DesotoExplorer.com

De Soto senior Mike Sprowl ended his high school football career playing with the best players from the state in the Kansas Shrine Bowl Saturday at Cessna Stadium in Wichita.

Sprowl helped anchor the offensive line for the East team, and though the West team won, 14-7, Sprowl said the players on both teams were exceptional and he enjoyed the experience.

“All the players there were grade “A” players,” Sprowl said. “They were the best of the best. There was no one there that was bad. Almost all of them were going to college, except maybe a couple of them who were going to play baseball or basketball. But everyone was hand-picked from the best of the best and I happened to be one of them.”

Sprowl was first nominated for the game by former De Soto head football coach Brad Scott. Sprowl, who missed the Greater Kansas City Coaches All-Star Game a few weeks ago with a shoulder injury, has since recovered and played most of the Shrine Bowl game.

“It was fast paced and nothing like high school,” Sprowl said.

While at De Soto, Sprowl earned a reputation as a hard hitter and often pancaked his opponent. Sprowl did much of the same during the game and even bent his face mask.

“I pulled and hit a kid so hard, it was helmet-on-helmet on accident and I bent my face mask,” Sprowl said. “I’ve never done that before. But you have to hit kind of hard to do that.”

During the week leading up to the game, Sprowl had to endure three practices a day, which ran for two and a half hours each. Sprowl said the practices were harder than those he went through at De Soto, but added that they helped him get ready for college. He also attended a parade on the day of the game. The Shrine Bowl players also traveled to St. Louis and greeted and signed autographs for many of the kids at the Shriners Hospital.

“Just to see all of the kids and the cards that they were dealt, I thought everyone was going to be sad, but really that wasn’t the case at all,” Sprowl said. “It was just the opposite. Everyone was happy to see us and everyone thought it was incredible.

“I lost a game of table hockey to a 6-year old kid with spina bifida, and they were just competitive and always wanted to do something. They were good kids and none of them were sad.”

With his high school career now over, Sprowl will continue his football career this fall in college at Butler County. Sprowl reports to the team on Aug. 6.

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