Barb Cowherd
B.J. Flores
Robert “Bevo” Looney
Casey Garrison-Powell
Jeff Rogers
Grant Wistrom
Era of Excellence: Marshfield Lady Jays Basketball 1988-99 Era

Barb Cowherd has served Drury University for nearly 40 years as an administrator and coach. She began her stint at Drury as the head volleyball coach in 1980 and guided the program until 1999 compiling a record of 487-354-17. Cowherd was named the NAIA District 16 Coach of the Year in 1988 following their 43-11 season and led the volleyball program from the AIAW to the NAIA and then the NCAA-II level in the mid-1990’s. Cowherd also had a four-year stint as Drury’s head women’s tennis coach from 1981 to 1984 and led the team to three NAIA national tournament appearances. In 1999, she became an Assistant Athletic Director and Senior Women’s Administrator. She was named Associate Athletic Director in 2003. As Drury’s Senior Woman Administrator, Cowherd was instrumental in the start of the Lady Panthers basketball program that launched in 2000-2001 and has seen the program sustain national prominence since its inception. After retiring in 2019, she was brought back to Drury athletic offices in 2022 when Nyla Milleson took the reigns as Director of Athletics and restored Cowherd as the department’s Associate AD for External Affairs. A graduate of East Newton High School, Cowherd became a multi-sport athlete at Missouri Southern State, playing volleyball, basketball, softball and track & field. She was a four-year letter winner and co-captain in volleyball, was a two-time All-Central States Intercollegiate Conference (CSIC) selection in basketball, and a national qualifier in the javelin as a senior. In 1993, Cowherd was inducted into the Missouri Southern State Athletics Hall of Fame, and she was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2016.

Over the past several decades spanning the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the Flores family from nearby Willard has been among the most dominant athletic contributors to the Ozarks sports scene. Inclusive of a wide variety of endeavors ranging from football, to track and field, to boxing, a Flores family member has played a prominent role. But most noted among them is Springfield Sports Hall of Fame inductee Benjamin Joseph (B.J.) Flores who watched his dad, Frank, train his three older brothers in the art of boxing and then chose to lace on the gloves himself and pursue a career in the ring. His prep years at Willard were filled with fetes of athletic prowess from All Missouri honors in football and track to a national Golden Gloves title as a light heavyweight, B.J. was on the road to eventual national acclaim. His scholarship at Brigham Young University was earmarked for football, but he never lost the desire to step into the boxing ring so, after serving a two-year Mormon missionary assignment in Mexico, the bilingual B.J. boxed as an amateur and won United States championships as a heavyweight. Now the time had come to turn those hours of boxing into a cash reward which B.J. did in May of 2003. And that career is recorded with 39 fights, 7 of which were in Springfield with a pair at Drury University’s O’Reilly Family Events Center, 34 victories, 21 by knockouts, and a major leap into the world of communications as an analyst on NBC’s boxing telecasts inclusive of the Olympic games events. Currently B.J. is training heavyweight fighter Jake Paul.

Casey Garrison was a four-time all-state selection at nearby Bolivar High School, finishing her career for the Liberators as the 10th best scorer in Missouri prep basketball history. She averaged 23.1 points a game over her career. She led Bolivar to three straightstate tournament appearances and took them to a state third place finish her junior campaign before leading Bolivar to the state title as a senior with averages of 25.6 points and 8.4 rebounds per game. After her Bolivar career, Garrison burst onto the scene for the Missouri State Lady Bears from 2008 to 2012 and wrote her name across their record books. She averaged 15.9 points a game as a freshman, hiked that figure to 19.9 points as a sophomore, finished with an 18.2 average her junior season, and scored 15.4 a game her final season. She had two of the top seven single season point totals in school history. She gained four straight Missouri Valley Conference all-league first team selections and was named the league’s Player of the Year as a sophomore. Her totals for points, field goals, free throws and foul line percentage are etched across the MVC all-time leaderboard, and her Missouri State totals trailed only Basketball Hall of Famer Jackie Stiles in points (2,271), scoring average (17.5), field goals (792), FG attempts (1,748) and free throw (558). Garrison wound up third all-time in MSU career assists (525). She was voted the MSU Outstanding Female Student Athlete as a senior and was inducted into the Missouri State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2020 and last year was made named a member of the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame as well.

