Abingdon-Avon Tornadoes Football: 2026 Schedule and Results

2026: 2-1 · Coach: Rick Quinn · Division: Lincoln Land South · Enrollment: 275

No state trophy in any sport, a town of 2,951 that produced two Medal of Honor recipients, and a girls basketball team that just did something the school had never done before.

2026 results

• Aug 21 — beat West Hancock 41-12 at home. The biggest Week 1 win of any team in this coverage area, against a programme that went 6-4 and made the playoffs last season.
• Aug 28 — lost at Annawan-Wethersfield 22-14, to a team that went 11-1 and reached the Class 1A state semifinals.

Beat a playoff team by 29, lose by eight to a semifinalist. Through two weeks that is the most credible body of work of any eleven-man team here.

Sept 4 — beat Bureau Valley 41-16, away in Manlius. The most convincing performance of the season. One caveat: On3 lists this as 41-35 and dates it September 5. Five sources including both teams say 41-16 on September 4, so that is what we have used.

2026 schedule

† Lincoln Land South. All 7:00 p.m.

The 2025 girls basketball team

This is the best thing that has happened at A-Town in a long time.

The 2024-25 team went 30-4 and won the first sectional championship in the school’s history, beating Wethersfield 46-30 — a team it had already beaten to win the Lincoln Trail Conference tournament.

The run ended at the super-sectional against Pecatonica, who were 29-6 and led by a 6-foot-9 Division I signee.

Sophomore point guard Kennedy Quinn and senior Hailey Redding combined for 34 points a night; sophomore Kaydin Quinn added eight points and a team-best 5.5 rebounds. Brent Dugan coaches, eight years in at .714.

It was not a one-off. The Tornadoes went 26-8 with a regional title in 2024, and 26-6 with a 10-0 conference record and another regional in 2026, before losing 58-44 to Brown County in a Class 1A sectional semifinal in February.

Girls basketball is now 247-138 since consolidation, and it is the strongest programme in the building.

Baseball ended a drought too

In May 2025, A-Town won its first regional title since 2017, beating United 4-0 at Stronghurst. Three runs came in the top of the first on a Drey Anderson double; Justin Keener threw more than six innings, allowing four hits and no runs with eight strikeouts. Another regional followed in 2026 at 19-8.

Baseball is 187-99 since consolidation — a .653 winning percentage.

Rick Quinn, the only coach they have had

Abingdon and Avon consolidated their districts in 2013. Rick Quinn has been the head football coach for the entire life of the combined school — fourteen years at .477.

His 2025 team went 3-6, and four of those nine games were decided by five points or fewer. A-Town went 1-3 in them. That is where two more wins live.

Returning for 2026: quarterback Jamil Johnson, who threw for roughly 1,400 yards, all-conference lineman Cole Sheckler, second-team selections Tre Kenon, Carson Stenger and Ryker Darst, and a healthy Owen Timmons.

Two Medals of Honor

Abingdon, population 2,951, has produced two recipients of the Medal of Honor.

Vice Admiral James Stockdale was the senior naval prisoner of war at the Hanoi Hilton, held for seven and a half years, and later ran for vice president on Ross Perot’s ticket in 1992.

Captain Robert Hugo Dunlap was decorated for his actions at Iwo Jima.

Both are documented as Abingdon natives. We have not been able to confirm that either graduated from Abingdon High School, and we would rather say so than imply it.

The town, and the mousetrap

Abingdon sits in Knox County, fifty miles west of Peoria. It was first settled in 1828, laid out in 1836 and named for Abingdon, Maryland, the birthplace of founder Abraham Davis Swarts. It incorporated in 1857.

Hedding College operated here from 1855 to 1930 before merging into Illinois Wesleyan.

And in 1894 a resident named William C. Hooker applied for a patent on the common spring-loaded mousetrap. It was granted in 1907. The design has barely changed since.

Beyond football

Baseball, boys and girls basketball, boys soccer, volleyball, softball, bowling, cross country and track — plus girls flag football, newly sanctioned by the IHSA.

Students can also take vocational courses through the Galesburg Area Vocational Center.

Abingdon-Avon joined the Lincoln Trail Conference in 2021, moving with Knoxville from the Prairieland.

What the all-time numbers say

Since the 2013 consolidation, the pattern at A-Town is clear enough. Girls basketball 247-138. Boys basketball 263-162. Baseball 187-99. Three programmes comfortably above .600.

Then softball at 127-160, boys soccer at 56-75-8, and girls volleyball at 98-262 — a .273 winning percentage, the weakest mark at any school in this coverage area.

Football sits between the two groups at 62-68, and has not qualified for the playoffs since the districts merged. Abingdon alone had thirteen playoff qualifications before that.

The expanded 48-team field is the most realistic chance A-Town has had to end that drought, and at 1-1 with a 29-point win already banked, this is the year it is live.

Where the season turns

A-Town’s remaining schedule contains four Lincoln Land South games and three non-conference. The two that matter most are United on September 18 and Rushville-Industry on October 9 — the fixtures most likely to decide whether the Tornadoes reach four or five wins.

United beat A-Town in the 2025 baseball regional final before A-Town returned the favour in 2025; the two schools sit about twelve miles apart and meet in nearly every sport. It is the closest thing Abingdon has to a rivalry game.

Send us results

We cannot be at every stadium and every gym. If you have a score, a stat line or a photo from this programme, send it in — we post them as they come and we correct errors the same day.

Records via the IHSA and MaxPreps. Programme detail via Abingdon-Avon CUSD 276 and WMOI/WRAM. Area conference guide →