40 years of football championships in the Dome

CEDAR RAPIDS - This was a scene from 'Hoosiers,” only a different sport and well before the wonderful basketball movie about a small-town Indiana high school ever was released.

It was 1976, and Sigourney was about to play the Class 2A state football championship game against Central Lyon. It was one of three title games that November day at the brand-new UNI-Dome in Cedar Falls.

Davenport Central beat West Des Moines Dowling in the 3A game, 15-12. BCL won the Class 1A title with a 14-8 win over Graettinger.

Sigourney lost to Central Lyon, 14-0.

'I remember I told the kids 'It's going to be really nice in there,'” then-Sigourney Coach Chuck Henry said. 'But I told them the field was still 100 yards. It'd be just like if we were playing on our home field.”

Actually, the field being 100 yards long was about the only thing similar. This was a $4.8-million indoor facility with an air-inflated roof, not all of the permanent seats installed yet and an artificial playing surface.

Henry - retired, though he still substitute teaches in Washington, Iowa - remembered going to a sporting goods company in Waterloo for Pony football shoes for each of his players because they'd never played on 'plastic grass.” In future years, kids would simply wear tennis shoes for games.

'I remember driving up there that day,” said Jeff Holm, Sigourney's quarterback in 1976. He owns a funeral home in town now.

'When you see the Dome from a long way away, your heart just started racing,” Holm said. 'It was like ‘We're from little Sigourney, Iowa.' It was so big, so overwhelming.”

'As an 18-year-old, I was in awe,” said Bryan Bunting, a running back-safety for the Savages, who owns a construction company in Iowa City. 'Obviously, that was quite the experience, something you only dream about. I was definitely awestruck. The first time on artificial turf was a unique feeling in itself. It was not the reason we lost that game, though. We just didn't play well.”

This marks the 40th anniversary of championship games being played at the UNI-Dome. The 'Road to the Dome” has become familiar nomenclature for every prep football player in the state.

'It's one of those things that every team has T-shirts made for, and is on every one of their bulletin boards,” said Bud Legg, Information Director for the Iowa High School Athletic Association. 'The 'Road to the Dome” is synonymous with where you want to be at the end of the year.”

'It's the ultimate for every high-school kid and coach,” said Cedar Rapids Xavier Coach Duane Schulte. 'You have that goal of getting there each and every year. There is no better feeling than getting off Highway 20 and going down Hudson Road (toward the Dome).”

Schulte remembered attending the 1982 Class 1A state title game in which his brother, Darrel, was the starting quarterback for Cedar Rapids LaSalle. The Lancers blasted Sibley, 24-0.

Cedar Rapids Regis was the first Metro team to make it to the UNI-Dome, routing Emmetsburg in the 1978 2A final, 42-7. Both Regis and LaSalle were in 1982 finals, Regis losing to Harlan, 15-14.

'Guys my age always get together and talk about how good we could have been if we had been together back then,” Schulte said.

Linn-Mar was the first big-school Metro team to win it all at the Dome, in 1985. Cedar Rapids Kennedy has that opportunity Friday night, when it plays Dowling in the 4A title game.

All semifinals have been played in the UNI-Dome since 1998.

By the way, the weather forecast is for cold temperatures and six inches of snow Friday and Friday night. Can you imagine playing Friday's 4A, 1A (Iowa City Regina versus Western Christian) and 2A (Mount Vernon versus Spirit Lake) championships games in those conditions?

'Weather is always an unknown this time of year,” Legg said. 'Somedays it's pretty bad. But in the Dome, we're 70 degrees and no wind. One factor that could decided a game, you are taking it and removing it.”

l Comments: (319) 398-8259; jeff.johnson@thegazette.com