DOUG HUFF

WHEELING — One of West Virginia’s most prolific sportswriters received some national recognition on Thursday when longtime Intelligencer sportswriter and editor Doug Huff was named to MaxPreps’ top 25 list of the most influential people in high school football history.

For his efforts in creating the first national high school football record book, Huff was listed as No. 8 on the top 25 list.

Huff is in illustrious company– the MaxPreps list also included, to mention only a few of the names, 26th U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, early football pioneers Pop Warner and Walter Camp, star players Jim Thorpe and Red Grange, lawyer Thurgood Marshall, Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne, and on and on.

Huff is listed right above Eddie Cochems, widely regarded as the first coach to utilize the forward pass.

“I was really stunned,” Huff said. “I mean, I had no idea that I would be on such a list with some of these other people. I said, ‘holy cow’ when I started seeing who was included and the people there on that same list that I was on.

“I mean, I know what my role was in keeping stats and doing the record books and all that stuff, but I never really considered that as a major influential part of high school football history. It is history and it’s a recording of history, but you know, when you see the other people on there, like the President of the United States, Teddy Roosevelt, other famous coaches and people that really promoted the sport and were really foundational type people, that sort of leaves you wondering, why are you doing this? All you did was compile all the records.”

Nevertheless, Huff was proud of his contributions to the high school football scene on the national level. His football and basketball record books were published in Letterman magazine and then by the National Federation of High Schools.

“Maybe they looked at it from a standpoint that what I did was national, you know, and people across the country use my compilations as a guide or as a resource for records that were happening locally. That’s just very satisfying knowing that something like that is being recognized and it all started here in the Ohio Valley and just sort of mushrooms from there.”

Huff’s infatuation with records and sports history started when he was attending Magnolia High School in New Martinsville.

“I kept [Magnolia’s] records and statistics and I was really curious when I’d see something happen elsewhere,” Huff said. “I’d say– ‘I wonder how that compares to a record.’

“One of my friends in high school scored 51 points in a basketball game– nobody knew if it was even a school record at the time, you know, so I did my due diligence and checked the papers and all the score books and all that, and I said, yeah, it broke this record. So that’s just how it mushroomed because one thing led to another.”

Huff wrote for The Intelligencer for 44 years, being an associate sports editor for 12 of those years and a sports editor for 20. During that time, he also produced national rankings and All-American football teams with Street & Smith’s Magazine and later Student Sports and ESPN.

“I was in the Dallas airport once, and I always made it a habit to go to the newsstand when I was waiting in an airport to pick up the local papers and read the sports sections and stuff,” Huff said. “I’m there getting my newspaper in the Dallas Airport. And a fellow next to me was thumbing through a Street & Smith’s. He is looking through the high school section there, I can see what he was reading. Out of nowhere he said, ‘Can you believe all these high school players are 300 pounds and more now?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I can believe it. I wrote the article.’ And the guy’s face was just in shock, and I had to leave and I didn’t have any more conversation with him. I always remembered that because it was so spontaneous. The extent of where these magazines were– Street & Smiths was in every state in the Union, even went overseas. I got letters from people who read Street & Smith’s from England, Spain, Japan.”

Huff, 82, also ran the West Virginia Sports Writer’s Association for 40 years,

“It’s been a fun ride, I’ll tell you,” Huff said. Yeah. “But to see your name as number eight on a list that leads off with a president of the United States? I’m thinking wait, wait a second, what the heck did I do to deserve this? I mean, look at all these people, they started all this stuff and, you know, I guess I started national records, I guess they feel that’s important too.”

“I am really humbled by it and stunned by the recognition,” Huff said. “But, you know, I’m definitely proud of it and I’m glad that people, you know, you’re glad to see your work being recognized and everything, but to be number eight on this list was pretty special to me.”

MaxPreps is a leading online platform for scores, schedules, stats, rankings, and news from American high school sports.