Muddy River Showcase: Caring for kids comes natural for Highland’s Goings

The inaugural Muddy River Showcase is taking place June 18 at John Wood Community College’s Student Activity Center. The Illinois vs. Missouri format for senior prep basketball players will feature a girls game at 3 p.m. with the boys game to follow at 5 p.m. Admission is $10 at the door and all seating is general admission.

EWING, Mo. — The next chapter in Summer Goings’ life links back to the first.

“My whole life, from when I could remember, I loved playing with baby dolls and I would treat my baby dolls like they were actual children,” Goings said. “As I started getting older, my aunt started having younger kids and they would let me babysit.

“My aunt actually has twins, and they’re a handful. But I’m like the only one who can watch all three kids and not go crazy.”

So the recent graduate of Highland High School, who will be participating in the inaugural Muddy River Showcase on June 18, found her calling without having to search for it.

She plans to take care of kids for a living.

“Hopefully within a year or two, my grandma and I want to get land and build or buy an already-built building and start a daycare,” said Goings, who is going to take online courses through Moberly Area Community College to get her director’s license.

Goings even got a jumpstart while attending Highland, working with a first-grade class through a cadet teaching program.

“That showed me even more I want to work with kids,” she said.

Being able to show kids how persistence and perseverance pay off will benefit them, too. 

Goings helped the Cougars go 14-13 in Ashton Jaco’s first season as head coach while winning four consecutive Clarence Cannon Conference games in late January and early February. It was the Cougars’ first winning season in three years.

“As I’ve gotten older, the teammates and the coaches I have had provided a spark,” Goings said. “This year was the best chemistry I think we’ve had. So that was fun. It was exciting to play on a team that was really close and was a family.”

The opportunity to represent Highland in the Showcase, which will feature boys and girls games pitting seniors from Illinois and Missouri against each other, is important to Goings, too.

“Since we’ve been in high school, it’s always been about the boys and they earned it. They had a great football season and success in all sports,” Goings said. “So this is exciting to represent the girls team and the accomplishments we made. This year, everyone thought we weren’t going to have a good season. No one had faith in us, but we ended up doing well.

“So it’s exciting to show all the hard work that we put in pays off.”

Plus, she gets to carry on a family tradition.

Her uncle, Michael Rich, represented North Shelby in the McDonald’s/Herald-Whig Classic in the 1980s. Goings remembers going to past events and seeing her uncle’s name in the game program.

“It’s kind of cool my name will be in it, too,” Goings said.