Apollo Conference of Illinois

The final edition of the Apollo Football Conference in its current eight team format includes the four 217 Football teams in Charleston, Effingham, Mt. Zion, and Paris and four 618 Football teams in Newton, Olney-East Richland, Robinson, and Salem. Olney, Robinson, and Newton will leave the Apollo to join the LIC in a new two division conference next season leaving only Salem as the lone 618 Area Code holdout in the conference.

Plenty of Experience Returns

Believe it or not the Apollo Conference returns 16 all conference selections from 2010, including one player who made the team as a sophomore. The team with the most returning is the Mt. Zion Braves with four lineman. The Braves have two All Apollo Offensive line selections in Luke Miller (2nd team) and Mason Clark (1st team) and two all defensive lineman in Grant Naylor (1st team) and Brock Lemmon (2nd team). Charleston returns three in Chris Creek (1st team as LB), L.J. Welsh (1st team as RB) and Aaron Bence (2nd team as WR). Newton returns one player in A.J. Hyatt as first team running back and Salem did not have a returning all conference selection. The other four member schools return two all-conference selections per squad including first team selections Bill Knust from Robinson (LB), Effingham's Nate Boggs (DL) and Grant Johnson (first team selection as both RB and DB). Second team selections include Scott Lawrence (RB) and Stewart Arp from Paris (RB as a sophomore), Joel Eagleson (WR) and Brook Pampe (DB) from East Richland and Ryder Brannon from Robinson (RB).