Vince Lombardi was arguably the greatest football coach of all time. After he hung up his whistle for good, a writer once asked Vince what he remembered most about the many illustrious teams that he coached. Lombardi answered with these words: The Green Bay Packers never lost a football game, they just ran out of time.
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I thought quite a bit about the man whose name adorns the ultimate trophy in professional football a few weeks ago Friday as I sat in the stands at Ralph Wilson Stadium watching the Section VI Class AA championship game between the North Tonawanda Lumberjacks and the Orchard Park Quakers.
Ostensibly, I found myself among some 2,000 people who had assembled to watch a high school football game, but as H.G. Bissinger so eloquently detailed, there is far more than athletics on display under the "Friday Night Lights."
My good friend Phil Harris had invited me to the game. Phil's son Adam is a junior at NT. He is also a star Defensive End on a Lumberjack team that is perennially one of the best in Western New York. Adam's younger brother Vinnie started off the year as a freshman on the JV squad, but was called up to the varsity by the end of the season.
Both Harris boys have inherited their dad's ability to dominate play on a chalk-lined field of grass.
Phil Harris was a two-way player for Fredonia High School in the late '70s and early '80s. On the defensive side of the ball he was a pass-rushing demon and was named All-Conference. It was along the offensive line that Phil really shone however. His unmatched ability to give a quarterback time to stand in the pocket and pick out an open receiver and his thirst to lead the run block by pancaking a defender into the turf resulted in Phil being named to the All-State team as an offensive lineman.
Soon the letters started pouring in from Division I programs. The Big East, Big Ten, SEC, ACC and Pac-10 were all heard from. Phil decided to play for Army at the United States Military Academy at West Point. It was while competing for the Black Knights that Phil blew out a knee that ended his very real dream of one day strapping it up for a team in the National Football League.
Fast forward some 25 years and Phil is feeling the words of Yogi Berra: It's like deja vu all over again.
"I always wanted to play in Rich Stadium when I was at Fredonia," Phil confides before the game, "but our teams always fell a game short of making it that far. To watch my sons get that opportunity is pretty surreal."
The game was scheduled for an ungodly 10 p.m. start on a cold and windy November night. I arrived at the Harris household at 6 p.m. to find Phil, his wife, Julie, their youngest son, Nicky, and neighbor Michael already in Phil's idling Cadillac awaiting my arrival. Phil and Julie are both decked out in replicas of Adam's NT jersey. The car is filled with a combination of supreme expectation and inconsolable nervousness. If the Lumberjacks win they will play the following weekend, again at the Ralph, for the overall Western New York Championship. The winner of that game moves on to play at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse in the New York State Championship game.
We fill the ride from North Tonawanda to Orchard Park with small talk and idle chatter -- anything to divert our minds from concentrating on how much is at stake for these young men who are nearing the end of the journey from diapers to diplomas.
As we take the off-ramp from the Thruway at Orchard Park, Nicky asks how much longer it will be before we arrive. I direct his gaze to the northern sky and for the first time that evening we all get a good look at the Friday night lights burning brightly around Ralph Wilson Stadium.
We make a quick stop at Tony's Pasta and Pizza for a tray and some wings to warm up our tailgating experience.
Arriving at the stadium, I am struck by how many buses and campers are in the parking lots. Those folks are not there for high school football, but have already arrived for the game Sunday between the Buffalo Bills and the New York Jets. They say that Pennsylvania and Texas are the two prime hotbeds of football fanaticism in America. I guess those who hold that opinion have never been to Orchard Park in November.
Once we make our way into the stadium parking lot, we spot a raging fire that someone who arrived for the earlier game between Lew-Port and Iroquois left burning inside a steel trashcan.
The cold November air will make squatters out of almost anyone and we are no exception. When the fire begins to dwindle, Julie and I spot some firewood in the back of the pickup parked next to the blaze. We decide to "borrow" some to keep the fire raging and our hands and toes warm.
During halftime of the early game, the owner of the truck comes out to find us huddled over our fire. He turns out to be a great guy and, when we confess that we took some of his wood to keep the fire going, he admonishes us for not putting more on the mini-inferno. As he goes back into the stadium, he gives his blessing to help ourselves not only to the wood, but to the Cajun turkey he has roasting on a nearby grill. Once again, the hospitality of Western New Yorkers has been shown to have no equal.
