By Staff Writer, ShowMe Times Sports

There is a lot riding on Thursday night’s football game at Charles “Seed” Bland Stadium.  A rematch will occur of the 2010 District Championship game between two Class 3 District 1 opponents  -  the Dexter Bearcats and the Fredericktown Blackcats. Both teams have already qualified for the playoffs, but this game determines home field advantage in the first round and who plays the #2 qualifier from District Two.

Last year, the Bearcats defeated the Blackcats 30 to 22 to capture their first district championship since 2005. Last year's game was highlighted by the Bearcats forcing eight Blackcat turnovers. The Bearcats had a very balanced attack against Fredericktown with 198 yards rushing and 177 yards passing.

Last year, the ‘Cats were led by Nate Watkins with two interceptions along with five receptions by Morgan Hedrick and three by Jake Cox. However, many key players return in this year's game as well.

Tyler Miller returns in the defensive backfield where he intercepted two passes against the Blackcats last year. The Bearcat running game returns in its entirety which was led last year by Cody Stevens (92 yards), Josh Overall (67 yards), Nick Summers (60 yards) and Alex Cliff (23 yards).

Last year’s win propelled the Bearcats on to the State Quarter Finals, while the Blackcats lost their first round game to the Park Hills Central Rebels. .

Fortunes of the two teams have taken different paths this year. This year's contest finds the state ranked Bearcats with a season record of 8 - 1 against the 4 - 5 Blackcats. Both teams have identical 2 and 0 district records.

However, the Blackcats should not be taken lightly as they put on an impressive offensive performance in a 63 to 14 defeat of the Kennett Indians this past Friday night. That win mirrored the Bearcats 68 to 20 defeat of the Indians the previous week.

Other common opponents between the two teams include St. Genevieve, which defeated Fredericktown 46 to 20 early in the 2011 season, Park Hills, which resulted in a 35 to 23 victory for the Blackcats, and New Madrid County Central which also resulted in a 36 to 14 victory for the Blackcats. Dexter defeated these three teams by 28 to 6, 37 to 27, and 53 to 7 respectively.

Another comparison can be found in the Missouri Power Ranking System which ranks Frdericktown at 39.75 and Dexter at 78.08. Fredericktown’s strength of schedule is 44.14 compared to the Bearcats at 56.07.

According to Missouri Power Ranking Systems, Dexter is ranked number four in the state behind traditional powerhouse districts of Cassville, Osage and Maryville.

Thursday night’s game should be an entertaining matchup with perhaps an extra motivational incentive for the Blackcats to avenge last year's championship loss.

Be sure to be on hand at Charles “Seed” Bland Stadium as the district championship will be decided this Thursday night. Stadium announcer, Aaron Mathis, will keep you informed of the St. Louis Cardinals progress in Game 7 of the World Series or bring your headphones to listen while you watch the Dexter Bearcats square off against the Fredericktown Blackcats.

If you can’t make the game, be sure to tune in to KDEX radio on FM 102.3, where Rob Mayer, Andrew Steuver and Jason Comfort will bring to you the action of the Bearcats. You can also tune in to Channel 21 on YHC-TV where Ed Gargas and Jeff Bush will bring you play by play action of the ‘Cats.

Joplin, Mo. - The Southwest Baptist University football team played a tough game against Missouri Southern on Saturday afternoon, but ultimately came up short, losing the game 68-28. The Bearcats continue to put up points, but came up short in the shootout.

The Bearcats found themselves down 7-0 early in the first quarter until quarterback Dan Connors had a nice 8 yard touchdown run to pull even with the Lions 7-7. Missouri Southern went on to score 23 straight points, to take a 30-7 lead halfway through the second quarter.

However, the Bearcats wouldn't go away, and turned to Connors to air it out to pull them back. With 7:23 left in the second quarter, Connors hit Charles Johnson with a nice 52 yard pass, resulting in Johnson breaking a tackle and pulling SBU within 16 at 30-14.

The Southwest Baptist defense came up big with a key interception, and blocked field goal, leading to another Bearcat score. After the blocked field goal, Connors hit Marcus Sullivan with a 28 yard pass down the sideline for another SBU touchdown, bringing the score to 30-21. Missouri Southern would add a field goal before the half ended, giving Missouri Southern a 33-21 halftime lead.

After three Missouri Southern scores in the third quarter, the Bearcats found themselves down 54-21. After forcing the Lions to punt, Clayton Davis picked up the poor punt and ran it back 35 yards for a Bearcat touchdown, making the score 54-28. However, Missouri Southern returned the following kickoff for a touchdown, extending their lead to 61-28. The Lions would ultimately go on to win the game 68-28.

