Every day, Joe Morris drives from his home to Mayfield High School on the other side of town where he – and his father before him – became legendary Kentucky high school football coaches with 12 state championships to their credit.
But “at least once a week,” Joe said, he tears up as he crosses through a downtown that has been there for him his entire life – and now, it’s no longer there.
“The buildings I grew up with are gone,” he said of the aftermath of the 220-mile-long, 190-mile-per-hour tornado that went right through the heart of town 51 weeks ago, killing 24 people and destroying some 1,300 homes, churches, and businesses. “They’ve just moved out.”
Morris has lost a player to Texas where he had to move to find a home. And some Mayfield students now live in Paducah, the nearest place they could find to live and are bused 21 miles to the school.
For a month, Morris and his coaches did not see their team together. There was too much else to do since an undamaged Mayfield High School became the site for the immediate aid that was coming to this Graves County town of 10,000.
“Our gym looked like a mini-Wal Mart,” Morris said, “except for the frozen food.”
Here’s the list of contents for the first loaded semi-tractor-trailer that the Beechwood High School community put together for the stricken town: warm clothing, hats, gloves, blankets, bedding, food, water, cleaning products, hygiene products, 30 to 40 space heaters and kerosene heaters, grills for cooking absent electricity, extension cords, phone chargers, flashlights and on and on.
RELATED: Beechwood lends a helping head to Mayfield tornado relief
“Coach (Noel) Rash was one of the first to reach out,” Morris said of his good friend and Beechwood head coach who have developed a close relationship over the years of these teams playing in either the state championship or semifinal games.
In fact, the very last time they’d seen each other was the final game last season for Mayfield in the state semifinals, when the Cardinals were beaten 38-7, by Beechwood, the first win for the Tigers after seven straight defeats to Mayfield. Beechwood would go on to win their second straight Class 2A title, and 16th all-time, the next week.
RELATED: Beechwood cruises past Mayfield in state semis
But Rash’s first text wasn’t about football — it was about Morris and his family. How were they doing? How was Mayfield doing? At the same time, Beechwood principal Justin Kaiser was reaching out to his Mayfield counterpart. And already knew how dire the situation was.
Morris explains it in a sentence.
“It’s going to take us a minimum of 18 years to rebuild,” he said matter-of-factly, “at least.”
By the time Rash reported in, Kaiser had already secured the first truck to deliver necessities from Fort Mitchell, and then another, and another.
“There were at least five of them,” Morris said. “I should know. I helped unload one of them.”
There was a police car, even, from the Fort Mitchell Police Department to replace the destroyed Mayfield fleet. And $22,000 in cash donations.
“And now we’re playing each other in the championship game,” Morris said, “kind of ironic, isn’t it.”
Although not a surprise. Mayfield is an impressive 14-0, Beechwood 13-1.
The special relationship between these two teams and two schools and two Kentucky towns might not have been predicted. For many in Kentucky, Fort Mitchell might as well be in Ohio, a part of Cincinnati.
And when you look at the map, Mayfield, 320 miles and one time zone away from Fort Mitchell in far western Kentucky, looks like it could be Tennessee, Missouri “or Illinois,” Morris adds with a laugh.
But they’ll be next to one another Friday on UK’s Kroger Field before the 4 p.m. kickoff. We’re not talking about the players but the mayors and principals and superintendents and head coaches from both towns when a proclamation recognizing what Beechwood did for Mayfield will be formally presented.
“Athletics have a way of bringing people together,” Kaiser said. “Here, our kids who do service projects all over Greater Cincinnati were getting to do something for people they knew, that they’d lined up against just weeks before.”
And now these teams are lining up once again.
“It’s been a long, tough year here,” Morris said. “We talk to our kids about overcoming adversity in football, but that’s real adversity. If having an undefeated football team can bring a smile to this community, well, we’ve not had a lot to smile about.”
When Mayfield reported for summer practice, Morris knew he’d have to decide: Does he talk about the tornado and how it changed all their lives – or not.
“I decided not to,” he said. “It’s all they hear.” What did he say: “Let’s just go out and play football.”
And play they have.
“I think it brought us closer,” Morris said. “We’ve had a lot of adversity…and hey, here we are.”
Last year, “We were really young,” he said of that team that turned the ball over early, got behind and got beaten in a way Mayfield almost never has.
“We’re a better football team this year,” Morris said. “We have a lot of those guys back and some really good senior leaders. The first week of practice, we realized this team had a chance to be special because they want to be good.”
They’ll have to be, Morris said.
“Beechwood is good,” he said. “Every time I look at their film, they look the same. They play the game the way it’s supposed to be played. They run the ball, they stop the run and even if they don’t do anything (fancy) on defense, they do it really well.”
Of his coaching counterpart in this game, he said, “Noel Rash is a quality man…his teams are well-coached and they play hard.”
And the good football fans from Mayfield picked up on all of it – the football and the part that was about much more than football. Here’s a note that Mayfield native Jeff Thompson sent us to pass along to Beechwood’s Rash that pretty much says it all.
“Coach, on behalf of a small town, torn and tattered, please convey our collective thanks and gratitude to your school, your team, and to your community. Again, you all let your actions do the talking off the field, even more than on the field. Mayfield will be back; I mean the town. We have another historic comeback in us. We will also be back on the gridiron. We have no intention of letting Beechwood even up this fine series. Until we meet again on the field, if ever we can lend a hand to you all, if ever you should need us, I hope we WIN, the way the Beechwood community won, the days following December 10.“