Every Saturday Missouri plays a home football game, from a few hours prior to kickoff until well after the game is over, a large motorcoach sits near the base of the bridge that crosses Providence Road to the Faurot Field parking lot. Like many other vehicles on fall Saturdays in Columbia, it is decorated bumper to bumper in black and gold. Unlike most of the vehicles carrying fans to Faurot, its point of origin is well outside the borders of the Show-Me State.

This motorcoach belongs to Keith and Rondi McGovern, residents of Fargo, North Dakota and proud parents of Missouri offensive lineman Connor McGovern.

"They're very proud of me and like to come down to games," Connor said. "I have family in St. Louis and Kansas City and they come down to the games. There's a lot of family that didn't get to watch me in high school that come down."

But asked about his weekend itinerary from Fargo to Columbia, Keith makes a confession.


"We cheat," he said. "We leave the motor coach at the airport and we fly down in a private airplane."


The McGoverns leave the "Mizzou'd out" (Connor's description) ride at the airport and pick it up on Saturday morning when they get to town. They drive a few miles to Faurot and set up shop.

"His three sets of grandparents all come to the games, and now we have become friends with the parents of his friends," Keith McGovern said. "The Berkstressers, Corbin's parents, Brad McNulty's parents, now Evan's (Boehm) parents. After the game I always run out to the motorcoach and fire up the grill and put a meal on. Connor and whatever guys want to stop by, he brings buddies over. There's usually like five of them come over and we feed them because they're hungry after the games."


One of the centerpiece items on the menu? Potatoes. Keith is a potato farmer in Fargo. His father-in-law, Ron Offutt, was a potato farmer.

"We got out of college, we came up here and we didn't plan on it," Keith said. "I originally was going to be a pilot. I would fly for the company. When I wasn't flying I was on the farm."



From there, he made the transition to full-time farmer. McGovern's farm now provides potatoes to processing plants in North Dakota and Minnesota. Those plants in turn provide many of the potatoes used by McDonald's for french fries west of the Mississippi River.


"We've been trying to ride Connor about it and trying to drop hints to Connor about it, but I don't think from North Dakota he's not really picking that up," starting center Evan Boehm said. "It's starting to upset us a little bit. He thinks we're making fun of him, but we're trying to drop a hint that, hey, we want some fries. We want some McDonald's fries.

"God love him, Connoor's a great guy and great competitor. The friendship could get better with him supplying us some McDonald's fries. But that's fine."


Keith receives that news with a laugh. "That's a little beyond my control. I can bring them french fries and tater tots and all that stuff."

Fall is a busy time for farmers. It isn't the easiest thing to get away for seven to nine weekends in the fall (the McGoverns went to the SEC Championship Game and the Cotton Bowl last year in addition to Missouri's seven home contests).

"Fall's a really busy time," Keith said. "But all the guys on the farm think it's fantastic that's Connor's playing down there and they get to watch him on TV."


So the staff picks up the slack and Keith and Rondi hit the road for Columbia. It's not the normal destination for the small number of Division One players the state of North Dakota turns out. But the McGoverns targeted Missouri early on. Keith's brother went to law school at Mizzou in the mid-eighties and, as mentioned, there is family in both of the state's major cities.

"At the end of his freshman year he had a really good coach all through high school, Steve Locklay told me at the awards banquet that we need to spend the time because he could be a Division One football player. When I heard that we got serious and started sending him to camps.

He went to camps at North Dakota and North Dakota State. The other one? Missouri. He attended for three years, beginning the summer after his freshman year in high school. The Missouri coaches took notice and wondered if this mammoth lineman from North Dakota's Shanley High School could match up with the players from more traditional high school programs. After his junior year, Missouri's coaches matched him up against some of those players at camp and came away impressed with how McGovern held up. They offered him a scholarship in August of 2010.

"I committed on the spot," McGovern told PowerMizzou.com back then.

And so it is that a family motorcoach that used to be used to haul the McGovern brothers (Blake will be a freshman student at TCU this fall) and their motorcycles to motocross competitions until "Connor got a little too big for motocross" is now decked out in black and gold waiting for a plane to arrive from Fargo on seven Saturdays this fall.

McGovern started all 14 games at right guard during the Tigers' magical 2013 run. "Unbelievable. Just amazing," his dad says. He is entrenched as a starter this year, tentatively set to take over the job at right tackle. He missed the first couple of weeks of fall camp with an injury (McGovern said it was due to attempting to lift 495 pounds, Boehm says it was closer to 335--"Connor lies a lot") but is now back in action ready to help defend Mizzou's SEC East Championship. The family will once again be there for as many games as they can along the way, including the home opener against South Dakota State on August 30th. Boehm's order of McDonald's fries will have to wait. But the post-game meal after the opener may have something special from the McGovern clan.

"They are gonna get one of the steers from the Missouri State Fair," Keith said. "I guess it's an old tradition that the grand champion, the 2nd place one, one would always get bought and donated. One of my friend's daughters shows them and she got 2nd place this year. We went in with other people and bought it and we are donating it to the football program."

So the Missouri offensive line will eat well this year. The menu after the opener, well, that's obvious since the chef is a potato farmer from Fargo. Keith says he's serving meat and potatoes.

2014Promo from PowerMizzou on Vimeo.