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Morning Sun

Southeast starts football season in Baxter Springs

By Kalon Fullerton
kfullerton@morningsun.net

The Southeast Lancers will
look to improve on a 1-8 season
last year as they start the season on the road facing bigger
opposition.
Southeast travels to Baxter
Springs to face the Lions, a
Class 3A school that competes
in the CNC League. Last year,
the Lions blanked the Lancers
42-0 to open the season and end
a long losing streak.
“They’re a large school and
we’re Class 1A. But you have
to play who’s on your schedule,” Lancer head coach Nick
Cheney said. “We just have to
show up and block who we ask
them to block.”
Baxter Springs has a new
head coach in 2023. Jeff McCoy
takes over after the Lions won
three games in 2022. Last year’s
win over Southeast was the first
victory for the program since
2018 and snapped a 25-game
losing streak.
Baxter Springs started the
season on a three-game winning
streak before losing their its six
games, earning victories over
Uniontown and Afton (Okla.).
The Lions return senior quarterback Peyton Gaines, who
threw for over 1,000 yards, and
wide receiver/running back
Javen Alexander, who rushed
for 247 yards and earned 251
receiving yards.
Linebacker/offensive lineman
Gage Maggard returns for his
senior year along with senior
lineman Caleb Pujols and sophomore Ivan Ogle, who play up
front on both sides of the ball.
“They have some kids back,”
Cheney said. “They have an
excellent quarterback. They
spread you out on offense and
they run and gun a lot of the
time. On defense they just send
the house on almost every play.”
The Lancers lost the first
eight games of the season in
2022, rebounding with a win in
the final game of the season
20-6 over Northern Heights.
On offense, Southeast returns junior running
back Aden Smith, who
earned all-conference nods,
as well as sophomore wideout
Colton Lawrence. The Lancers
also return junior quarterback
Andrew Phillips, who was
sidelined by injury in Week 1
last season. Up front, seniors
Blayke Burns, Austin Ford and
Jayce Stewart return on both
sides of the ball.
“We’re trying to run some
of the plays they run, but we
don’t have the same speed,”
Cheney said. “We just want
to get better. (Last year) when
that game was over with, a lot
of the kids got better, and it
helped us down the road.”
The Lancers saw a glimpse of
the Lions at their jamboree in
Cherryvale last Friday in their
final tune-up before the regular
season.
“That was a good jamboree for
us,” Cheney said. “We learned a
lot. We played a whole lot better
than we did last year. And the
kids have a better attitude.”

Morning Sun

By Brock Sisney
bsisney@morningsun.net

CHEROKEE, Kan. — Southeast Kansas high school football
teams have experienced two
extremes in temperatures from
the first to the second Monday
of practice.
On the first day last Monday,
teams were blessed with temps
right around 80 degrees, cooler
conditions more ideal for building up early-season conditioning.
Temps reached 100 degrees
and it felt more like 120 on the
second Monday, and teams like
the Southeast Lancers practiced inside because of the heat
illness prevention policy established by the Kansas State High
School Activities Association
(KSHSAA).
Other teams practiced earlier
in the day, in an effort to beat
the heat and have athletes get
in their required number of
practices before their first competition date.
“I’ve coached probably 45
years, and you just go with the

flow,” Southeast head
coach Nick Cheney said
of the differences in
weather from the first
to second Monday and
the second week. “Some
years, it’s ideal. Then,
other years, it’s hot and
then you’ll be playing
in snow at the end of
the year. This is Kansas
weather … just play.
“The state’s got some
rules on heat, which are
good rules because if it’s
as hot as it is right now,
you’re inside. Then, they
have rules if it’s like in the
90s, you leave your shoulder pads off and then
sometimes you don’t have
any shoulder pads or helmets. They’re good rules
for kids. They probably
should have been there for
a lot of years.
“We’ll probably be in the
gym most of this week. On
Friday, we have a jamboree at Cherryvale. They’ve
already moved it back to 7
o’clock, and they might
move it back again, I don’t
know. We’ll get something
out of the gym, because
they’ll work hard. We’ll be
alright. Individual drills
are individual drills.”
The Lancers are coming
off an 1-8 season during
which they earned their
win 20-6 in the season finale last October against
Northern Heights.
“We’ll be in the mid-20s,”
Cheney said of the number of players available
this season. “We’d like
to be in the 30s, but our
junior and senior classes
are just small classes
where they don’t have as
many guys as they do gals,
if that makes sense.
“It’s been going good
so far. Kids have been
working hard, and that’s
all you can ask is for them
to work hard. That’s what
we worked on more than
anything, just mental
toughness and that kind
of stuff.”
The Lancers, following
their jamboree Friday at
Cherryvale, open their
2023 season Sept. 1 on
the road against former
CNC League rival Baxter
Springs.