Sport Football Meetings total 38 | Next meeting November 12, 2016 All-time series Northwest leads, 27–11 | |
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First meeting September 19, 1981
Missouri Western 20, Northwest 8 Latest meeting November 1, 2014
Northwest Missouri 40, Missouri Western 3 | ||
The Missouri Western–Northwest Missouri State football rivalry between the Missouri Western Griffons football team and Northwest Missouri State Bearcats football team is between two Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association NCAA Division II rivals that are less than 50 miles apart.
The schools off the field are constantly competing for state funds in the same market ever since Missouri Western expanded from a junior college to a four-year college in 1969 fulfilling a Missouri governor Warren Hearnes campaign promise to build the school St. Joseph, Missouri (2000 population 73,912). At the time Northwest at Maryville (2000 population 10,581) founded in 1905 was the sole four-year state college in northwest Missouri.
In 1988 the state under John Ashcroft recommended that Northwest be closed altogether.
In the wake of the ultimately abandoned proposal both schools have considerably ramped up their football programs with Northwest appearing in seven NCAA Division II National Football Championships (winning three) while Missouri Western has lured the Kansas City Chiefs to the campus for its summer training camp starting in 2010.
The rivalry on the field is a big draw. The biggest crowds at Spratt Stadium are 10,129 in 2009 and 9,007 in 2007. A crowd of 9,346 attended the September 13, 2008 game—the second biggest at Northwest's Bearcat Stadium. The 2010 game was attended by 10,805 the biggest in the stadium history.