The coolest thing about 2026’s Friday Night Lights season isn’t that all 12 schools have threatened to be contenders at some point in the previous few years. It’s not Highway A’s dominance of the state playoff bracket. It’s not even the rising popularity of Varsity pigskin in Missouri, though that’s a close second. JeffCo’s biggest preseason celebration doesn’t have anything directly to do with our Quad County Conference representatives Grandview, Jefferson, and Herky, but it’s a celebration all the same.

Ladies and gentlemen, Regional Radio IS BACK! MyMoInfo’s radio network went from a sold-to-corporate morass of national news, bland talk shows, and occasional “mystery” football broadcasts to its old status as a local sports hub in one short offseason. The Gridiron Geek is not certain if they’re going to call it “Regional Radio” once again, but it’s the familiar Friday Night Lights coverage that we know from forever-through-2024. KJFF, J-98, and KREI will combine to air a whopping 23 games this regular season.

Like everything in our time, the good news has a conservative and a progressive explanation. Somebody from the Cato Institute would say that MyMoInfo’s national bosses realized they can make more money by broadcasting Friday Night Lights to every local market than spoon-feeding us Judge Jeanine on weekend nights, when everyone is trying to follow a football team. Jefferson County did everything but boycott MyMyInfo after local sports were deemphasized in the aftermath of the buyout. If they still wanted our listenership and our business, they had to put the teams back on the air. Progressives might argue instead that someone at corporate grew a Grinch Heart, and realized that it stinks to rip part of a community away from folks. Regional Radio did once treat Friday Night Lights as an institution rather than a business. But we can’t rely on New York City to think that way. Regional Radio’s reboot gives our community’s own media a chance to make things right. There’s a new version of the End Zone Show, by the way, though it’s on Saturday instead of a postgame slot. Griffin Weinberg may not return from Ohio, so we’ll see how it goes.

Quad County Conference schools will be on J-98 and KJFF a combined seven times in 2026’s first nine weeks of pigskin. The Geek feels sure that “September 2” is a misprint next to the Jefferson vs Park Hills Central listing, since that would be a Wednesday. But the Grandview-Perryville scheduling for a Thursday is accurate according to Perryville’s MSHSAA page, making it so cool that MyMoInfo jumped on that opportunity for more prime-time action.

Yes, there’s a whole lot of Perryville’s kids on that radio schedule, especially since there are no Perryville stations under MyMyInfo’s watch! The boosters from “Perry’s Villas” deserve that honor richly, however, since 93.1 KBDZ Perryville flew a flag for riverside pigskin coverage while Regional Radio was on the fritz.

Besides, the QCC’s table has been topped by Perryville’s two teams, the St. Vincent Indians and PHS Pirates, for two straight years. They can be considered the standard-bearers of a relatively new league. What can our three teams do to challenge a southern county’s QCC dominance in 2026?

Grandview Eagles: Talent “Poole” is Nicked at 2026’s Starting Blocks

Grandview has done everything it needs to do to avoid having a hangover from 2025’s senior-studded tour de force. Senior RB Brock Poole is ready to race with the football, lining up behind an offensive line that is bigger, and more numerous, than The Geek’s worst fears implied Grandview line might be. In fact, Grandview has at least a 25-man roster again, a sign that every class at GHS likes its pigskin.

There’s one thing the Eagles still can’t seem to do, and that’s to buy enough bottles of Hot Shot and kill the Injury Bug. Senior Iron Man athlete Aaron Smith is ailing with a foot injury suffered in a summer camp. Meanwhile, the defensive backfield has been thinned by more players’ pratfalls in the preseason. It puts pressure on the greener skill players to have to step into positions like running back, fullback, and cornerback, especially on a Birds of Prey team that plans to run often, and rely on defense.

You would think a flock of Birds of Prey could kill a simple bug! But it’s not a new story at Grandview High. The Geek believes that a modified annual schedule could help the Eagles maintain their wind in summer camp. As former Detroit Lions HC Joe Schmidt says in “Paper Lion,” being able to go 100% on every rep means that you don’t sustain as many injuries. Sometimes, though, injury problems just come down to bad luck and timing.

