MORGANTOWN – The 77th annual OVAC Rudy Mumley All-Star football game kicks off at 7:15 p.m. Saturday at Wheeling Island Stadium, with a combined eight players from Morgantown High, University High, Clay-Battelle and Trinity represented.
The OVAC game pits players from the two states that share the conference — West Virginia and Ohio — against each other.
Wheeling Central head coach Mike Young will coach in the game for the third time overall after previously manning the sidelines for each team. Blake Allen out of Barnesville brings his staff to the sidelines for Ohio.
““The All-Star game is a destination event,” Dirk DeCoy, Executive Director of the OVAC, said Monday. “Everybody wants to play in this game. Where else can a player be given the opportunity to play for and defend your state in a football game? What a way to end your high school football career, defending your state, playing for your state. And for the coaching staffs, to lead their teams into battle and bring home a victory for their state as well.”
Morgantown’s Eli Stahara and Drew Boczek will take the field with three members of their crosstown rival University in Jake Croston, Jacob Stevens, and Landon Cool.
For Trinity Christian, Levi Teets and Bryce Bailey will suit up, while Matthew Gadd will be the lone Cee-Bee on the team.
Boczek, who says he grew up coming to watch some of the OVAC All-Star games in the past, is excited to participate as help bring home a win for the state.
“I’ve always wanted to play in this game since I was a kid,” he said. “Having been here six or seven times watching and now getting to be here participating is sort of a dream come true.”
Boczek has seen his share of OVAC football at all levels after playing for Clay-Battelle, Trinity, and Morgantown in his high school career. That also means that he gets to play with his friends and former teammates also.
“It’s cool to have a last chance for everybody to come together and see what we can do,” he said. “Hopefully we can come out and perform and bring home a win.”
Teets will go on to play for Grove City College this fall and says the opportunity to experience the week and play in the game was one he couldn’t pass up.
“It’s just exciting being able to play with some new players and some great athletes,” he said on Monday. “Being around everyone has been awesome already and I can’t wait to get on the field and have some fun playing with and against some great talent.”
Students can attend the game for just $1 and the first 2,500 fans to enter will receive a complementary gift, as the OVAC eyes to build some strong traditions with the all-star game.
““What we want to see are more kids in the stadium, in the stands,” DeCoy said. “We want to see the green, we want to see the maroon, we want to see the purple, the orange. We want to see the red, white and the blues. We want to see more of that, and we’re also hoping to have more young families come out and start a tradition, like a lot of us have, going to the OVAC All-Star football game every fall. It’s a tradition, a lot of guys have been going to this with their families, with their kids, their dads. We want to start more of those traditions with our younger fans.”
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