Robert “Bevo” Looney was one of the most exciting sports figures across the southwest Missouri region in the early 1960s as he combined amazing speed and remarkable athleticism to capture the imagination of fans at all levels. From his days at Boyd Elementary, Eastwood Junior High, Central High School, and Southwest Missouri State, Looney was easily outrunning the competition and making headlines while he did it. At Central High, he was a standout halfback for the football Bulldogs, a talented playmaking guard in basketball, and an award-winning sprinter in track. In football, he was a handful to bring down in the open field, eluding tacklers and making them miss as a continuing deep threat for the Bulldogs’ offense. In basketball, his best season came in his senior year as the Central juggernaut was making headlines and bringing large crowds into “The Pit,” the famed old gymnasium on the CHS campus. Bevo and his brother Mike were the playmaking Central guard tandem behind a massive front line of Carl Gardner and Danny Bolden at forwards and Manny Oliver at center. Denny Whayne was a versatile sixth man off the bench. CHS won its first 20 games of the season and carried a 28-1 record into the state’s Class L final four matchups in St. Louis before Central wound up with a state fourth place finish. In track Bevo was a head-turning sprinter in the 100 and 220-yard dashes. His best time came with a clocking of 9.4 seconds in the 100 while at Central. He enrolled at Southwest Missouri State and posted a 9.5 time in a meet at Kirksville as an SMS sophomore.

Jeff Rogers has coached the Glendale Falcons boys’ soccer team since 1990 and the Glendale girls’ soccer program since its beginning in 1996. Overall, he is 1020-382-70 and is one of just 4 coaches in Missouri soccer history to reach 1,000 wins. In boys’ soccer, his record is 595-205-33, which is 5th best total in state. His girls record 425-177-37 is 5th best as well in the Show-Me state’s history. Along the way, Rogers’ combined success with the girls and boys has resulted in 27 Ozark conference titles, 38 District championships and 13 Final 4 appearances resulting in 6 fourth place finishes, 4 third place and three state runners up trophies. Under Coach Rogers leadership, Glendale has had 106 All-State selections, including 11 players selected to the United Soccer Coaches All Central team. Rogers was inducted into the Glendale Coaches Hall of Fame in 2012, the Missouri Soccer Coaches Hall of Fame in 2013 and then into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2017. Rogers grew up in Pompano Beach Florida and graduated from Highlands Christian Academy where he played for the school’s first state championship soccer team. He received a degree in education from Liberty University in Virginia where he also played college lacrosse. However, while he was in college, his parents and two younger brothers relocated to Springfield, Missouri. Rogers decided he would move here, too, after graduation. He is married to Jackie and they have 3 children Justin, daughter in law Brittny, Jacob and Jessie. He is affectionately referred to by his girl’s soccer players as “Papa.” He is an official Papa to Connelly and Ruby Rogers his granddaughters.

Few names from the Ozarks are more synonymous with “football success” than that of former Webb City Cardinal, Nebraska Cornhusker and NFL standout Grant Wistrom. He helped to lead the Cardinals to two state championships in 1992 and again in 1993 on the front end of what would became three decades of Missouri prep football dominance for the program. The winning ways continued for Wistrom during a career at Nebraska, playing for the legendary coach Tom Osborne, where the defensive end equipped with the non-stop motor helped the Cornhuskers compile a 49-2 record in his four seasons (1994-97) with NCAA national championships in 1994, 1995 and 1997, earning All-America honors three times and the Lombardi Award as the nation’s top lineman (as well as Big 12 Defensive Player Of The Year) after his senior season in ’97. After completion of his legendary career as a Husker, where he finished with 26.5 sacks over four seasons and his No. 98 jersey was retired, Wistrom became the sixth overall pick in the 1998 NFL Draft by St. Louis, starting a spectacular run with the Rams and their “Greatest Show On Turf” that would include achieving All-Pro status and making three Super Bowl appearances, including a dramatic victory in the 2000 championship game over the Tennessee Titans in Atlanta, GA. A College Football Hall of Fame inductee in 2009, Wistrom would finish with three seasons in Seattle, including a Super Bowl appearance with the Seahawks in 2006, and completing his nine-year pro career with 53 sacks. Since retiring, Wistrom has resided in Springfield with his wife, Melissa, and children Wyatt and Charlie.