On the bright side, Poole isn’t the only rusher who could gobble 1000+ yards for the Eagles. MyMoInfo beat The Geek and the Jefferson County Leader to a critical JeffCo story on July 22, allowing head coach Cory Hanger to announce that junior QB Christian Volner is taking over behind center. Volner played at running back and occasionally split-out wide last season, although for all we know, he was already one of Grandview’s backup QBs, because the scholarship alum Brendan Martin played every Friday.

Volner needs to bulk up his body to be a successful running QB. But not only did the junior look increasingly stocky late in the 2025 campaign, his 34 turns carrying the ball nearly led the way with an eight-yard average. With 270-pound senior Johnny Schmidt leading the blocking effort, Grandview coaches clearly want to pound the rock this year, which The Geek thinks is smart.

Running plays to the strength of a physical team with a new QB. It will also benefit Grandview to keep the Game Clock running and compete in shorter games this season, even though there’s a nice full group of players in the overall. More snaps, more episodes, and more fatigue could spawn more injuries at the absolute worst time. If 2026 goes well, it’ll be because the remaining healthy players stay that way.

Claiming a 5-4 record against Grandview’s schedule would be an achievement for any Class 1 school. TGG has spilled a lot of ink complaining about the strength-of-schedule of Fox and Crystal City without paying enough attention to just how many larger schools the Birds of Prey have been facing. After all, Grandview was the only Class 1 team in 2025’s conference field. The QCC field includes two Large Schools teams and Herculaneum of Class 3. GHS still came within one win of the title last year!

Grandview should focus on winning its first two home games over Bayless in Week 2, and over Veritas Christian in Week 4. If the Eagles do that, and they happen to play well and win at Cuba in Week 3, they’ll have built at least a 3-1 record going into the endurance test of four consecutive league matchups. More importantly, it would buy time for summer’s injuries to heal, while keeping GHS above the .500 mark.

Herculaneum Blackcats: Heavy Load Up Front Could Punish Dunklin’s Opponents

Football coaches contradict their projected confidence all the time. For example, why did Herky’s former head coach Stan Helms run up the sideline screaming at Scott Croom to “stay in bounds!” with Dunklin leading 14-7 and 2:00 left to go against Priory in the 1991 Class 3 semifinals? Sure, he wanted to run the Game Clock out. But before games, Helms and other head coaches have always said things like, “If our defense has to stop them in a two-minute situation, why, I have total faith that they’ll get the job done.” Really? Then why care if your RB goes out-of-bounds to stop the clock with 2:00 left? The worst eventuality would be Priory getting the ball, and they won’t score a TD. You said so yourself!

To deal with the contradiction means to A) admit that your team is fallible, or B) admit that sometimes your opponents are really, really good. Herculaneum’s skipper Blane Boss has to choose “B” (a natural choice for Coach B. B.) and speak to the HHS Blackcats about their expectations for this season – especially this postseason. The good part is that Boss, whose team turned things around in a potential watershed of a 2025 campaign, does not have to tell the Blackcats that they aren’t very good, and that they’ll need to lower expectations for their own performances. By all accounts (and box scores), Herky is transforming into a contender again! That can continue … but there’s a roadblock up the bend.

The Herculaneum Blackcats look like a potential Quad County Conference champion this year. There’s a double-digit contingent of seniors, and close to 25 upperclassmen overall, counting in Dunklin’s Class of 2028. Senior QB + RB Chase Luebbert is a “dual position threat” who ran for 369 yards last season. Herky’s veteran running backs Michael Hankins and Austin Brinkley should give the backfield more than enough juice to start making up for the loss of graduate Clark Struckoff, running behind an O-line of ferocious blockers such as Ayden Bowling and Taylor Greenlee. 280 lb. sophomore Gerald Brown can add more thump.

Herky’s defense and kick-coverage teams showed very high upside in 2025’s conference games. HHS shut down and defeated the QCC’s two best teams, holding Perryville and St. Vincent to a combined 26 points. It was the tough midseason loss to Grandview that kept the Blackcats from lifting the hardware.

