The toughest opponent

SLUH has, without question, one of the toughest prep schedules in the area. Among the opponents on the 10-game regular-season schedule are DeSmet, defending state champion Webster Groves and CBC — ranked No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3, respectively, in last week’s St. Louis Post Dispatch prep football poll. And last weekend, hands-down, the season’s […]

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Cerulean SLUH

The history teacher — in his 27th year at the Jesuit prep school on Oakland Ave. — doesn’t remember the exact year it began. “Probably about 12, 15 years ago,” Tom McCarthy says. “Students used to paint themselves blue and literally run down Oakland Ave. to the old CBC High School on Clayton — a […]

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Behind the stats

Early in the third quarter of SLUH’s second game of the season — an unseasonably hot September night —  senior running back Cameron Stubbs powered through the Ladue line and ran about 32 yards for his second touchdown of the night. It put the Jr. Bills up 20-7 and was the start of what would […]

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Starry, starry night

Jack is a true football freshman, buckling up the pads for the first time and figuring out how to run, scramble and tackle in full football regalia. So expectations regarding playing time are low; we are happy with any snap or play in which No. 15 runs out on the field. So a 42-0 shellacking […]

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The Hit

I didn’t see it, but I heard it from the last row of the bleachers at the exact opposite end of the field. A hit no mother wants to hear. I was sitting at the far end of the bleachers at Parkway North High School Friday, Aug. 26, near the end of the third quarter […]

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The Opener

The Season starts perfectly at 6:30 a.m. when two teenaged boys indulge their mom and pause for a picture before leaving for school. It’s gameday, and football players get to wear their jerseys. They hate that kind of thing I’m pretty sure but they do it for me because they know it will make me […]

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Turn on the lights, it’s Friday night

Our grocery bill went up exponentially this summer, and it had nothing to do with inflation. The food tab rose about the same time Jack returned from his two-week backpacking Boy Scout trip to Philmont, N.M., and began early-morning runs through the neighborhood getting in shape for football. Football? It’s everywhere. From Oakville to Belleville […]

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The roster is set

It’s official! Jack brought home jersey No. 15 so now we have two Junior Billiken football players living under our roof. I wasn’t too worried. Jack has always been a pretty good athlete who simply enjoyed participating in soccer and volleyball in the fall, basketball in winter and baseball in the spring. He played games […]

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Opening Kickoff

“You’re playing football?” That was my reaction four years ago, when our oldest son, Matt, an incoming freshman at Jesuit prep school St. Louis University High School, told us of his intentions to go to football camp and then tryout that August. We are not a football family. Tom, a teacher at SLUH, is also […]

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