Shane and Conor McGraw two of three six-man players named to South Team for the 47th Annual Shrine Bowl
From left, Shane, Joan and Conor McGraw pose for a photo following the Six-man Championship at War Memorial Stadium in Laramie in November.
The Wyoming Shrine Bowl will have two seniors from the 2019 Hanna, Elk Mountain, Medicine Bow (HEM) football team playing on June 13 at Cheney Alumni Field at Natrona County High School.
The Shrine Bowl fields a team from the north and one from the south. There are 40 seniors selected to play on each team from the entire state. This year the North Team features 17 players and the South 13 players that participated in a state championship game last November in Laramie. Conor McGraw and Shane McGraw were named to the South team.
"This is really remarkable that three players were picked from a six-man team," Head HEM football Zach Scott said. Also selected from a six-man team was Riggen Meyer, another Carbon County player from Little Snake River. "It rarely happens that more than one six-man player is picked. It is actually a blessing when even one is picked. Of course, this year, they picked three of the best players that have played in recent memory."
All three players were in the final state championship game.
"Each boy is deserving and it is an honor well earned," Scott said. "All the boys are the face of a great six-man player. It is great they will be on the same team."
This is the 47th year of the annual Shrine, which was started back in the early 1970s. In 1973 two Wyoming High School football coaches, Jerry Overton of Kelly Walsh High School and Denny Brown of Byron High School, started organizing an all-star football game with the teams' rosters being made up from Wyoming high school players who were graduates of the current year. Obtaining sponsorship for this game was a daunting task as they tried different organizations. They approached the Officers of the two Shrine Temples in Wyoming, Kalif in Sheridan and Korein in Rawlins.
The Officers of the two Temples agreed to sponsor the annual game and the the Shrine Bowl of Wyoming Inc., a non-profit corporation, was formed with the first game played in 1974.
The annual game is played the first week of June with a full weeks activities for the participants. The highlight of the week is the trip that the participants make to the Shriners Hospitals for Children in Salt Lake City to visit the patients and see what the Shrine Organization does.
The week's activities are at no cost to the participants and the profits of the game are sent to the Shriners Hospital to benefit the children in the facility.
"I couldn't be more proud of the boys," Scott said. "Like I said, it so well deserved."
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