Sikeston, Central brush up on rivalry at football camp

~ Contact Football camp brings conference teams together

The tension built started several plays before.

Sikeston's offense was just held scoreless and now it's defense was trying to do the same against the Central football squad. But the Tigers were marching.

One play was stuffed with a hard tackle by a Sikeston defender up the middle. The next play went for 15 yards and ended when Central's Kwaychon Chism was brought down hard close to the sideline.

The chatter picked up on the field and near the benches soon after.

A short time later, Chism launched a deep pass to the back of the end zone which was snatched out of the air by Tigers receiver Al Young. Sikeston's Donell Cobb was quickly in on the play and brought down Young which led to a small skirmish after the tackle was made.

The two were separated quickly by an official and several teammates before the pushing match could turn into anything else.

And this was just a scrimmage game.

The fire shown between Central and Sikeston highlighted the first day of the SEMO Coaches Association Contact Camp on Thursday at Central and was a small reminder of how much the two SEMO Conference rivals, simply, don't like each other.

"I felt like the very last game we got emotional with Cape because, you know, we're such good friends," Sikeston coach Kent Gibbs said tongue-in-cheek. "We've been going at each other since I've been at Sikeston and It's been a really nice, good rivalry and emotions happen. We saw a little bit of that and I think both teams elevated their game a little bit."

Unofficially, Central won the scrimmage with Sikeston 1-0, with Young's catch being the only score. Though a shoving match did occur, nothing more took place and was what both coaches come to expect when the two meet.

"It's a great rivalry," Central coach Nathan Norman said. "Our kids like playing them and they like playing us. Both teams competed and picked up the pace during that session and we knew that would be the case, and that's good. We wanted to see how we would respond to that level of competition."

Competition was what every team was looking for Thursday between Central, Dexter, Kennett and Sikeston, who all went head to head in a scrimmage style setting. Each team had 15 plays on offense and 15 plays on defense within 40 yards of turf with officials on hand during the sixth annual event.

Norman was looking for competition on the other side of the ball as well as internally.

"We've got a lot of new players and we're just trying to get a feel of who can play football," Norman said. "We're not necessarily worried about what plays we're running, we just want to see who's going to compete, who's going to play with good technique and leverage. It's just another good, quality practice against somebody else."

The camp concludes with a 4 p.m. start today at Central.