Southwest Missouri is known for its outstanding brand of women’s basketball and many look to the Marshfield Lady Jays with kickstarting its excellence and setting a standard for others to follow. From 1988-99, Marshfield teams advanced to nine state Final Fours and an amazing seven state championships (1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1996, 1997 and 1999). The Lady Jays were runners-up in 1992 and 1998. Talk about a dynasty. Marshfield’s 102-game winning streak from early in the 1988 season until early in the 1991-92 season under Coach Scott Ballard was a state record until the Strafford girls surpassed it in 2019. The first three state champions all went 32-0. The Lady Jays became a box-office draw, home and away, as fans lined up hours before the ticket window opened. Everybody wanted to see Marshfield play. The program’s success was a full frenzy, not only in Marshfield, but throughout the Ozarks as little girls grew up wanting to play basketball. The 1987 team gave an indication that big things were ahead, becoming Marshfield’s first state quarterfinalist and finishing 25-5 after a four-point loss to McDonald County. That would be the last defeat for more than three years. The success continued under Coach Gary Murphy, who took over after the 1990 season and guided Marshfield to four more state championships. Before the program was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2019. Among the Missouri Basketball Coaches ’Association all-state players from Marshfield from 1987-99 were Trish Van Diggelen (1988), Melody Howard (1990), Stacy Nunn (1989), Nikki Cooper (1990), Julie Howard (1991), Melissa Grider (1991), Carissa Wilson (1992), Michelle Mikkelsen (1994) and Lauren Ivey (1997).

Dan Cashel
Jim Winn
Dr. Brian Mahaffey
Darrell “Smitty” Smith
Jack Jewsbury
Courtney Frerichs
Era of Excellence: Greenwood Laboratory School, Football - Paul Mullins Era

Native Springfieldian Dan Cashel is a graduate of Saint Agnes High School and 1974 graduate of Benedictine University. His professional career was fashioned at Drury University from 1974 until his retirement in 2020. His long stint at Drury included a myriad of assignments with his longest post as Sports Information Director and Assistant Director of Athletics from 1977 to 2005. After two years in the Drury Admissions Office, he moved to athletics just as Panthers’ men’s basketball was reaching national prominence. Drury was the nation’s top-ranked NAIA team in 1978 and captured the NAIA national championship in 1979. From 1979 to 1985, Cashel was men’s tennis coach, taking the Panthers to a 102-68 record with seven District 16 runner-up finishes. As Drury moved into the NCAA in 1991-92, Cashel added duties of compliance coordinator and was interim director of athletics during times when the department was in transition. His work as SID earned Drury more than 20 publications design national awards from CoSIDA, including several basketball yearbooks voted best in the nation in the NAIA. He worked closely with media outlets as Drury launched its women’s basketball program in 2000-01. His SID years saw the department grow from six sports in 1977 to 28 at his retirement. The biggest of the many special events he oversaw was coordinating the highly-successful Drury Sports Hall of Fame. He also supervised Drury’s All-Sports Award and was tournament coordinator for many NCAA and other post-season events Drury hosted in several sports. He had many basketball game management duties. In his last years at Drury, Cashel was Director of Campus Recreation and Student-Athlete Enhancement and managed the Barber Fitness Center.