Maybe the gained experience of defensive backs like junior Lenny Eaves will help the defense play more consistent football this fall. Meanwhile, there’s so many upperclass linemen poised to rock and roll that Boss can utilize bruisers such as 6’1” senior defensive end Lucas Mercille as stand-up linebackers if needed. 6’3” senior LB Gavin Feltman led HHS with 14 tackles-for-loss in 2025.

What kind of “roadblock” could stop a team with so many road-graders? None at all, until you get to the Class 3 playoff bracket. This year’s Class 3 field will be filled with legacy kids, outstanding rushers and quarterbacks, and Class 5 state-playoff credentials. Making it worse is that many of a projected Class 3 field’s new arrivals are way closer to Jefferson County than Blair Oaks. The Country Day Rams are now projected to drop into C3. Lutheran North has been relegated one class into Class 3.

The trade-off of contenders who’re leaving C3 includes the departures of Valle Catholic and Lift for Life, but Borgia’s still hanging without a state points-boost, and don’t forget nearby public schools with sky-high ceilings of performance, i.e. Park Hills Central. Principia could be a threat behind senior QB Tristan Coon.

Herky has to be drawn into Class 3’s District 1, 2, or 3, and at least one or two of the powerhouses are probable to fall into a District with the Blackcats and/or the promoted St. Pius X Lancers. What timing for Herculaneum and St. Pius to boast their best rosters of the 2020s! The key is to manage expectations – if Lutheran North and Country Day are part of Herky’s bracket in Week 10, then Dunklin fans might have to take “advance stock” of a fine winning season that’s still likely to end for HHS by mid-November.

There remains hope for Herculaneum to make its first District Championship Game since 2014. MICDS and Lutheran North won a combined 11 contests in 2025. The Lutheran North Crusaders, a ghost of LNHS’s prior powerhouses, had to win four mismatches to stay above .500. What’s crazy is that neither school is set to field 10+ seniors. There’s hardly 15 seniors between the both of them!

Should the Herky Blackcats be drawn into a District semifinal against one of those teams, it might not be for the reason you think – it might be a No. 3 at No. 2 meeting between a struggling state-playoff brand and a Herculaneum squad that’s bearing a conference title. Park Hills Central has diminished so badly, Rebel Nation had to endure losses to St. Genevieve and Potosi last season. It won’t be impossible to reach Week 12 in Class 3. It could actually prove hard for the schools who’re used to vying for C5 District honors.

Don’t wince, but the best scenario for Herky and St. Pius could be if MSHSAA ignores politics and makes them into District tournament rivals this season. The kids from each team remain friends, even if some grownups are still doing their kid-stuff. It would be worth some of the boosters for each side trying to hire Danhausen to curse the gridiron prior to a Lancers-Blackcats playoff, because such a match would most likely not be in Week 11. It would probably be for all the Human Moneys in Week 12.

MSHSAA doesn’t prefer to stack too many state contenders in one District bracket. St. Pius X’s status as a state runner-up and Park Hills Central’s status as a recent state champion would make a Lancers-Rebels matchup gleam and glisten in the autumn mist, tempting MSHSAA to let CHS take one of the District’s other contender’s slots. Should Class 3, District 1 have St. Pius and Herky in it, the Lancers and the Blackcats may be staring at six other District bids of familiar teams and beatable opponents. The relegated Class 4 and Class 5 tycoons might have to duke it out in a separate Class 3 District.

Luebbert and the Blackcats could even win the No. 1 seed in whatever District race they’re about to be in. Herky’s schedule sets the ‘Cats up to claw out an impressive regular-season record, perhaps a GREAT regular-season mark if things fall into place. Bowling’s offensive line should get a tremendous push versus Herculaneum’s first two opponents of the campaign, Affton and Fredericktown.

Herculaneum’s first underdog road trip is to St. Vinny’s in Week 4, but the 2025 Blackcats were not “underdogs” when they whipped St. Vincent. The schedule softens in early October, leaving the Blackcats two early-year conference wins away from a big streak.

