High School Sports

By Calvin Silvers The Savannah Savages boys’ tennis team recently achieved an impressive 2nd place finish in the Class 1 District 16 Tournament, highlighted by Cole Horton’s victory in the Class 1 singles state championship. This remarkable success did not go unnoticed, as MSHSAA honored head coach Wakefield Hare with the prestigious 2023-2024 Boys Tennis

By NewsPress Now Check out the final scores of your favorite city and area teams. Bishop LeBlond defeats Plattsburg 60-12 in News-Press NOW’s Game of the Week. If the opening kickoff served as a foreshadow of how Friday’s nights contest would play out, Bishop LeBlond would serve as the beneficiary. Plattsburg would fumble the opening

By Calvin Silvers The Plattsburg Tigers are making waves in the 8-man football scene after their transition from 11-man just two seasons ago. Right out of the gate, they found success, making a strong run to the state quarterfinals against South Holt last season. While fans last saw star quarterback Isaia Howard in that quarterfinal

By Calvin Silvers It’s Week 4 of the high school football season and this week’s ‘Game of the Week’ features two 8-man teams in the 3-0 Bishop LeBlond Golden Eagles, traveling to Plattsburg to take on the 2-0 Tigers, who moved to 8-man football two seasons ago. Like last year, LeBlond will face the Tigers

By Jacob Meikel The Benton Cardinals served up a 3-0 loss to the Central Indians on Monday to improve the Cardinals’ record to 8-0 on the season. The last two meetings between these St. Joseph School District foes had gone the distance in the past, going five sets, with both happening in comeback fashion when

By NewsPress Now Check out the final scores of the city and area matchups for the third week of high school football. Lafayette defeats Benton 22-0 Lafayette continues to dominate the all-time series against Benton, and it wasn’t particularly close. The Fighting Irish’s ability to do damage on the ground and through the air proved

By Jacob Meikel Lafayette football has the latest bragging rights over its rival in the Benton Cardinals, as the two teams are set to square off on Friday. The Fighting Irish have already matched their win total from a year ago. At 1-1, it’s their best start to a season since 2020. In their win

By Calvin Silvers In one of the most anticipated matchups of the season here in St. Joseph, the Benton Cardinals and Lafayette Fighting Irish will renew the fierce rivalry under the Friday night lights. The classic Northside versus Southside showdown has been dominated by Lafayette for the past five seasons, but Benton is hungry to

By NewsPress Now GAME OF THE WEEK: Central 21, Benton 14 The matchup between Class 5 Central and Class 3 Benton has been lopsided for the last two years. Central won the previous two matchups against the Cardinals by an average of 31 points per game heading into Friday’s contest. Offense was hard to come

By Calvin Silvers The Central Indians are coming off a 45-19 victory over Winnetonka in Week 1, capturing not only the first win of the season but Sheldon Farrell’s first victory as a head coach. Now the attention is turned to in-city rival, the Benton Cardinals. While Benton has struggled in recent years, they aren’t

By Calvin Silvers It’s Week 2 of the high school football season, and News-Press NOW’s Game of the Week features two in-city rivals, the Benton Cardinals and the Central Indians. This will be the third straight season these two teams have faced each other on the gridiron, and the Cardinals are hoping to take the

By NewsPress Now The lights were back on at football stadiums across St. Joseph Friday night as local high school teams returned to action around the area.  In News-Press NOW’s game of the week, St. Joseph Christian visited DeKalb. The Lions came off a winning season for the first time in years, and they kept

By Jacob Meikel In 2023, St. Joseph Christian proved that the past is the past, and in 2024, it’ll try to not rest on its laurels. Last season, the Lions broke through by going 7-4, but what they went through in the years prior is what makes the record stand out even more. Prior to

By Calvin Silvers The DeKalb Tigers are coming off a 1-10 season last year, with that single win in the Class 1 state district quarterfinals against Stewartsville with Osborn. One of those 10 losses did come at the hands of St. Joseph Christian, when the Lions faced the Tigers in week 1 of last season,

By Calvin Silvers Lafayette head football coach Nate Daugherty enters his second year with the Fighting Irish, looking to take what he learned in year one and improve from last year’s 1-9 season. The team has a rich history, recently having had multiple winning teams throughout the 2010s. However, the start of this decade wasn’t

By Jacob Meikel The Central football program has exceeded expectations each of the last two seasons, and the next step will be to add playoff wins to its resume in 2024. From 2018 to 2021, the program only won four football games. Since then, they’ve tallied five wins in 2022 and seven wins in 2023.

