Ozarks… Read more »
Marshfield Lady Jays Basketball Program
Thumb through the Marshfield High School yearbook of 1975 and eventually you’ll land on a four-page section devoted to the inaugural Lady Jays basketball team. Splashed with old black-and-white photos, the opening pages also feature headlines reading “Girls Shine In First Season” and “Show Potential for the Future.” Amazingly, it was prophetic. Just outside the… Read more »
Eric McDonnell
For the past 37 years, Eric McDonnell has stood right on the sidelines either with the University of Missouri football team or on the bench of the women’s basketball and volleyball programs and – best of all – they paid him to be there. And to think his career as an athletic trainer almost never… Read more »
Chip McGeehan
There’s a saying that everybody has to grow up sometime. For Chip McGeehan, sometime has always been beyond the next deer stand. “I never had kids,” McGeehan said with a laugh, “so I’m the kid in my own family.” In other words, he is among those who has loved to live life – especially in… Read more »
Ted McKnight
It almost sounds too good to be true: A military kid who didn’t grow up under the impressionable Friday night lights of small-town football, who finds his way to a Minnesota high school and shifts to running back only in his senior year – all before heading off to a quaint NCAA Division II school… Read more »