Jefferson Blue Jays: Atley’s Repair Work Will Be Tested in Late Summer

Any recap of Jefferson’s 2025 season should be as quick as it is painful. The 4-1 start and a perfect record in regulation through five weeks, followed by a disintegration of form that we didn’t believe was possible at JHS in the 2020s. It reminded The Geek of when Jefferson abandoned an effective Double-Wing playbook in favor of a fancier offense circa 2016, looking to take things to a different level … and succeeding by finding a different level four or five levels below where the Blue Jays had begun from. The 2025 Blue Jays couldn’t block, and made up for it by not tackling, finishing 0-5 with an average 27-point margin of defeat.

Oh, and both of Jefferson’s star quarterbacks got hurt, the Jefferson County All-Star senior Cooper Frisk, and the talented understudy Sam Kerley. MSHSAA TV’s final regular-season broadcast from Blue Jay Way was deleted in postgame, replaced by random footage of Jefferson’s empty field with the lights dimmed in a rainstorm. It felt all-too-fitting for a season gone gloomy after the leaves had turned.

Head coach Matt Atley appears to have done a nice job regrouping the Blue Jays this offseason. Atley’s interview with MyMoInfo in training camp, and the team reporting J-98’s crew was moved to run alongside it, offered clues to a Jefferson offseason with clear messaging, healthy self-promotion, and humble hard work. Atley feels that his offensive line and defensive front will get better with training and experience. R-7’s skipper touts the junior Kerley as the next in a line of exciting JHS signal-callers who can operate Jefferson’s 11-v-11 running game while tossing accurate balls downfield. Far from calling for another “2016” Air Raid experiment, however, Atley is also allowing his corps of rushers to go into this season cocky.

How cocky? Oh, nothing hectic, just the senior tailback Aiden Kentch telling MyMoInfo that his goal is to rush for (gulp) 2000+ yards this season. Dare to dream. Jefferson’s entire stable of ballcarriers ran for about 1600 yards last year. Kentch rushed for 564 yards. The 5’9” RB brings a decent load at 185 pounds, and it’s it’s thrilling to hear that Jefferson’s OL might be heavy enough to block for a 2000-yard rusher in 2026. Atley wouldn’t let a less-talented player boast to the media like that. But you don’t want your key Iron Man players to get “Kaian Roberts-Day” syndromes and try to be Walter Payton, when you really want them to be Jim Thorpe.

Jefferson’s not even going to try to have a 2000-yard rusher if Kerley zings the ball as well as his coaches think he can. The Blue Jays plan to spread the bean around too liberally for any RB to average 30 carries. Kerley finished last year as the most accurate QB on the Blue Jays, via a 61% completion rate. Junior backup QB Parker Taylor tossed three TD passes on just eight attempts.

Now, if Kentch’s goal is to get 2000+ total yards, that’s something different. A misunderstanding of what “total yards” meant caused The Geek to be made fun of by lazy readers some years ago, when he wrote that Festus High had four available running backs who might gain “2500 total yards” if featured as the do-it-all fast kid on an average rural team. For some, that looked like The Geek was saying FHS had four Cody Shavers. A versatile skill player can accumulate 1500+ rush yards, 300+ reception yards, and more bones on special teams to contribute 2000+ total yards without playing 100% running back. That’s probably what Jefferson’s coaches have in mind for Kentch, who’s such a tenacious tackler that his legs shouldn’t be overused on offense anyway.

If you tally 2000+ total yards without having to hog a team’s touches to do it, that’s when you’re playing on a healthy, explosive offense of the sort that Jefferson struggled to attain last season. Kentch will be hoping that 2026’s corps of wide receivers is good enough to snag Kerley’s spirals and keep defenses honest. It’s another of R-7’s question marks, but seniors Brandon Crader and Evan Botkin could each contribute at wideout. No one besides graduate Noah Buehler caught more than one TD pass in 2025.

The Blue Jays have to improve on defense this season, or all of the talk of quarterbacks, offensive lines, and four-digit rushers will be for naught. Windsor’s bolstered beef at the line-of-scrimmage will challenge the strength and the depth of Jefferson’s defensive front right away in Week 1. If the Blue Jays play well on defense against a Class 4 offensive line that’s finally starting to look like one, it will be a good omen headed into a difficult pair of September road games at Park Hills Central and Herculaneum.

Photo Credits: Blackcat Blitz Facebook, Grandview R-2 Facebook, Jefferson Blue Jays HUDL