Public appeal issued in Terrebonne for elderly heat health
March 22, 2011"The Metal Children" (Baton Rouge)
March 24, 2011
One last chance.
It’s a phrase that goes through the minds of virtually every player who has ever entered the world of adulthood after playing high school football.
One more Friday night under the lights. One last chance to lace up the cleats and slap on the pads. One more touchdown. One more crushing hit. And one final opportunity to defeat a rival for the sake of school pride.
For a group of several of the greatest prep football players in the history of the Tri-parish area, that second chance will be granted.
Several of the top prep football players in the history of the Tri-parish area will take the field one final time this weekend in a three-day series of football at Nicholls’ John L. Guidry Stadium.
For two of the participating schools, South Lafourche and Central Lafourche, they vow their second chance will not go down the drain.
Because after all, they’ve waited to get another crack at the gridiron for a very long time and this game means more than just football – it’s about pride.
“You always want another opportunity,” 1998 Tarpon graduate Cory O’Quinn said. “You always just want to have that one more game and this is it – it’s just for the love of the game – that’s why I’m here.”
“For a lot of guys, that’s what it’s all about,” 1999 Trojans graduate Shaun Estay agreed. “A lot of the guys just want to get on the field one more time with their friends and to just get after it again and have some fun.”
The game is part of the Gridiron Alumni, a program started this year to rally together football players across the country in the name of a good cause.
The program was founded by three California guys, including Chris Cavender, who said the event is designed for exactly what O’Quinn and Estay explained – to give one more chance for football to guys who never make it past the prep level.
“This gives guys a chance to put the pads back on again,” Cavender said. “Once you’re done with football, most of the time, there’s really no other way to play full contact football. Guys don’t have the gear, so there’s only flag football.”
Each player participating in the event pays a $75 entry fee, which contributes to the player’s helmet, pads and stadium expenses, according to Cavender.
From that, concessions and a portion of attendance revenue go either to a host school or a local charity.
In this particular event, no local high school was able to host the game, so instead of donating concessions, Cavender said he and his coworkers would discuss ideas for other ways to give back to the participating teams.
“We’ve already looked into possibly donating some t-shirts,” Cavender said. “We’ll look into doing a few other things for some of the other schools if we can, as well.”
The way the program is organized is simple. There are no age groups amongst the players. That means every South Lafourche and Central Lafourche graduate participating will be a part of the same squad – which pairs some of the best among several graduating classes onto one team.
For example, Tarpons’ Class of 2004 quarterback Cody Fillinich will have the benefit of throwing to Class of 2010’s All-State halfback Rusty Borne, while being protected up front by Class of 1996 offensive lineman Ernest Young.
The Trojans will see Estay team with Class of 89 standout Tyrone Dominique, as well as former quarterback Matt Lanegresse and Class of 2001 graduate Jeffrey Dacon.
That blend of talent from several generations is one of the best things about being back on the field, according to Fillinich, who holds virtually every passing record in the Tarpons’ school’s history – even despite former NFL player Bobby Hebert being a product of the school.
“We’ve got the best athletes South Lafourche has on this field,” Fillinich said. “We’re going to give it our all and hopefully come out on top.”
Teammate and Class of 2006 offensive lineman Britton Comeaux agreed and said the Tarpons initially struggled to get their enrollment numbers up for the big game, but they now field a roster of approximately 40 or so players.
“Not many guys wanted to come out here and do this again at first,” Comeaux said. “But the guys who are out here are some good players and this should be some fun.”
Like the Tarpons, the Trojans struggled to get people to attend practice, because of work obligations, but Dacon said he believes the team will have a full roster in Friday’s game.
“We usually have about 30 or 35 at a good practice,” Dacon said. “But for the game, I think we’ll have more. Hopefully we’ll have about 50. But that might be wishful thinking.”
For the younger players in the event, being involved is about sticking with the routine of high school. For some of the elder statesmen, it’s a bit more.
Young said he is using South Lafourche’s intense practices to get back into shape.
“The truth is, I need to get back into shape,” Young said. “I’ve been 300-plus pounds for as long as I could remember and the truth is I needed to get out and run around. And I’m having a blast.”
That and something more – something a little closer to home for the former player.
“My little girl never got a chance to see me play,” Young said. “And that’s one of the reasons why I came out, because when she heard about it, she said, ‘Daddy, you should go play.'”
Away from the sentimental reasons, the two teams are all business on the practice field, working out two and sometimes three times a week.
South Lafourche coach Ryan Fournier said he initially thought the players would be rusty and unwilling to take the game seriously. But after a few weeks on the job, he knows that’s not the case.
“I don’t want to say it’s necessarily a surprise,” Fournier said. “But the way they’ve taken to the coaching side of this in terms of being here on time and what we’re asking them to do, we’re putting ourselves to be in a good position to win this game.”
Dacon agreed and said that while the Trojans don’t have an official coach like the Tarpons, they have seen great attention to detail among their players at practices.
“Our organization is great,” he said. “I wish we had coaches, but it seemed like all of the guys that coach that went to Central didn’t want anything to do with this, but that’s OK. Our guys have paid attention and we’ve done the best with what we’ve got, definitely.”
The elephant in the room and the reason for both side’s attention to detail is the opponent.
Lafourche Parish is split in half vertically by a bayou. But it’s split in half horizontally by an imaginary wall in northern Larose and southern Valentine – the boundary between South Lafourche and Central Lafourche.
It took a split second for the players on both sides to think of the year they graduated, but it took a mere instant for everyone involved to give their record against their rivals.
“We never lost to Central,” O’Quinn boasted.
“We were 1-2 against South Lafourche in my career,” Dacon added.
“Our group went 2-1 against them when I was at South Lafourche,” Fillinich said. “It should have been 3-0, though.”
“In my years, we were 0-3,” Estay said. “We never beat South Lafourche.”
The Tarpons lead the all-time series between the two schools by a 31-14 margin, so it makes statistical sense that the South Lafourche players have winning records against the Trojans in their careers.
Don’t think that fact is lost on anyone on either side.
“Yes,” Dominique said simply when asked if he views South Lafourche as a rival.
Dominique was one of the few Trojans who boasted a winning record for his career against the Tarpons with a 2-1 mark.
He said he doesn’t want to be all-square when Friday’s game comes to a close.
“I wouldn’t want to be 2-2,” Dominique said with a laugh. “But we’ll see what happens.”
The same can be said for Young, who was also 2-1 in his career against the Trojans. He took it a step further and said the one loss changed his entire outlook on life.
“We lost to them when they had great running back Ricky Guidroz,” Young said. “And I’ll never forget it. That was my first time ever getting on the field playing high school ball in my sophomore year and it seemed like I was the smallest guy on the field and he ran right by me. I told myself I’d never let anything like that ever happen to me again.”
Whether it does or doesn’t happen again on Friday remains to be seen, but either way, the Tarpons and Trojans are ready to cash in on their “one last chance”.
That fact that they are doing it against one another just seems to fit.
“Everybody wants that one last chance to go and hit somebody out on that field,” Fillinich said. “We’re getting the opportunity to do that.”
The Tarpons and Trojans will renew their rivalry this weekend at the Gridiron Alumni game Friday at Nicholls’ John L. Guidry Stadium. CASEY GISCLAIR
