{"id":2447947,"date":"2019-08-24T20:16:01","date_gmt":"2019-08-25T02:16:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/glenwoods-luke-gair-walks-on-with-missouri-football\/"},"modified":"2019-08-24T20:16:01","modified_gmt":"2019-08-25T02:16:01","slug":"glenwoods-luke-gair-walks-on-with-missouri-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/glenwoods-luke-gair-walks-on-with-missouri-football\/","title":{"rendered":"Glenwood\u2019s Luke Gair walks on with Missouri football"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Glenwood Springs Demon Luke Gair escapes a tackle and runs the ball down the field during Friday night’s game against the Steamboat Springs Sailors at Stubler Memorial Field.<\/strong>
Chelsea Self \/ Post Independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Luke Gair knew where he wanted to go for college and what he wanted to do in college dating back to his early childhood.<\/p>\n

Gair dreamed of not only studying at the University of Missouri, but also playing for the football program.<\/p>\n

Coming out of tiny Glenwood Springs, the odds were stacked against Gair getting a spot on the Tigers\u2019 football team in the tough Southeastern Conference, but on Aug. 19, Gair\u2019s dream came true as the Tigers awarded him a roster spot, a helmet, and a locker with plans on using him on the scout team offense and defense with a chance to crack the gameday roster on special teams.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, it\u2019s a dream come true,\u201d Gair, who is studying industrial engineering at Mizzou, said during a phone interview from his dorm room in Columbia, Missouri. \u201cWhen they gave me my helmet and locker, it really didn\u2019t feel like I was there; it was all surreal. Everything I\u2019ve ever wanted was being placed in my hands, and I\u2019m so excited to be part of this great program.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two years ago, Missouri offered Gair a preferred walk-on spot in the recruiting process, but last season \u2014 Gair\u2019s senior year at Glenwood \u2014 the Tigers gave the preferred walk-on spot to another player, leaving Gair in limbo. The senior, who rushed for 1,576 yards and 22 touchdowns in three years at Glenwood while adding 40 receptions for 598 yards and two touchdowns, garnered some attention from smaller Division II schools like the University of Northern Colorado, but Gair remained steadfast in his desire to play for the SEC program, even if they didn\u2019t seem to show much interest until late in the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d been communicating with them here and there, but I didn\u2019t really know if I was going to play football for them,\u201d Gair said. \u201cIn the back of my mind, I made the decision to come to Missouri for the education, but it really ate at me that I wasn\u2019t playing football this fall until they called me Monday and asked if I was interested in coming out for the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut once I got that call and got a chance, there was just a lot of satisfaction that I felt,\u201d Gair added. \u201cI realized that all the hard work was towards something, and that it\u2019s actually possible to make it coming from a small-town school like Glenwood. That\u2019s a big lesson in life for me, knowing that if you have the will and the determination, things will work out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Once Gair got word he\u2019d earned a spot on the Tigers\u2019 team, he fired off a quick text message to his father, Todd, with a picture of his Missouri helmet and locker.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a really cool moment,\u201d Todd Gair said. \u201cWe weren\u2019t expecting him to get a chance so quickly; it was just a great moment to get that text from Luke. He was kind of up in the air about not being a preferred walk-on with them and all the work being worth it without getting a real chance, but once they gave him his helmet and told him what the plan was, he was all in.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gair\u2019s point of contact at Mizzou over the years has been former CU star safety Ryan Walters, now the Tigers\u2019 secondary coach under head coach Barry Odom. Former Glenwood Springs head coach Rocky Whitworth has a long-standing relationship with Walters, so the connection was there from the coach\u2019s side, as well as the family side.<\/p>\n

\u201cMissouri was our home, but we moved here to Colorado when Luke was 3,\u201d Todd Gair said. \u201cHis mom and a number of aunts graduated from Mizzou, so he\u2019s always wanted to go there and wanted to play football there. We\u2019re really happy for him and proud of him. He set his mind to achieve this and worked hard over the years, so it\u2019s great to see him get rewarded.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gair won\u2019t travel with the Tigers for the first year, unless he makes the gameday roster as a special teams player in his first year. However, Gair will dress for home games and will get to run out of the tunnel with the Tigers on Faurot Field at Memorial Stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really looking forward to that moment,\u201d Gair said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to put it into words, honestly.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tigers open on the road Saturday, Aug. 31, at Wyoming before opening up at home on Saturday, Sept. 7, against West Virginia.<\/p>\n

jcarney@postindependent.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Glenwood Springs Demon Luke Gair escapes a tackle and runs the ball down the field during Friday night’s game against the Steamboat Springs Sailors at Stubler Memorial Field.Chelsea Self \/ Post Independent Luke Gair knew where he wanted to go for college and what he wanted to do in college dating back to his early […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2447947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-25 16:20:43","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2447947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2447947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2447947\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2447947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2447947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2447947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}