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Little Vikings

By Tom Carothers

Special to AmericanYouthFootball.com

 What began as a promise to a son four years ago is turning into quite a success story for the southern Minnesota town of Hayfield.

 “It all began with a promise I made to my son Dylan that we would have youth football,” Little Vikings coach Dean Bungum said. “In his first year of youth football, he had to go to Kasson-Mantorville (16 miles away) because we did not have any youth football in Hayfield.”

 In just five years, the town of Hayfield has gone from not even fielding a youth football team to boasting an undefeated team — the 8-0 Hayfield Little Vikings. 

Hayfield, as the name suggests, is not a large town, but this rural burg of 1,300 people are a proud grouping of people.  

And just as many similar towns do, a great amount of identity is derived from the local football team — in that respect, Hayfield had suffered. 

“The varsity program here has had maybe two winning seasons in 10 years,” Bungum said. “When people saw the fruits that could come from having a youth football program, many were interested in supporting it.” 

In that vein, the Hayfield/Brownsdale Youth Football Association was formed in 2002. One thing that was clear from the get-go was that there was a definite yearning among the children of Hayfield for pigskin.

 “We had 75 kids come out, which was odd because we had been told there wasn’t any interest in football,” Bungum said. “What happened was that just about every kid in fifth and sixth grade came out — these kids were hungry for some football.” 

Of course, the clothing and equipping of 75 growing children doesn’t exactly come cheap. It cost $110 per child to get them ready for the gridiron — to that end, Bungum and the newly-formed football association fanned out to local businesses for support.  

They were pleased with the results.

 “Local business will always do something for youth, and this became truly a community effort,” Bungum said. “We went to all the major players in the Hayfield/Brownsdale area to see if they were interested in becoming charter members of the association for $500 apiece. 

“They were all very willing.”

 So, with the funds secured, football kicked off in Hayfield. Just one thing — the Southern Minnesota Youth Football League, of which the Hayfield/Brownsdale teams were to play in, had already started its season. Yet, it may have turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

 “We just played each other that first year,” said Bungum, who was also getting his first crack at coaching a football team. “We learned as we went, picked out football strategies from books and the internet and put things together by trial and error, basically.”

 The experience paid off as Hayfield joined the SMYFL for the 2003 season. Bungum’s sixth-grade team started off slow, but improved drastically throughout the season — so much so, that they played in the championship game, where they lost to a team from Le Centre.

 As word spread about Hayfield’s success as well as the “Little” Vikings having an opportunity to play on the same field as the “Big” Vikings, as they did in a mid-season game against the same Le Centre squad, more and more towns wanted to be part of the SMYFL.

“Suddenly, we went from six to 12 teams in the league with all these teams joining,” Bungum said.

 The Little Vikings finished third in the league in 2004 — the last year of a single-division SMYFL. Four more teams joined the league for the 2005 campaign, necessitating a move to a two, eight-team division format.

 “People really like the structure of it,” Bungum said. “Everyone in the league plays by the same rules and codes of conduct for the players, coaches and parents.

 “People see it as a good thing to be a part of.”

 Yet, while the 2005 season consisted of teams from Hayfield, Le Center, Cannon Falls, Blooming Prairie, Kenyon-Wanamingo, Pine Island, Randolph, St. Clair, Glenville-Emmons, Madelia, Alden-Conger, Waterville-Elysian-Morristown, Janesville-Waldorf-Pemberton as well as a trio of squads from Waseca, it all came down to the Little Vikings.

 Bungum’s team caught lightning in a bottle and dominated the SMYFL, rolling to a perfect eight-win season on the strength of a stifling defense that did not allow a single point until Kenyon-Wanamingo managed a touchdown just before halftime in the league semifinals.

 “It was the first year  of having a team where players had been in the program for three years and it showed on the field,” Bungum said. “Everyone was out there playing unselfishly and as a team.

 “There are no prima donnas, everyone works together.”

 The Little Vikings etched their name into SMYFL lore with a 19-0 victory against Waterville in the league title game played in the dome.

 “My other son Adam quarterbacked the team, and that was very special,” Bungum said. “Dylan is now in eighth grade.”

 Whether Dylan or Adam plays on a future Hayfield team that does have a winning season or better remains to be seen. However, the chances are growing because of the efforts of the HBYFA and the SMYFL.

 “I think we’re going to continue to grow and get better,” Bungum said.

 To that note, the SMYFL is looking at adding up to four more teams for 2006 and has requested to join American Youth Football in hopes of a Hayfield or Le Center or Waseca team playing on a national level.

 “We’re looking at not only what there is for us to get out of it, but also what we can put into it,” Bungum said. “But it would be pretty cool to be able to go forward, get to the next level and be a part of something like a national championship game.”

 Quite a ways from the days when the only football youth were playing in Hayfield was on a video screen.

 Story courtesy Red Line Editorial, Inc.