The parking lot is filled with roving gangs of high school boys. Many of them sport jackets from one of the two schools currently playing, so it is easy to discern that they didn't come to the stadium to watch football. Despite our state's tough talk on cutting down on underage drinking, there is no security in sight and most of the young men have slender fingers wrapped around long-neck bottles of beer.
It isn't long before the ancient sport of bare-knuckled fisticuffs breaks out. One group of a half-dozen or so youths takes exception to the comments of a passing group and we quickly find ourselves witness to an episode of "Boys Behaving Badly."
This scenario is repeated a handful of times. Phil and I stand ready to intervene if any of the kids look to be in real danger, but it seems that only a few egos end up bruised.
At 9:30 we head into the stadium. Lew-Port has lost a close one and the dejected faces of the green-and-white faithful are evident as they file past us. On the field, the Iroquois players are celebrating like they've just won the Super Bowl.
As we watch the NT squad warming up, Phil tells me that Vinnie probably won't get into the game.
"They brought him up to essentially be a tackling dummy in practice, but he's turned the coaches' heads. The players have nicknamed him 'Manster' -- half man, half monster -- because of the tenacity he showed in practice. Next year I see him and Adam as bookends on the defensive line. They'll be the Mash Brothers."
The game begins and NT starts sophomore QB Scott Gregson over senior Matt Scalice. The two have split time throughout the season and the choice is met with mixed reviews by the NT faithful. While many like Gregson's mobility, others feel that Scalice's experience is needed to calm the other players.
NT drives well in the first half, but turns the ball over by fumbling twice. The story, I quickly realize, isn't on the field, but in the faces and words of the nervous parents in the stands. NT entered the game with a record ofÊ8-1. The one blemish on their record was a season-opening 22-16 loss to the very same Orchard Park team they are facing in the finals. The Quakers also ended the Lumberjacks' season last year.
For the parents of the seniors on the squad, this is the last hurrah. While a few of the kids who suited it up at the Ralph this evening will go on to play college ball, most will not. Lose here and it's not only the end of a season, but also the end of an era.
Orchard Park stakes out a 14-to-nothing lead and the Quakers crowd is noticeably louder than the Lumberjacks supporters. Scalice, who also plays linebacker on defense, has his name called again and again as he drops ball carriers for losses all over the field. Adam Harris plays a stellar game and Phil and Julie often get to cheer the public address announcer's call of his name. Gregson hits receiver Bill Cheehan with a 25-yard scoring strike with 4:25 left on the clock to keep NT's hopes alive.
The NT defense tightens and Orchard Park is forced to punt the ball. NT takes over with 1:12 to play and no timeouts left. The Lumberjack coaches put the senior Scalice under center. The nerves on the NT side of the stands are wound tighter than the braids in Ricky Williams' hair. In the movies there would be little suspense as to what would happen next. Scalice would march the team on an electrifying drive and put the ball into the end zone as the final tick disappeared from the stadium clock.
But life is not lived between the credit rolls of a Hollywood film. On the final play of the game, Scalice is stopped at the OP 27-yard line. The Quakers are still alive for a trip to Syracuse. The Lumberjacks will have no more practices this year.
For the parents of the seniors, there will be no more Friday night lights, no more Thursday night pasta dinners, no more August practices and team photo days. Those parents no longer have boys in their homes, but young men who will soon be making their way in the world -- hopefully better equipped due to experience derived from being a North Tonawanda Lumberjack.
For Phil and Julie Harris, there is still next year. They still have the dreams of a season that lies ahead. One in which their sons Adam and Vinnie line up together and attempt to lead NT to the promised land of Syracuse.
There is so much that plays out under the Friday night lights.
It's not about winning and losing, but about living within a moment that refuses to stay within our grasp.
As we filed out of the stadium, the words of Vince Lombardi again flooded my thoughts. The seniors of North Tonawanda, and their parents, didn't lose the game. They just ran out of time.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | Dec. 7 2004 |