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Born in California, Jim Winn and his family moved to Missouri in 1976. Jim would attend Clever High School. He would become a member of the Republic American Legion baseball team in the summer of 1978, a team that would go on to win the state title that summer. Jim Winn’s baseball career would continue in college at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Arkansas. In his three seasons as a Golden Eagle, Winn would capture 27 wins and

only 9 losses. In the 1981 season he went an impressive 10-2 and led his team to the NAIA World Series. They were eliminated by Lipscomb in game 5. He was then selected as a 1st team ABCA/Rawlings All-American that same year and was selected in the 1st round of the 1981 draft by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Winn was the 14th overall selection. He remains the highest drafted baseball player in John Brown history. On April 10th, 1983, at age 23, Winn debuted for the Pirates, staying with the team until 1986. Winn went 2.0IP with a strike out. He allowed no runs or hits his first time out. He would spend his last seasons with the White Sox and Twins, before Tommy John surgery ended his career. He pitched in his last Major League game on September 6th, 1988, against the Seattle Mariners. He finished his career with a 12-17 record and 159 strikeouts. In May of 2014 he was honored by the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame as a member of the first Diamond 9 at the Hall’s Baseball Enthusiasts luncheon. Our organization’s founder Bonus Frost was inducted in the same event.

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Native Springfieldian Dr. Brian Mahaffey bleeds Kickapoo High School brown and yellow, Missouri State University maroon and white and now St. Louis Cardinals red and he has excelled at all those levels to join the 2022 induction class of the Springfield Area Sports Hall of Fame. A slugging catcher-infielder in his playing days, Mahaffey led Kickapoo to league and district titles and two American Legion state runner-up finishes in his years with the Chiefs. A four-year starter for Coach Keith Guttin at Missouri State from 1985 to 1988, Mahaffey was a three-time Mid-Continent Conference all-league first team selection, three-time academic AllAmerica and co-AMCU Player of the Year as a senior. He played on four straight MSU AMCU league championship clubs and was a key as the Bears made their first-ever NCAA Division I tourney appearance in 1987 in Tempe, Arizona. Mahaffey posted a .349 career batting mark for the Bears with 175 runs batted in over 174 games and he swatted 42 home runs. Inducted into the MSU Athletics Hall of Fame in 2005 and the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2018, he graduated in 1993 from the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Medicine and got his first experiences with sports medicine. He joined the Mercy Family Medicine Department as a resident in 1998. He then spent 16 years as a team physician for Missouri State athletics and joined the St. Louis Cardinals organization in 2013 through Mercy Health Systems as one of the Cardinals team physicians. In that role, he works with the organization’s physicians, athletic trainers, strength coaches and physical therapists from the big club down through the Cardinals’ minor league system.

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Darrell “Smitty” Smith opened the Smitty’s Mid-West Boxing Gym & Youth Center in 2012 in Springfield, and he has coached more than 1,500 kids in the sport of boxing. For the last decade, the facility has operated as a USA amateur boxing gym while also focusing on getting disadvantaged youth involved in a structured boxing program. Smitty’s Mid-West Boxing Gym has had four boxers selected for the US Olympic Trials, and he was named the Kansas City Golden Gloves Outstanding Coach of the Year in 2017. Smitty’s Boxing Gym has also assisted kids outside the ring in helping many complete their high school or GED program, enlist in the military, enter vocational training, or prepare for college. The success of his facility resulted in Smitty being named the Man of the Year by the Springfield Business Journal in 2021. An accomplished fighter in his own right, Smitty amassed a career amateur record of 218-14 and won more than 30 regional Golden Glove championships. He was named the Outstanding Fighter of Kansas City Golden Gloves in 1982 and was the youngest member of the US National Team that same year. Smitty was the North Carolina Regional Golden Gloves Champ in 1987 and was inducted into the Fort Bragg Boxing Hall of Fame in 2018. He was named the Springfield Fighter of the Year five times and currently serves as a coach and official for USA Boxing. A veteran, Smitty served 10 years in the 82nd Airborne Division of the US Army and retired after serving in the Gulf War. He has degrees from Drury University in Basic Law Enforcement and Belltown University in Washington in Criminal Justice.

