JWCC Prairie State Profile: Muegge ready to help Unity-Payson pancake opponents

MENDON, Ill. — Spend enough time exploring YouTube, TikTok or any other video streaming service and you are bound to run across an entrance or hype video featuring an offensive lineman devouring something.

With that in mind, Brady Muegge knew he needed to be different.

Biting the cap off a bottle of syrup accomplished that.

A starting offensive and defensive lineman for the Unity-Payson football team, Muegge gained some quick notoriety during the filming and subsequent airing of the Mustangs’ hype video when he appeared on screen with a plate of pancakes. He proceeded to bite the cap of the syrup bottle, spit it to the side and pour syrup over that stack of flapjacks.

“I only ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for my last video,” said Muegge, a junior. “So you have to one-up that. Coach told us we were doing the intro videos and I thought, ‘I better get to cooking.’”

Muegge made his own pancakes for the shoot.

“I fired up the skillet,” he said.

He stacked five pancakes on his plate.

“They were pretty decent size,” Muegge said. “They were pretty good.”

He realized while they were recording the short video in front of a green screen others were taking pictures and videoing the shoot as well.

“I couldn’t screw it up. I only had one take because I didn’t have that much syrup,” Muegge said. “But it was pretty cool. Whenever you pancake a guy in games, it feels like you live up to it.”

Muegge discussed the pancake video, the Mustangs’ season-opening 48-6 victory over North Greene and growing up on an Adams County farm with Muddy River Sports Editor Matt Schuckman for this week’s Prairie State Profile, brought to you by John Wood Community College:

Q: Was it your idea to do the pancakes for the intro video?

A: You’ve seen it around on the internet and stuff like that. I thought I’d throw my own spin on it and bite the cap off and dump the syrup on the pancakes. It had to be my own spin on it.

Q: Did you expect people to react to it the way they have?

A: I thought they’d love it. It’s something different. It’s something pretty entertaining. It puts on a little show for everybody, something to go out there and look for. You get there to the game and you’re waiting for it to start. They start introducing the guys and you see that up there and you go, “Oh, boy, this is going to be great. This is going to be awesome.”

Q: How cool is it for the team to have such a great intro video?

A: It adds another level to the game experience. It’s not just going out there and playing. You get a little bit of show to it. It’s fun for everyone. Everyone has a great time doing it. I really appreciated everything (Brian Shoemaker) has done with it. It’s really awesome. It’s great how he’s been going around to all the WIVC teams.

Q: You mentioned making your own pancakes. So do you like to cook?

A: Oh, yeah. I’ll cook whenever I’m hungry.

Q: Do you have a favorite dish to make?

A: I like making chicken. I don’t know if I’d say it’s fun to make, but it’s pretty nice to make. Mac ‘n cheese is pretty good, pretty simple. It’s easy. Spaghetti every once in a while. There’s all sorts of things.

Q: What else do you like to do aside from football?

A: Most of the time, I’m either helping my dad when we’re working or showing cows. Showing cows is fun. I got some pretty good ones coming up this year. So hopefully we will do better that we have in the past.

Q: Does that mean you’re involved with FFA?

A: I love FFA. I think it’s a great thing in the rural areas to get involved in.

Q: You mentioned helping your dad. Does that mean helping him on the farm?

A: Baling hay, getting cows back in whenever they’re getting places they’re not supposed to be, putting up fences. We’ve been doing a lot of that.

Q: How much have you learned from growing up on a farm?

A: I think it’s a good opportunity because Dad will put responsibilities on me that I have to take care of. Taking care of the cows, for example, you have to do it. There’s stuff you just have to do and take care of. You just do it and learn responsibility from it.

Q: What’s it like heading into Week 2 sitting at 1-0?

A: It feels pretty nice. We’ve been working pretty hard. It’s a pretty quick turnaround. We’ll have to make the best with what we have.

Q: How do you make the adjustment to playing on a Thursday night?

A: First, we have to adjust to the different offense we’re going against. With Calhoun, we have to figure out what their whole scheme is and plan around it. We have to use our time pretty wisely and make sure we’re getting things done when we’re in practice.

Q: Having played last Saturday and knowing you have a short week, what was it like getting up last Sunday morning?

A: I’d say I was pretty ready to keep going. It felt like a pretty short game, so I was ready to get back at it as soon as possible. I’m kind of glad we ended up having a Thursday game so we can get back at it, get back into the swing of things.

Q: What did you like about the way your team played?

A: I liked how we were able to come together. Everyone worked together. We all really felt very connected after that game. We all felt we have the chance to have a pretty good season. We think we’re going to do a lot better. If anyone is nervous, that pushes that away. We got something to look forward to and expect.