One of the great missions, if you will, of this site is to categorize and then memorialize Kentucky High School football. This is both for the fans of the game now and for posterity. Records, pictures, and accounts of some of the great teams of yesteryear are sparse with pictures downright non-existent it sometimes seems.
So, we have taken it upon ourselves periodically to write stories about former players, former coaches, and even former teams. We are the online publication which had the 1940 Hopkinsville Tigers declared the Kentucky State Football Champions by two separate governmental agencies. Both agencies signed of on a governmental proclamation, giving our research and efforts the force and effect of settled law. Yes, we take this role of ours pretty seriously and name another publication which can brag of having done anything nearly this monumental. We’re waiting…go ahead!
We would be remiss if we didn’t memorialize one of the greatest Northern Kentucky Teams to ever run out on a high school football field. Today we will remember “Red-Dog” Daugherty’s Lloyd Memorial Juggernauts from 1976.
Probably the game which stands out the most to fans of Lloyd Memorial, particularly those old enough to remember 1976, was a game against Newport Catholic. This game was one-week prior to the Championship beat-down (24-0) of Shelby County for Kings of the 3A classification. At that time 3A was Kentucky’s largest classification for teams not located in Louisville. Those teams were in the 4A classification.
There are people who, still today, claim the game with Newport Catholic was the “…greatest game they ever saw.” With a tad over 2-minutes remaining, Newport Catholic had the lead in a game which pitted two teams where the winner was most probably going to win the entire thing.
Lloyd, behind its QB, Mark Molitor, and behind the running of RBs, Lockard and Ashley, drove the length of the field and won it at the end. It would take a forward pass at the end, something not often attempted in the day.
The pass was “Molitor to Doug Burkemeier” and it ended in the end-zone and won the game for Lloyd. This pass was a heave thrown down the middle of the field.
The Newport Catholic DB had a bead on the bomb and a chance to knock it to the ground. As the fickle hands of Fate would deal the cards on this particular occasion, the DB for Newport fell with the ball safely landing into the arms of Burkemeier. Doug casually jogged into the both the end zone and into the pantheon of great Northern Kentucky football all-time memories.
Burkemeier has since passed away with ALS and is still, even today, both missed and discussed. Lloyd capped off the undefeated season and State Football Championship the following week at Commonwealth Stadium in Lexington, Kentucky as we alluded to earlier in the article.
The team’s head man, Jim “Red Dog” Daugherty would rise to the status of Northern Kentucky legend together with many members of his staff. If you will look at the picture of Rudy Tassini (nice belt Rudy) to the left of this paragraph you can just make out Red Dog sitting behind Rudy. That staff also featured coaches like Mike Burns, Richard Wilmhoff, Rusty Kordenbrock, Buddy Didis, Randy “Coop-Dog” Cooper and statistician John Salyers who was a lawyer.
The Juggernauts defense was particularly nasty in 1976 and this team, for many young fans living in Northern Kentucky, forged an interest in the game of high school football. The team which had been playing football since 1928. An article in the Cincinnati Post reported that Lloyd High School, how it was then known, played “…like a juggernaut,” thus anointing the team with an official mascot.
Lloyd was one of the first schools to integrate, which it did in 1956, had one of the best bands in the southeastern US during the early 70s, and had an Academic Team which won the first area championship to go along with a cross county team which would be crowned State Champion during the 1975-76 school year. Lloyd also reputedly started the first baseball team back in the late 40s.
The school’s colors were first “black and gold” but changed to the colors it has today when the band director, between 1940-45, Louise Evers, thought the color “blue” more fetching. Ms. Evers ordered the band uniforms in the color she preferred and the colors were officially changed to “blue and gold” from “black and gold.” Apparently she had no qualm with “gold.”
Over the years, Lloyd Memorial won two State Football Championships (1965, 1976); 3 Regional Championships (1965, 1976, 2003); had over 42-winning seasons with 20 Head Football Coaches. The team won 16-straight (Game 10 of 1975 though Game 1 of 1977) and once won 12 in a roll at Cecil Dees Field (1990, 91, 92).
There have been many memorable teams and many which achieved greatness and any team winning it all may certainly make the claim. For the people KPGFootball regularly encounters, this Lloyd Memorial team, the 1976-version, will always be considered among the best they have ever seen play.
This is Coach HB Lyon, reporting for KPGFootball, and we’re JUST CALLING IT LIKE WE SEE IT!
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I was 7 years old when Lloyd won the ’76 state championship. My father dated Doug Burkemeier’s mother during this time and I often would play football with Doug, Mika Lockard and other players out in the yard. I was around the team a lot and one time Mika took me to their locker room and they let me run them out on the field one game. It’s still one of the greatest memories of my life. It’s sad to read that Doug passed away. I hope Mika and the others are doing well. Great memories of a great team.
Thanks for sharing those memories with our readers
Thanks for sharing that story Greg Wolfe. Daddy-O is doing good (Mika) and is still as passionate about football as he was then. He coached us through our adolescence and now bounces around doing the same for his grandchildren. Go Juggs!!
Hello Tanner,
It was good to receive your message. I’m glad to hear Mika is doing well and was able to coach you and now his grandchildren. He was my favorite player on that team. My time around those guys developed a passion for football in my own life and I played from middle school through college. Anyway, if he remembers me, tell him I said hello. He may remember my father, Allen Wolfe, who dated Doug’s’ mother, Laura, during that time.
The Newport Catholic game was not the semi finals of state. They played Whitley County, then Belfry then Shelby County. However, the NEW CATH game was the game of the year.