The Montgomery County football team had a long, painful two-hour bus ride back from Clark County High School in a Class 2 district quarterfinal game last year.

The Wildcats not only lost to Clark County by 21 points, but they also wrapped up their first losing season in five years. MCHS was 2-8 after winning six games the year before.

“It’s always tough because the biggest thing I think as a head coach I probably failed at last year was we weren’t together enough,” MCHS coach John Klekamp said. “We weren’t focused enough on the same things. Offensively, we changed our offense two, three or four times throughout the season because we couldn’t sustain what we were doing because we couldn’t hold on to the football. Our goal was to try running the football, but we didn’t do it very well.”

With a large senior class, the Wildcats will look to get back on the winning track this fall. MCHS has 14 seniors, most of them have played with the program since they were freshmen.

“It’s a good group of kids,” Klekamp said. “We’ve got some skilled guys who have really put in a lot of good work. We actually have some guys up front in that group who are really ready to finish off their career with us. Up to four of them could be starting for us up front.”

Two of the seniors – Mason Leu and James Pollard – earned all-Eastern Missouri Conference honors last fall. Leu was named first-team defensive back after recording 56 tackles and Pollard was selected second-team defensive lineman after finishing with 48 tackles.

Jace Ellis, another senior, turned in a strong first year with the Wildcats in 2022, finishing with 47 tackles and 4.5 sacks. He will be sharing quarterbacking duties with sophomore Jacob Hogue.

“Jacob took most of the reps all summer long because Jace is a really high-end baseball player,” Klekamp said. “He did a lot of traveling and wasn’t able to be with us all of the time. Jacob grew into that position. We’re now growing with Jace. Jace has been great in practice. Those two guys have been really supportive of each other. They have really driven our offense. I’m super excited for both of those guys.”

Other seniors include Jacer Brower, Wes Cobb, Chase DeJesus, Kadyn Emily, Conner Finke, Bryson Hoffmann, Weston Marshall, Landon Massey, Christian Naylor, Ben Rajchart and Dayton Simmons.

The Wildcats have a small junior class that includes Hogue, Trenton Birkner, Riddick Carlock, Jordan Hicks and Tatum Wessel. MCHS has a combined 30 sophomores and freshmen.

The Wildcats begin their season at 7 p.m. on Aug. 25 with a road game against Hermann. Last year, MCHS lost to the Bearcats 25-13.
Hermann, which finished 8-3 in 2022, has a new coach in Jed Leeper. Klekamp said he worked with Leeper while he was coaching at South Callaway years ago.

“We’ve been close throughout the years,” Klekamp said. “(Former Hermann coach Andy) Emmons and I had a great relationship, but Jed and I were almost like brothers when we coached together. When we were at South Callaway, we were peas on a pod. We’re both defensive guys. He’s just a great dude.”

MCHS lost its first five games of the 2022 season. The Wildcats had three consecutive winning seasons before that streak was snapped last fall.

The Wildcats hope to turn in a strong season in conference play this fall. They won just two league games a year ago.

“Bowling Green is the class of the conference right now and that’s who everybody has to chase,” Klekamp said. “Somebody has to try to knock them off first. But underneath them, the conference is kind of wide open. There are a lot of us who are kind of retooling and trying to figure out who we’re going to be. I think it’s going to be a competitive conference.”