Drake U football is in a “sweet spot”
My Iowa small-college football tour continues, at not-so-small Drake University. Honestly, the bigger & costlier that Big Time college football gets, the better the Bulldogs’ program looks & feels.
The 110-member Drake Bulldogs football squad singing “Here’s To The One Who Wears the ‘D’” after their 27-17 victory Saturday, Oct. 12, over Butler University of Indianapolis.
DES MOINES, Iowa – What were the two best moments of the Drake University Bulldogs’ 27-17 victory over the visiting Butler University Bulldogs this past Saturday?
Well, let’s see. It was Drake’s 14th consecutive win in the Pioneer Football League, in which the Bulldogs are defending champions. They’re 4-1 this season and gave Butler its first loss. Quarterback Luke Bailey passed for more than 100 yards for an eighth straight game, going back to the 2023 season. Running back Taj Hughes had a break-out day as a receiver, with 127 yards and a touchdown on his receptions. Linebackers Sean Allison and Sebastian Adamski had 12 and 11 tackles to lead the defense.
But neither of the best moments occurred during the game.
The first of those special moments was just after 10:30 a.m. Saturday morning, when the Drake players, some of the players’ parents, the coaches and a few football alumni gathered around the statue of “Spike the Bulldog” just outside the southwest corner of historic Drake stadium. It’s a tradition of 15 years or more.
“We actually start every team meeting with an ‘appreciation time,’ or some of the players call it ‘mix it up,’ and what we do on Saturday mornings before home games is an extension of that,” said Todd Stepsis, now in his sixth year as Drake head coach after serving five previous years as defensive coordinator. “Everybody knows that 2 ½ hours before kick-off, we’ll be gathering around the Bulldog statue. It’s a time for anybody to point out somebody you appreciate, give them a shout-out, a thank you, maybe a high five or hug.
Drake University’s head football coach Todd Stepsis. (Drake University photo)
“It seems like when I speak there, I say about the same thing all the time, but I mean it. I thank the players for all they put into our program. I thank the other coaches, our wives and all of our families for their support, I thank the players’ parents for raising such good boys and trusting them to us for their college years. I tell the alumni that our guys today play for each other, but we play for them, too, and for our fans.”
Ironically, in his post-game video “presser” after Saturday’s victory, the 47-year-old Stepsis reflected on that morning’s “appreciation time.”
“This morning, when the players and coaches left breakfast at Hubbell Hall and were walking down to the Bulldog statue, I glanced back over my shoulder and saw all the players there talking together, flanked on both sides by the other coaches,” he told the media.
“Maybe it’s because I’m getting older, or maybe because my own kids are getting older, but I looked at all those guys and the word that came to mind was ‘gratitude.’ While we were walking there, and when we were around that statue, it just hit me, ‘Wow, this is a whole group of people who’d do anything for each other.’ That’s a really good feeling.”
The other best moment of Drake’s victory over Butler came immediately after the game.
That’s when the whole team, and coaches, too, gather on the west side of the field, in front of the marching band when it’s there, and they all sing the “Drake D Song,” which goes:
Here’s to the one who wears the “D”
Makes a good fight for Varsity
Here’s to those who've fought and won
Makes a good fight as a true Drake alum
Here's to the one who’s brave and bold
Ready to battle like days of old
Fights like a Bulldog for victory
Oh, here's to the one who wears the “D”!
Do the coaches sing it, too?
“Oh yeah!” Stepsis said. “We all know it.
“In our pre-season training camp, we probably sing the ‘D Song’ 30 times or more, making sure everybody knows it,” he continued. “Our veteran players almost get tired of practicing it, but they know they’ve got to help the young guys learn it. We got started on that several years ago when we were having off-season workouts in the Knapp Center (where Drake plays basketball), and they had the fight song words on banners hanging up in the rafters. That helped everybody get started learning it.”
When the singing ended after Saturday’s game, most of the parents, other Drake students and a whole lot of the fans – a few thousand for most home games – go mingle with the players on the field. The most common thing you hear from the Drake players then? “Thanks for coming to watch us.”
A lot of Drake’s football players are really big people, like 6 ft. 6 in., 387-pound offensive lineman Russ Palmer, of Waukee. Some of their dads are really big people, too.
If you follow college football closely, you might know that Drake plays NCAA Division IAA non-scholarship football. They’re classed in the “Football Championship Series,” which means if they do well enough, they can be in playoff games at the end of the regular season, and that’s how the “FCS” national championship is determined. The University of Northern Iowa Panthers also play in NCAA Division IAA, but at a higher level that allows football scholarships.
The Iowa State University Cyclones and University of Iowa Hawkeyes play NCAA Division I scholarship football, which is using a newly-expanded College Football Playoff system to determine their national championship. That’s the Big Time in college football.
In Iowa, we also have about 25 teams playing at our smaller private colleges and universities – some offering football scholarships and some not -- and another dozen teams are playing for our public community colleges.
So there’s lots of college football here.
When you walk into historic Drake Stadium — which of course is also the home of the iconic Drake Relays — there is lots of history to savor.
Drake has tried playing it at almost every level in its 131 years in the sport.
The Bulldogs Coach Stepsis said his wife Angie “says we’ve found ‘the sweet spot’ in college football now, and I think she’s right.
“We play a national schedule, we offer a Division I experience with good hotels, good post-game meals, charter flights when we’re playing at a distance. But there’s a 100 percent different in the way we emphasize that our football is just part of the educational experience, and we’re hanging our hat on that. Our focus is on giving our players experiences they’ll never forget, experiences that will broaden their hearts, minds and spirits, experiences that will help our guys be better husbands, fathers and career people down the road.”
The more I’m around it, the better I like it.
Enjoy a look around Drake on a football Saturday in the photos and captions that follow here.
Drake vs. Butler, with Drake in blue. The other schools in the Pioneer Football League, which stretches coast-to-coast, are the University of Dayton in Ohio, Valparaiso University in Indiana, Davidson College in North Carolina, Marist College in New York, Morehead State University in Kentucky, Stetson University in Florida, St. Thomas University in Minnesota, the University of San Diego, and — this next one hosts Drake in football Oct. 19 — Presbyterian College in Clinton, South Carolina. Drake officials say travel costs for the football team are off-set by the payments the Bulldogs receive for playing larger schools in their non-conference games.
The Drake cheerleaders salute scores by running with the Drake flags on the “Blue Oval.”
A first-class electronic scoreboard and videoboard at Drake Stadium.
Post-game picture-taking time for the family and friends of Drake defensive end Finn Claypool, (at right) a junior who in 2023 was named Pioneer Football League defensive player of the year. Claypool played high school football at Des Moines Roosevelt and a final year at Dowling Catholic in West Des Moines when Roosevelt canceled a season due to COVID.
Starting a quick look around the Drake campus, here is Drake Stadium (to the left) and Drake Fieldhouse on Forest Avenue, about a mile northwest of downtown Des Moines.
J.J. Tesfay, 12, rides “Spike the Bulldog” at the southwest corner of Drake Stadium.
You know you’re in a historic football stadium when it has a room designated like this one in the tunnel surrounding Drake Stadium.
A look north to the Knapp Center, where Drake plays basketball.
Drake’s Old Main, from the backside.
Every campus ought to have a “promenade,” and Drake named the one it has after two of its most well-known graduates and supporters. Robert D. Ray, as most know, was the governor of Iowa, mayor of Des Moines, president of Drake and more in his long life of service to our state.
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