Cousins lead Kansas’ state champs into new Week 1 high school football mega-matchup
Coaches who are cousins will meet again in what will almost certainly be the most highly anticipated regular-season game in Kansas high school football this year.
Derby and Mill Valley are coming off of Class 6A and 5A state championship seasons, respectively. They will meet in Week 1 as Derby travels up to Shawnee in a one-year agreement.
Derby coach Brandon Clark and his cousin, Mill Valley coach Joel Applebee, made it happen after games against the Panthers’ original Week 1 opponent, Newcastle (Okla.), and the Jaguars’ initially scheduled opponent, Gardner-Edgerton, were called off because of COVID-19 concerns.
The newly scheduled game between the two defending state champions was announced Wednesday morning.
“It’s going to be a great game,” Applebee said. “Two great programs with great kids that work really, really hard. The opportunity to challenge them Week 1, you can’t pass that kind of stuff up.”
Clark and Applebee talk daily. Their kids are about the same ages, and their kids talk with one another almost daily as well. Applebee said he saw the game as a way to connect everyone again.
The cousin coaches last met in 2014 and 2015. Derby took the first showdown 35-14, and Mill Valley repaid the favor a year later with a 27-20 victory. The Panthers have lost just one regular-season game since then.
Last year, Derby won the Class 6A title for the second straight year with another 13-0 record. The Panthers beat Olathe North 63-26 with a record-breaking offensive performance.
Mill Valley’s Jaguars, meanwhile, claimed their third state championship since 2015 — all under Applebee — last season with a 40-31 victory over City League champion Wichita Northwest.
There has been no announcement yet about what fan attendance might look like for this game. The Mill Valley USD 232 Board of Education voted Aug. 3 not to adopt the Johnson County creteria for activities, defaulting to the Kansas State High School Activities Association (KSHSAA) guidelines.
The district has decided to start all students remotely Sept. 8, and Assistant Superintendent Alvie Cater said parents have questioned why in-class learning is being held off while activities continue. That has led to the USD 232 BOE calling a special meeting Monday to discuss the criteria for returning to schools. Cater said he predicts activities will be discussed but did not say whether he believed action would be taken.
As of Wednesday, Mill Valley activities, including the school’s game against Derby in Week 1, are still on. Applebee said although he is committed to the Sunflower League and will play those teams if possible, preliminary negotiations are ongoing with other schools to fill a schedule in case games start to drop off because other teams can’t play.
That was how the Derby game came together.
“The best part about this is that these kids get that experience, and they get to experience big games,” Applebee said. “Brandon and I talk all the time; someone’s got to lose, and that’s the worst part of it. But at the same time, it’s not about us. It’s about the kids.”
This story was originally published August 19, 2020 at 10:38 AM.