Battling for Prep Bowl bragging rights
Annual game between Chicago Public, Catholic League squads shaped legends
There was a time when a football game at Soldier Field that drew as many as 120,000 people featured players too young to vote.
It was a time when the biggest football game for high schools here wasn’t played for the state title — but for local bragging rights.
The Prep Bowl, or the Kelly Bowl as it once was called, pitted the champion of Chicago’s public schools against that of the area’s Catholic League. This postThanksgiving match between private and public school squads was the only football game that really mattered at the end of the season.
It was so big that in 1937, as the Tribune reported, about 120,000 people crowded the stands at Soldier Field to see Austin High halfback Bill DeCorrevont help shut out Leo Catholic 26-0 behind his four touchdowns, three rushing and one passing.
“The size of the crowd amazed even the most enthusiastic sponsors of the game,” the Tribune wrote. “The ballyhooing of DeCorrevont attracted thousands of football fans and the rivalry of the public and Catholic high schools lured thousands of others.”
Chicago Park District official Evan Kelly told the Tribune that “pending the actual checkup of tickets, the crowd was the largest that ever saw a football game in Chicago. … The stands of Soldier Field seat 76,000.” Children by the thousands were squeezed in among adults in the aisles, and fans stood six deep around the stadium top.
The first Prep Bowl, which the Tribune dubbed “the football championships of all the Chicago high schools,” was on Dec. 3, 1927, between Schurz, winner of the Public League, and undefeated Catholic League champion Mount Carmel.
Played on Soldier Field turf that was in “splendid condition” after snowflurries, 50,000 fanswatched asMount Carmel froze out Schurz
6-0 “in the first interleague game ever staged,” the Tribune wrote. Amid fumbles on both sides because of the wintry chill, the Caravan scored the game’s only touchdown in the second half, when team captain Mel Brosseau “dovefouryardsthroughthe center of the Schurz line” to score. The game raised $35,000 for Christmas charities.
Raising money for charity was a driving force for the game fromthe start, but primarily under the guidance of Mayor Ed Kelly. Starting in 1934, the game was christened the Kelly Bowl after the mayor; itwasn’t known as the Prep Bowl until the 1940s.
Attendance continued to be robust, and Mayor Richard J. Daley threw himself into promoting the game during his tenure. Tribune prep columnist Barry Temkin, while waxing poetic in 1998 about the game’s glory days, wrote ofhow the elder Daley would hold his annual Prep Bowl banquet at the old Bismarck Hotel. He also was a regular at the game, “usually sitting
in the west stands and working his way through the press box at halftime,” Temkin wrote.
And the game was on radio and television. If fans couldn’t score a ticket, they could easily follow the play-by-play at home or read about it in next day’s paper. There was never a shortage of coverage.
But then things started to change.
While the elder Mayor Daley was a presence at pregame festivities and on game day, the younger Mayor Daley, Richard M., was rarelyseenatPrepBowlmatchesin the 1990s.
And in 1974, the Illinois High School Association created the state football playoffs. Some years later, the mayor and his office decided they would no longer sponsor the Prep Bowl. Interest was waning. The Catholic League was not only dominating the yearly event, but also the league’s best teams weren’t even playing in the Prep Bowl because they were eligible for the IHSA playoffs. And thatseemedtokeepfans awayfrom
Soldier Field. Crowdswere averaging about 5,000 people instead of 50,000, the Tribune reported in 1979.
So a new format emerged, one that is still in place today. Public League and Catholic League teams that don’t make the state playoffs can vie for a chance in the Prep Bowl playoffs to win their respective league titles. Catholic and Public League teams that lose in the IHSA playoffs before the semifinal round have the option to play in the Prep Bowl playoffs, too, but those teams can opt out if they wish. And some do, especially if a program has a large number of athletes who play other winter sports at the same time.
Many teams that choose to go back into the hunt do so to prove something to themselves— and get a second chance at winning a championship.
Case in point: Mount Carmel in the early 1990s.
When the Catholic team faced off against the Bogan Bengals on Nov. 26, 1993, in the Prep Bowl, it mayhave felt like the Bengals didn’t have a chance. Mount Carmel’s highly talented squad featured future NFL quarterback Donovan McNabb, who was considered one of the best inthe state, andstandout running back Mike Clifford. The Caravan had suffered a stunning 9-6 loss to an unheralded De La Salle team in the second round of the Class 5A state playoffs. At the time, the loss was the earliest playoff exit ever for a Frank Lenti-ledMount Carmel team.
So the Caravan felt they should have been at Hancock Stadium at Illinois State University in Normal, vying for a state title, instead of at the Prep Bowl in front of only 1,244 fans on Soldier Field turf.
“They say you learn from your mistakes. … We had a second chancehere toprove ourselves, and we made the most of it,” McNabb told theTribune at the time.
McNabb — a six-time Pro Bowl quarterback who played 13 years in the NFL for the Philadelphia Eagles, Washington Redskins and MinnesotaVikings— threwfortwo touchdowns and helped the Caravan blast out to a 34-0 lead over the Bengals. Mount Carmel ended up beating Bogan 34-14 for its ninth Prep Bowl crown, on a day when the wind chill was a jarring 3 degrees at kickoff.
“We’re not kidding anybody — this isn’t a state title,” coach Lenti said.“Butourkidshadtheopportunity to win a championship, and they did it.”
Chicago Public Schools tried to revitalize the event in 1999. Bears coach Dick Jauron promised that 10 of his players would be on hand for the game, less than 24 hours after the Bears played the Detroit Lions on Thanksgiving. And the Prep Bowl banquet even returned, this time at the Palmer House where about 500 guests attended.
But the excitement was shortlived. The Prep Bowl isn’t even played at Soldier Field anymore. In 2015 thegamewasmovedtoGately Stadium on the Far South Side because CPS could not afford the Park District fees to use the facility. And last year, when St. Laurence won its first Prep Bowl in 41 years with a 35-34 victory over Simeon, it was the first Prep Bowl played outside the city as St. Laurence hosted the game on its home field in southwest suburban Burbank.
It’s been a long time since the game had the cachet it once did. But for those who have played in it, the Prep Bowl is still part of Catholic League and Public League tradition, lore and history.
“I told the kids, maybe the game’s not what it used to be. Maybe there used to be 100,000 people there,” Gordon Tech coach Tom Winiecki told the Tribune in 1993. He played for Leo in the 1956 Prep Bowl. “Butwhen you’re in the Catholic League, and you see the trophies and hear the people talk about the Prep Bowl, you have to feel it’s still important.”