By Calvin Silvers While the Kansas City Chiefs have been preparing for their season here in St. Joseph, a few more teams in the community were able to begin their own practices, as high school football teams began their journey to a state title for the 2024-25 season. The first stop for high school football

By Calvin Silvers We’re still months away from the 2024-25 high school girls’ basketball season, but that doesn’t mean offseason tasks weren’t completed as early as possible. For Bishop LeBlond, there was a large task at hand, and it involved finding a replacement for former LeBlond girls’ basketball coach, Jackie Steltenpohl. The search led to

By Jacob Meikel St. Joseph native and Missouri Western Griffon Jeffrey Johnston is currently tied for the lead through round one in the Missouri Amateur Golf Championship at St. Joseph Country Club. Johnston shot -8 for the first round of stroke play on Tuesday, tying him for the top spot with Kevin Kring of Springfield.

By Calvin Silvers The community of St. Joseph holds a special place in many hearts, and that rings true for former St. Joseph Mustang and Mid-Buchanan assistant coach Brady Holden. The outfielder has seen some success as both a player and coach, and it has all been done right here in the area. The feelings

By Jacob Meikel Three St. Joseph football players got the chance to put the pads on one last time at last Saturday’s Missouri 8-Man Football All-Star Game. Bishop LeBlond seniors Brady Rocha and Jackson Sigrist, as well as St. Joseph Christian senior Jaren Padgett took to the field at Spratt Stadium, as they realized it’s

By Calvin Silvers The campus of Missouri Western has seen some heavy traffic this summer, as multiple schools and athletes have been using the football facilities for teams and summer camps. This Saturday will be no different, as the 16th annual Missouri 8-Man All-Star game will take place at Spratt Memorial Stadium. The more than

By Calvin Silvers The community of St. Joseph has been known to recreate quality game day experiences for area student-athletes and coaches, and the St. Joseph Sports Commission is keeping that true as they announced the field and matchups for the 3rd Annual St. Joseph Area Sports Hall of Fame Holiday Hoops Classic and the

By Jacob Meikel Central senior Gabe Fields made one of the biggest decisions of his young life last week, committing to Vanderbilt University to continue his football career. A decision that was worth mulling over came to a conclusion last Friday, as Fields went to social media to announce his decision to join the Commodores.

By Jacob Meikel In what was a successful year of high school baseball for the St. Joseph area in 2024, multiple local players received recognition for their superb play. On Monday, the Missouri High School Baseball Coaches Association released its 2024 All-State teams with several local players making the cut this time around. The Benton

By Jacob Meikel Mid Buchanan and Benton’s baseball programs will both travel to Ozark, Missouri, this week attempting to cap off their seasons with state championships. The Cardinals will take to the state semifinals this week for the first time since 2007. The last time they went, head coach Johnny Coy was a player instead

By Calvin Silvers It was an unusual circumstance Thursday at Mid-Buchanan High School for the Class 3 State Quarterfinals, as the Dragons found themselves as the away team on their home field, going against the Lone Jack Mules. The Mules entered the contest at 30-1 on the year, but in their most important game of

By Jacob Meikel The 31st win of the season for Benton baseball came in dominant fashion as the Cardinals got to pack up early in the Class 4 quarterfinals. Superb hitting and shutout pitching was the exact formula in route to a 16-0 victory for the Cardinals over District 14 champion St. Michael the Archangel

By Calvin Silvers While the city of St. Joseph was washed out with rain earlier Tuesday afternoon, the overcast skies held off during the Class 4 State Tournament in the sectional round as the St. Pius X Warriors made the trip to Missouri Western to take on the Benton Cardinals. Despite what looked like a