The Bearcat offense was lead by Connors who was 15-23 for 198 yards and 2 touchdowns, and also a rushing touchdown. Charles Johnson was once again the leading receiver, pulling in 4 receptions for 84 yards and one touchdown. Thad Everson was the leading rusher for the Bearcats, collecting 42 yards on 11 carries. On the defensive side of the ball, Zach Moore was once again the leading tackler for the Bearcats with 9 tackles and 1 interception, while Austin Otwell also recorded 9 tackles.

The Bearcats will be back in action next Saturday, October 29, when they host Missouri Western for SBU Homecoming. Kickoff is set for 2:00 p.m. from Plaster Stadium.

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Southwest Baptist University is a four-year evangelical Christian university that was established in 1878. The main campus is located about 30 minutes north of Springfield, Missouri, in Bolivar, a town of approximately 10,000 people.

DHS alum Glen Johnson is a defensive lineman for the Bearcats.

For more information on SBU Bearcat Athletics, visit sbubearcats.com.

By Andrew Cato, ShowMe Times Sports Editor

The Lady Bearcat 8th Grade Team was in action this weekend as they hosted the 2011-12 Dexter Invitational Tournament. Undefeated to this point in the season, the 8th Grade Lady Bearcats have dominated their opponents.

But a busy weekend was in order with seven games scheduled for Saturday at the Bearcat Event Center. The Lady ‘Cats have many strong teams invited for the tournament including; Sikeson, Puxico, Jackson, Cairo, Cape and Charleston. .

As the host team, the Bearcats received a Bye in the first round of the tournament. The first round games found Puxico, Jackson and Cape advancing on to the second round of the tournament.

In the second round game against the Puxico Indians, the Lady ‘Cats jumped out to a 18 to 7 first quarter lead. They extended this lead throughout the game with a final score of 60 to 27 in favor of the Bearcats.

The Bearcats were lead in scoring by Melanie McKuin with 20 points, followed by Dakota Reynolds with 14 points. Karaline Keirsey and Ashlynn Werneck both added nine points, while MaKayla Waldner rounded out the scoring with 8 points.

The other second round game found Jackson against Cape. Jackson was able to win this game to advance on to the championship game against Dexter.

The Bearcats vs the Jackson Indians is not just another game. This game is marked by many as one of the most competitive games of the season as many of the members of the Dexter team play together on a summer league team with the standouts for the Jackson Indians. You will find these young ladies friendly but highly competitive as both teams seek to be named as the champions of the tournament.

The championship game will be played on October 24, 2011, Monday night at 7:00 PM at the T. S. Hill Middle School gymnasium. All Bearcat fans are encouraged to come out and watch this game.

There will also be consolation games that will begin at 4:30 with Sikeston vs Charleston and the third place contest 5:45 with Puxico vs Cape. All games will be held at T S Hill Middle School.

Both 7th and 8th Grade teams will resume regular season play on Tuesday, October 25th at Twin Rivers.

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By Andrew Cato, ShowMe Times Sports Editor

NEW MADRID -- The SEMO Conference championship has been elusive for the Dexter Bearcats in the last few seasons, but with a 53-7 blowout win over the New Madrid County Central Eagles, the ‘Cats were able to claim their first Conference title since the 2005 season, and the 20th Conference title in the history of the DHS football program.

Coach Aaron Pixley, winning his third Conference title as DHS head coach, was extremely proud of his team’s win, despite their slow start.

“It has been a few years. I’m proud of my boys, they really wanted it,” Pixley said of the Conference title. “They did a good job of going out and playing hard and well all night. We needed to wake up a bit early in the game, but once we got off we played well.”

“Once the game got going, the defense played extremely well, and the offense played well, we just played a great game as a team. Our kickoff coverage was very good - Kennett ran a kickoff on us last week - and we did a much better job tonight. New Madrid is very dangerous whenever they get into space, and we were a little worried about the kickoff team.”

Quarterback Cody Stevens (8-13 for 175 yards & 2 TD’s passing; 11 attempts for 93 yards and 1 TD rushing) broke the 1,000 yard mark through the air AND on the ground in the contest. Stevens is now the 11th member of the DHS 1,000 Yard Club, which includes his father, Nate Stevens (1985 & 1986).

“We did good tonight,” Stevens said after the game. “At first we got stuffed, but once we started rolling we were solid. The running game was good, and the passing game was really good tonight. We did really well on defense. It’s the Conference championship - we haven’t had one of those since ’05, and we came out tonight and really wanted it.”

