The Hatfields and the McCoys once had their infamous feud, in part, over a pig.

Now, they are feuding again over a pigskin.

The 14th-annual Hatfield-McCoy Senior Bowl is scheduled to be played on Saturday night at Matewan High School’s Tiger Stadium.

Kickoff is set for 8 p.m.

The game pits the best graduated senior players from southern West Virginia (“The Hatfields”) against those from eastern Kentucky (“The McCoys”).

Game organizers are hoping the Hatfield-McCoy Bowl, sponsored by Massey Energy, will be able to withstand last year’s ripple where Kentucky was only able to field 19 players.

With such a small roster, Bluegrass State gridders who participated in the game were sucking wind and worn out as West Virginia won 20-12 and claimed its fifth straight victory in the series.

West Virginia once trailed the all-time series 4-1 but have pretty much dominated the bowl game ever since.

It seems there has been more interest in the game on this side of the Tug River, especially in recent years.

Game Director and bowl game founder Yogi Kinder is hoping for more parity and interest from participating Kentucky schools gathered from Pike, Martin, Floyd, Letcher and Johnson counties.

West Virginia players are brought in from Mingo, Logan, Boone, Lincoln, Wayne and Wyoming counties and support over the years has been strong.

This was evident again on Monday as 32 West Virginia players showed up for the first day of practice at Matewan. It’s been said that interest from Kentucky players has been lacking again this year in the leadup to the game.

Kinder said Kentucky All-Star coach Jesse Peck, however, could be the man to rekindle interest.

This is the first year the Phelps High School football mentor has been a head coach in the ballgame. The West Virginia All-Stars will be coached for the second year by youthful John Frye, one of Kinder’s assistant coaches at Matewan.

“This is the 14th year that we’ve had the bowl,” Kinder said. “Kids are getting tougher and tougher to get them interested. There hasn’t been any problem with the West Virginia kids. There’s a lot of them over here that want to play. Over in Kentucky we’re just not getting a whole lot of cooperation from the coaches, just to be honest with you. But we’ve got a good coach over there this year in Jesse Peck. He’s got a lot of quality kids (just not the quantity). It is easier for us to fill the rosters. Right here at Matewan we had 12 seniors and that will bump your roster up. The year before we just had one. Sometimes that’s the way these smaller schools go. With some of the bigger schools sometimes you have 10 to 15 seniors.”

Kentucky shouldn’t have a problem fielding its roster if you look at the size of its schools. Schools like Sheldon Clark, Belfry, Pike Central, Shelby Valley, East Ridge and Johnson Central have large student bodies. Tradition-rich Belfry, which has won two state football championships this decade, have seemed to form the lion’s share of the Kentucky All-Star roster over the years.

“They’ve got a lot of bigger schools over there than we do. We’ve got a lot of small schools,” Kinder said. “The only Triple-A school that we have in our area is Logan High School. But we’re getting some numbers for the Kentucky team from Prestonsburg. At Pikeville, their numbers are down. They used to be one of the biggest Single-A schools in the state. The problem over there is that you have just so many turnovers on the coaches. I think that’s a problem but I think that there’s just a little more interest in football over here as opposed to Kentucky. Over there you’ve got Belfry and they whip up on everybody.”

Once again, Kinder said there’s been overwhelming support from Logan County schools Chapmanville, Man and Logan High School.

Former Wildcats, Hillbillies and Tigers will once again form the nucleus of the West Virginia All-Star team.

Khris Tolliver, who rushed for more than 2,000 yards for Man last season and led the Billies into the Class A state quarterfinal round of the playoffs, will be one of the top go-to running backs for West Virginia.

Tolliver will team up in the backfield with Chapmanville Regional High School duo Joey Stevens and the speedy David Wiley, who combined for more than 1,500 yards on the ground last season for the Tigers, which went 8-3 and were a Class AA playoff team for the second straight year. Stevens, a standout member of Chapmanville’s secondary over the last three seasons, will also be key for West Virginia on the defensive side of the ball.”

Logan’s Derrick Perrin, who played running back, wide receiver, quarterback and defensive back, is also expected to be a player to watch for the Mountain State team. Several others from Man, Logan and Chapmanville will be key.

“Coach Frye has got some schools here that had a lot of seniors like Chapmanville, which had 10,” Kinder said. “Matewan had a bunch. I think you could make a football team out of those two teams. Logan always gives us good numbers and so does Man. In Mingo County, we’ve only got one player from Williamson, one from Tug Valley and none from Burch.”

The Hatfield-McCoy Bowl was born in 1996. Its forerunner, the Kiwanis Bowl, was discontinued two years before. The K-Bowl, which had its roots back in the 1950s, was held at Williamson.