Small Town Missouri Rules Championship Play

Taking in the Show-Me Bowl year after year, I’m starting to wonder if the bigger deal is winning the title, or simply being there and taking part.

Players who perform on the floor of the Edward Jones Dome have been programmed for years that “winning is everything.” They've heard that from family and coaches from their little league days and on.

Losing is a proposition young athletes rather not endure.

Maybe, that’s why I love football so much. Unlike some other sports, football is predominantly a team game. I can’t recall any game simply won by a single player. With 11 players on the field, there is a great dependence upon one-another. Quarterbacks get a lot of glory and can accomplish a lot statistically. But without great receivers and excellent blockers, most team’s aren’t going anywhere. The quarterback cannot catch his own throw.

MICDS’ Thomas Militello threw for 44 touchdowns and some 3,000 yards this season, yet Webb City won the Class 4 title game.

Ezekiel Elliott of John Burroughs rushed for a phenomenal 42 TDs this year and nearly 1,800 yards yet Logan-Rogersville sailed down I-44 with the first place Class 3 trophy.

Whether we are talking about the Mathews-Dickey Knights or the Green Bay Packers, offense entertains and defense wins titles. Case in point, The Rams had 415 yards passing and lost the game. In the end, both Logan-Rogersville and Webb City had tougher, grittier hard nosed defensive teams. Their strength was in their numbers both on both sides of the line.

Other local teams did no better. Staley of Kansas City, a relatively new school bounced Kirkwood 35-21 and CBC fell to Lee’s Summit West 44-21. The St. Louis area teams went 0-for-4 for the tournament.

Just a year ago, Hazelwood Central, Webster Groves, Burroughs and Maplewood all got smacked in the mouth with Show-Me Bowl loses.

I can come up with two theories. One, other parts of the state put much more of a premium on middle school football programs. Kids, those ages are learning techniques and skills as a team sport, long before most St. Louis teams are getting serious. Jeff City runs one system from pee wee to the 12th grade. Hundreds of kids are in the program. Everyone's on the same page.

In small town, rural Missouri, football programs are the centerpiece of the community. There are less diversions and less distractions. Go down to Farmington and you will see just about everyone at the game, the mayor, the city council members, the pastors and most of the town folks. Local players are heroes in small towns like Logan-Rogersville and Webb City and Ste. Genevieve. Kids grow up dreaming of suiting up with the varsity. There’s not a whole lot else to do in these small communities.

There was a time when virtually every student at Valle Ste. Genevieve was either on the team or in the band, and in some rare cases, both.

One such year, the Warriors of Valle brought some 14,000 fans to the Show-Me Bowl at Busch Stadium. They filled a whole side of the lower portion of the stands. More people came to watch their team play than lived in the entire county.

Many years ago, starting out, I covered a playoff game, Chaminade at Jackson, Mo. The entire community showed up. The stadium was a sea of red. You could have fired a gun on main street and no one would have gotten hurt. Virtually everyone in town was at the game. I thought, what a good time to commit a crime?

I admire the small town values and devotion to school and teams. I think that’s cool. At any state tournament, small towns turn up in big numbers. These little towns in southwest Missouri produce lots of champions but few college type players. Its all about the team game, and year in--year out, athletes from these communities simply are getting the job done.