BY ANDY TAYLOR

chronicle@taylornews.org

CANEY — The Caney Valley High School men’s locker room Monday night didn’t have a single dry eye after the Caney Valley Bullpups earned a 66-54 victory over Neodesha in the class 3A sub-state tournament opener.

Those teary eyes weren’t fueled by a tournament victory but by complete sadness for the team coach, Criss Davis, who lost his mentor, father and friend, Les Davis, the previous day.

Criss Davis was not preparing to coach Monday’s game, instead focusing his time on making funeral preparations and dealing with the grief that had befallen his family in such a sad way. The elder Davis was afflicted with a stroke during his grandson’s wedding ceremony in Copan, Okla., on Saturday afternoon. Les Davis died the next day in a Tulsa hospital.

At the age of 77, Les Davis was enjoying his retirement years to the fullest. He was a permanent fixture at Caney Valley basketball games this year (he missed only one game this year due to a promise he made to a Sedan youngster to attend a recreation basketball game). He witnessed his final basketball game on Thursday night when he viewed the Sedan/Caney Valley game in the Sedan High School Gymnasium.

Les also helped Criss, who serves as the Caney Valley head football coach, during the 2009 and 2010 gridiron seasons as an assistant coach, where players gave the elder Davis a seemingly appropriate nickname: Papa Davis.

Criss Davis cried and hugged each of his players in his darkened coach’s office Monday night. That office opens into a locker room that usually echoes with adrenaline-fueled chatter and laughter after a victory, especially in a post-season tournament.

But the post-game atmosphere in the Bullpup locker room was largely silent. No sounds of showers to wash away the game’s sweat. No rattling and banging of metal locker doors. No boom boxes with post-game celebration music.

The only sounds were the muffled cries of a coach and his players as they sougbt comfort on each others shoulders.

“I lost my father, my coach, my mentor and, most importantly, my best friend,” Criss Davis said after Monday’s game. “My dad would call me around midnight after each game to talk about the game. If he and I didn’t talk by phone at least six times a week, mostly at midnight, it wouldn’t be a complete week for me.”

Davis said he changed his mind about attending Monday’s game after talking to Les’ wife, Mary Davis, as well as his own assistant coach, Bret Persinger. They all agreed that Les Davis would have wanted Criss to lead that team in that ever-pivotal first game of the sub-state tournament.

Criss Davis was in Sedan most of Monday but returned to his rural Caney house early Monday evening to grab his tie and sport coat and walked into the gymnasium with about four minutes before tipoff. It was the first time he had seen his players since they learned of the news of Les Davis’ death.

“I fell apart,” Criss said of walking into the locker room before the game. “And, walking into our gymnasium to coach a game undoubtedly was the most difficult thing I have ever done. I did it because of those 12 guys on this team. My dad always taught me to never give up on a team. And, I came back to coach because of those 12 guys.”

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Les Davis’ achievement in sports is widely chronicled and preserved in halls of fame across Kansas. But, Criss Davis said those halls do not tell the story of Les’ greatest gift: teaching about life to his players.

“Few people ever knew that my dad would go to the Sedan nursing home every Monday morning to visit the residents,” he said. “He didn’t have to do that. He had no family there. He did it because he felt it was the right thing to do and knew it would bring joy to others. And, that’s the type of thing he instilled to many of his players.”

Former Sedan and Caney Valley players have flooded Facebook and other internet sites this week with tales about Les. Players talk not of championship games or league banners but of the human approach Les Davis brought to the world.

One player talked about an inspirational poem that Les clipped out and gave to him years ago. That poem still sits — perfectly folded and resting in that former player’s wallet.
One player mentions how he was only 5-foot-3 and 105 pounds as a freshman but was recruited by Davis to join the football team not because of his size but because Davis thought the player could use a tall dose of confidence. Today, that player runs a corporation in Wichita.

Another player talks about enduring the wrath of Les’ legendary halftime rants, only to have that coach gave that player a quiet arm around the shoulder after the game.

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It almost seems appropriate that Les Davis’ last basketball game was between Sedan and Caney Valley. For decades, those two schools had a rivalry that was among the most intense in Kansas. Les helped fuel that rivalry . . . just as did more than a half dozen Caney Valley coaches who went head to head against the Legend.

Some 10 years ago, the Topeka Capital-Journal wrote a feature story about the top 10 high school rivalries in Kansas. The Sedan-Caney Valley battle — those yearly battles were known as the Ol’ Gray Mare games — was on that list.     Les Davis once was feared in Caney due to that rivalry.

But, times changed. Tempers cooled. And, the once-fiery rivalry cooled to a dim glow. And what once was a wall that kept the towns from enjoying each other’s company became a pipeline that linked two towns’ love for schools and sports. The Davis men helped change the perceptions of the two towns. So, too, did Bret Persinger, a Caney Valley assistant football and basketball coach who grew up in Sedan and was fortunate to be a player for the elder Davis at Sedan High School.

Bret said he respected Les Davis so much that he still referred to him as “Mr. Davis” or simply as “Coach.”

“Only in the past few weeks did I ever refer to him as ‘Les’,” said Bret.

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For Criss Davis, his greatest accomplishment as a coach was having his father by his side as an assistant football coach in 2009 and 2010. And, seeing his dad in the local basketball bleachers made Criss fully aware that a midnight telephone call would come — with a wiser voice on the other end asking if the team was still practicing free throws at every practice.

“It has been a joy — an absolute joy — to have my dad here for the past several years,” Criss said. “And, if I can only be half the man he was, I will think my life is a success.”