Tyler Miller had an outstanding performance against the Eagles on both sides of the ball. The senior led the Bearcats receiving corps with 4 catches for 91 yards and a touchdown, but he actually covered more ground catching passes from New Madrid’s quarterback: Miller picked off Austin Lynn (3-10 for 59 yards, 5 INT) four times in the contest, returned them for 102 yards, and found the endzone twice.

“He’d look pretty good to our side, so I just read his eyes,” Miller commented. “He usually only had one receiver on a side to throw to, so I just broke on the ball.”

“Tyler was great on defense, picking three or four footballs and taking two in for scores. In the passing game, he and Cody were really clicking tonight, so that was good.” Pixley said. “He had a good game, among others - there were some other guys on the team that had great games, and this Conference championship is well-deserved.”

Defensively, the ‘Cats were led by Alex Cliff with 11 tackles. Ryan Joyner chipped in nine - three for negative yardage - while Zach Watson recorded an INT, four tackles, and a sack for an 11 yard loss.

New Madrid’s defense did a great job of slowing down Dexter’s rushing attack, holding the ‘Cats to only 186 yards - well under the team’s 317 yards-per-game average - during the contest. Coach Pixley’s team adjusted well, and had great success in the passing game.

“We kind of made a concerted effort this week in our passing game; felt like we just needed to work on it a bit, and we did a good job,” he said. “New Madrid did a good job of stacking the box and bringing people hard off the edge, doing a good job against our counter-trey game. They brought us down from behind for the most part, and we’ll have to come up with something for that next week.”

The Bearcats must now look ahead to the Fredericktown Black Cats. With Fredericktown’s 63-14 stomping of Kennett on Friday night, the winner of the contest will be crowned the Class 3 District 1 Champion.


The Bearcats are looking for their first back-to-back district titles since 1986 & 1987 - head coach Aaron Pixley’s junior and senior seasons at DHS.

“They’re a tough, physical team,” Pixley said. “They’ve got a quarterback that runs the ball very, very well, and they like to spread you out and run the ball on you. You’ve got to play well against those guys. It’s going to be a big week for us - the physicality of that team, it being senior night - we’re going to have to be extremely focused and ready to go.”


The Class 3 District 1 Championship will be decided next Thursday (October 27) at Charles Bland Stadium in Dexter.


Kickoff is scheduled for 7:00 p.m.

For a full breakdown of the game’s stats, click here.

Bolivar, Mo. - The Southwest Baptist University football team continues to get national recognition this season, and have currently received the 28th most votes in the latest AFCA Division II Coaches Poll released earlier this week. The total amount of votes SBU received in this weeks poll (36) is five times greater than any other week in the history of the program, and is the third consecutive week the Bearcats have received votes.

The SBU offense is lead by junior quarterback Dan Connors who has thrown for 1202 with six touchdowns over the first seven games of the season. Connors has a completion percentage of 65.8% and is averaging 200.3 yards passing this season. Thad Everson leads all Bearcat rushers with 443 rushing yards and four touchdowns, while averaging 63.3 yards per game, and Charles Johnson leads the Bearcat receivers with 431 yards and four touchdowns, averaging 61.6 yards per game.

The Bearcats defense is lead by Zach Moore who has recorded team highs in tackles (57) and tackles for loss (4.5) this season. As a team, the Bearcats have wrapped up 10 sacks, picked off 9 passes, recovered 8 fumbles, and blocked 6 kicks on the season.

The Bearcats are off to the best start in school history, and look to move to 7-1 on the season with a victory over Missouri Southern this Saturday. The game is set to kick off at 2:00 p.m. from Joplin, Missouri.

The Coaches

Keith Allen has already engineered a significant turnaround at SBU, moving the ‘Cats from 0-11 his first year as interim coach, to 5-6 in 2008, to the winning record of 6-5 in 2009, and followed up with a 7-4 record in 2010. Allen served as defensive and recruiting coordinator before being named SBU head coach in 2007. His past coaching experience has included stops at San Jose State, Quincy, TCU and Oklahoma.

Bart Tatum is in his sixth season as the head coach at Missouri Southern State University. In Tatum’s five previous seasons at Missouri Southern he has lead his team to a 22-32 record.

Scouting the Lions

The Lions enter into this weekend with a 2-4 record, coming off a 24-17 win against Truman State University.

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Southwest Baptist University is a four-year evangelical Christian university that was established in 1878. The main campus is located about 30 minutes north of Springfield, Missouri, in Bolivar, a town of approximately 10,000 people.

DHS alum Glen Johnson is a defensive lineman for the Bearcats.

For more information on SBU Bearcat Athletics, visit sbubearcats.com.