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Jack Jewsbury is arguably the most famous and revered male soccer player ever produced in the Ozarks, from youth soccer excellence to outstanding careers at Kickapoo High School and Saint Louis University before embarking on a Major League Soccer professional career. Jewsbury scored a state record 59 goals his senior season (1998) at Kickapoo, with a fouryear total of 124 goals. He went on to star five seasons at soccer tradition-rich SLU in St. Louis, where his 101 career points on 38 goals and 25 assists placed him 10th on the Billikens’ all-time scoring list. At SLU, he was a two-time All-America and Academic All-America, was twice named first team All-Conference USA, and was league Player of the Year as a sophomore in 2000. His play helped SLU to four straight NCAA tourney appearances, with the Bills reaching the quarterfinal round in 2001. He was a member of the Billiken All-Half Century team. Jewsbury was selected 43rd in the 2003 MLS SuperDraft by the Kansas City Wizards, where he spent eight seasons with 14 goals in 195 league matches primarily as a midfielder. He was traded to the expansion Portland Timbers in 2011 and was selected for the MLS All-Star Game. Jewsbury played six seasons with Portland before retiring in 2016 when he ranked ninth in MLS history for games played and is one of just three players in league history to play 150 or more games with two different clubs. He had 26 appearances on Portland’s MLS Cup champions in 2015. He moved to the Portland club’s front office as director of business development to lead in developing new corporate partnerships for the club.

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The list of Olympic athletes who have called the Ozarks home is a short one. But one of the handful of names you will find on it is that of Courtney Frerichs. Courtney is nowa professional distance runner originally from Nixa, MO. She was introduced to track at an early age but would not find her love of distance running until high school. She graduated summa cum laude from UMKC in 2015 with a BA in Chemistry. During her time as a Roo, she was an eleven time Summit League conference champion, a five time All-American, and set seven school records that she still holds to this day. She competed for the University of New Mexico during her fifth year of NCAA eligibility where she led the Lobos to an NCAA Championship title in cross country and won the NCAA title in the 3000 meter steeplechase, setting the current NCAA record in the process. Upon completing her NCAA eligibility, she signed a professional contract with Nike and joined the Bowerman Track Club. She has competed professionally for the last five years where she has made two Olympic teams (2016, 2020), three World Championship teams, and won a silver medal at the 2017 World Championships. She most recently raced to a silver medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in the 3000 meter steeplechase and shortly after reset her American Record in the event, becoming the first American woman to break the 9:00 barrier. She currently lives in Beaverton, OR with her husband Griffin Humphreys and their cat Roo. Today she continues to train full-time while also pursuing a MS in Nutrition at Auburn University.

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The years Paul Mullins coached at Greenwood Laboratory School indeed comprised an Era of Excellence for the school that has enjoyed remarkable success in the smallest class of Missouri’s prep athletics. Mullins coached Greenwood football from 1964 to 1989 and his top grid assistant was Wil Purvis while additional coaching came from Dr. David Oatman and Dr. Tommy Burnett. Mullins took Greenwood football to a 162-84-10 record in 26 seasons with the Bluejays. He guided the ‘Jays to 10 district championships and took them to the Class I Missouri state title in 1981 with a 14-0 victory over Gallatin at Busch Stadium in St. Louis. Under Mullins, Greenwood was also state runner-up in 1971, 1980 and 1986. A native of Mount Vernon, Mo., Mullins previously coached at Carrollton (Mo.), Elgin (Ill.) Larkin, and Springfield Central High. He earned All-America honors in football at Missouri Valley College, gaining a spot in that school’s Hall of Fame. After college, he had a brief professional stint with the New York Giants of the National Football League. Mullins was also a U.S. Navy Seabee for two years. Mullins has been honored for his long service to Greenwood with the naming of Mullins Way, the walkway connecting the two-year old Betty and Bobby Allison Event Center to the high school. He and basketball coach Larry Atwood were honored with the Don Payton Award as they were inducted into the Missouri State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2020, and Mullins has also been inducted into the Springfield Area Sports Hall of Fame and the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. His 1981 GHS team is in the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame.

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