Moments after slipping out of the car, I could smell the intermingled odors of the hamburgers and sausages cooking on the open grills inside Laws Field.

It was about an hour before Eudora HighâÂÂs Class 4A football playoff game against Kansas City Piper, and I was relieved by the smell because I had lured my wife to the game by touting the sausages.

Yes, sausages. IâÂÂm sure the hamburgers are delicious, but, oh, those yummy sausages. Now you can ask my wife, too. SheâÂÂs a believer.

Eudora HighâÂÂs booster club is provincially famous for grilling the succulent sausages before and during Cardinalsâ home games. To tell the truth, the club could charge $3 apiece and I would have gladly paid, but you can buy two for that price, making EudoraâÂÂs sausages one of the greatest bargains in the history of Kansas high school sports.

OK, maybe IâÂÂm tossing out too much hyperbole there, but you get the point. For the record, the tasty sausages are the natural hickory-smoked skinless variety and theyâÂÂre supplied by Tom Pyle, probably Eudora HighâÂÂs biggest booster and owner of Pyle Meat Co., arguably the cityâÂÂs signature business.

Eudora High is enjoying a 21st century football renaissance, thanks in no small part to talented senior tailback Andrew Pyle, who happens to be Tom PyleâÂÂs grandson. But it takes more than one player to win football games, and the Cardinals have lots of good players âÂÂ:quot; like perpetual-motion guard-linebacker Joe Born, fleet end Kaleb Niedens, rugged tackle Dustin Moyer and shifty fullback Tyler Jackson, to name a few.

After back-to-back nine-victory seasons in 2000 and 2001, the Cardinals have won 10 games this year for the first time in school history.

During the latter part of the 20th century, Eudora was mostly football fodder. Oh, the Cards would have a good team every now and then – particularly under Don Laws, the football facilityâÂÂs namesake – but never three nine-plus win seasons in a row.

Then again, this isnâÂÂt your fatherâÂÂs or your grandfatherâÂÂs Eudora. Located seven miles east of Lawrence on Kansas Highway 10, the only motor speedway in the world without high-banked turns, Eudora is no longer a stagnant agricultural city on the edges of the Kansas and Wakarusa rivers floodplains.

Eudora has an industrial park and enough new homes to qualify as a bedroom community for both Lawrence and the Kansas City metroplex. A few years ago, Eudora jumped from Class 3A into Class 4A in the state high school classifications and its enrollment continues to climb.

About a decade ago, Eudora built a new high school that is already too small. Construction has begun on a larger high school just north of the current building, which will become the middle school when the 2003 school year begins.

Laws Field is located next to the current middle school just north of K-10 at the main Eudora exit, but its days may be numbered. Built in 1976, Laws Field is short on seating and on parking.

âÂÂWeâÂÂre hoping to have enough money to build a new stadium at the new high school,â Dave Durkin, Eudora HighâÂÂs athletic director, told me. âÂÂWeâÂÂre hoping to have one with 3,000 seats. If we can do that, we may turn Laws Field into a soccer stadium.âÂÂ

This fall Eudora became the first Frontier League school to field a varsity soccer program. Eudora wonâÂÂt be the last, either. High school soccer continues to grow in popularity in the stateâÂÂs mid-level schools.

While soccer and quality football are now staples in Eudora, it is clear another pastime hasnâÂÂt gone out of style. Folks in eastern Douglas County still like to hunt, too. Just ask Eudora High band director Rob Foster, who had so many band members gone for the opening day of the state quail and pheasant season that he had to fill in with middle school and grade school bandsmen at Saturday nightâÂÂs game.

ThatâÂÂs the same Rob Foster, incidentally, who was the long snapper on Kansas UniversityâÂÂs football team from 1985-87, meaning Eudora High has a band director who knows both music and football.

Right now, though, football is the all the buzz in Eudora. EverybodyâÂÂs talking about this Friday nightâÂÂs playoff game against Paola and how itâÂÂs on the road and, no doubt, how theyâÂÂll just have to do without those mouth-watering sausages this week.