Chesterfield's Marquette Teens Prove Punny

Marquette High School's wordplay competition Thursday proved to be an afternoon filled with clever jokes, innuendo and an engaged student body.

Simply put, it was a whole lot of pun.

The student attendees at the event in the school auditorium laughed, cheered, booed and shuddered—all in the spirit of the afternoon—at puns that ranged from witty to dumbfounding and everything in between.

Marquette High School's 4th Annual Pun-Off Winners:

1^st Place —Ryan Blake, junior, Ballwin
2^nd Place —Jeff Klein, junior, Chesterfield
3^rd Place —Mary Baker, junior, Chesterfield
4^th Place —Mitch Finnogan, senior, Chesterfield
5^th Place —Chris Jablonski, junior, Chesterfield

Pun Highlights

Some of the highlights of the afternoon included puns based on. . .

• Northern Italy's "Battle of the Oranges" festival ("Orange you glad nobody died?" —J.P. Morray, Ballwin freshman) 

• Drew Barrymore's recently speculated pregnancy ("Maybe she was just eating a lot of Prego sauce." —Gage Gelert, Ballwin senior)

• Farmers struggling with their crops and livestock ("That must have felt like Hail for the farmer." —Caleb Howard, freshman, Ballwin. Also, "I really drought he's going to overcome this one." —Mitch Finnogan, Chesterfield  senior)

• The Mizzou Tigers and St. Louis Billikens getting invited to the NCAA basketball tournament ("I can't wait til they Post the scores." —Mary Baker, Chesterfield junior)

Chesterfield Editor's note: If I have to explain it, it's not funny.