LEXINGTON — Of the 22 high schools to have reached five or more state championship football games, only Lexington and Geneseo has done so with five different coaches.

So what does this say about Lexington?

All five Minutemen coaches — Jim Mannaioni, Ed Moore, Hal Chiodo, Don Tanney and Mike Castleman — credit the community for making such a record feat possible.

“I think it says a lot about the community support and community expectations,” said Castleman, Lexington’s current coach, whose 13-0 squad faces Tuscola (10-3) in Friday’s 10 a.m. Class 1A final at Memorial Stadium in Champaign.

“They support football,” agreed Mannaioni, who was Lexington’s head coach from 1968 to 1984 and guided the Minutemen to the 1980 final where they lost to Atwood-Hammond, 17-16.

Before Mannaioni took over, Lexington had averaged two wins each of the previous 18 years.

“Slowly, the community support came,” he said. “The Junior Chamber of Commerce started a JFL program. That meant a lot of parents got involved.”

And that was crucial.

 “When you get parents coming to support the program, there is no way to go but up,” said Mannaioni, who retired as Peoria Manual’s coach in 1998 and now lives in Dunlap.

He will attend Friday’s game as will Chiodo, whose 1994 team lost to Sterling Newman 27-0 in the final.

Chiodo, who coached 7-4 Highland Park in his first season there this fall, believes Lexington football turned a corner in 1973, the final season before the playoffs began.

That Mannaioni-coached squad, led by Moore and Bob Grimes, went 9-0 while outscoring foes a combined 468-41. (This year’s team outscored its first nine foes, 396-34).

“That was one of the best small-school teams in state history,” said Chiodo, who feels a chain reaction began in which young boys started dreaming of playing football.

Unlike many towns, Lexington has kindergarten through 12th grade under one roof.

“The high school kids have a huge impact on the elementary kids here,” said Tanney, who still teaches at Lexington. His 2001 team lost to Kewanee Wethersfield, 21-6, in the championship game.

Jesse Kemp, a senior fullback and linebacker, said his biggest childhood memory involves the 2001 squad.

“I followed every game,” he said. “I just always wanted to be a part of that someday.”

Quarterback Chris Beard sees the cycle of hero worship continuing in the lower grades.

“Almost every single one that I’ve seen has been idolizing one of us on the field,” he said. “Just today I saw my brother was idolizing T.J. (Stinde).”

Stinde, who has a state single-season 3,197 rushing yards, embodies one of Moore’s theories about Lexington’s winning tradition.

“Lexington has gone through a lot of good kids,” said Moore, a Lincoln teacher who has seen Stinde play. “I couldn’t make up his numbers. He’s the real deal.”

Stinde also embodies the family aspect of Lexington football because his father, Tom, played for the 1980 team.

“A lot of the kids from year to year have older siblings or uncles or even in some cases their dads, who have been on previous successful teams,” Castleman said. “There is a little bit of pressure and just a little extra motivation to be a part of that.”

Lexington’s winning tradition makes the head coaching job an attractive one, but it does carry high expectations.

“It scared me a little bit,” said Castleman, who replaced Tanney three years ago, but eventually came to terms with Lexington’s tradition.

“Tradition is just a word unless you add to it. We started realizing that’s what it is. All these kids want to add to it.”

Chiodo considers Lexington fans very knowledgeable.

“The people know you have cycles of some talent and lesser talent,” he said. “They are realistic in their expectations.”

Mannaioni remembers the transformation he saw in parents, especially the moms, as they learned the game.

“Now you’ve got women in Lexington who know football as well as the coaches do,” he said. “That was not the case early on.”

One thing Lexington fans would like to forget is their 0-4 record in finals. The only other schools to have placed second four times without winning are Bloomington and St. Joseph-Ogden.

“There are so many great programs that don’t even get that opportunity, programs that get in the playoffs every year, but yet have never played in Champaign,” Castleman said. “We’re fortunate. This is our fifth trip there. That in itself is a testament to the football played in Lexington.”

Four-time winless finalists

Lexington: 1980, 1989, 1994, 2001

St. Joseph-Ogden: 1989, 1997, 1999, 2006

Bloomington: 1991, 2002, 2003, 2004