Where All Highlanders
I am standing at the football game in Patton with a couple of my buddies. Sitting in the bleachers, I have a disgusted look on my face. The scoreboard read 27-0, the stands were almost empty, and some of the fans were even booing their own team. It’s homecoming night, a night that always started great and ends horrifically, with a Cambria Heights loss.
Around 6:00 Cambria Heights Highlander fans filled the stands to watch our football team take on the Bishop Guilfoyle Pirates. Everyone was in high spirits and the stadium was packed. The local buzz was that we might actually win because the Pirates were equally bad. The homecoming ceremonies were carried out, with a king and queen being picked. Finally, the confident Highlanders had taken the field, and football was ready to be played. Things were looking up; it’s going to be a great game, then boom. They intercept the first pass our quarterback throws, and everything goes downhill from there.
For Patton, support for football was on the decline. The community seemed to be less and less eager to come out and show their support. No one in town wanted to see the team being annihilated every night. It was like we were living a bad dream. The team had not emerged victorious from a game since the 90’s. Every Friday in the fall our boys would give their heart and soul on that field, just to be beat by 21 points or more. Coaches came and went, and the struggling team didn’t benefit from the potentially good football players it did have. The worst part was no one knew if anything would get better. The district was even talking about shutting down football all together.
Things would change, slowly but surely. My sophomore year rolled around, and it was football season again. I went to the first game against the Richland Rams, but when they lost that game 51-14 I had already lost hope for the whole season. The town of Patton soon seemed to follow suite. Going into the last week of the season, we had once again lost every game. I still went to all the games to show support, but usually I ended up talking to friends rather than watching it. The enthusiasm just wasn’t there for anyone; the stands at the games were usually all but empty. The program was in jeopardy; the school was losing money rather than making it. Rumors floated around that this was going to be the last season of football, at least for a while.
Anyone in this world could say they know what losing feels like. I will be the first to say that you are absolutely positively wrong. You have never been a part of a community who has a football team that hasn’t won a game for 12 years. The feeling is indescribable for any member in the community. Football is big in our community just as it is in the community of any team Cambria Heights plays. To see your team lose you feel embarrassment, frustration, hopelessness, and just sick in general. To make it worse you have newspapers writing about how bad you are and making jokes about your team. That’s when all your emotions just turn into anger, but at the same time your helpless to do anything. I would never wish anything like that on anyone.
For the players, the only way to describe it would be as a living hell. They faced criticism from all angles. The newspapers, the community, the school board, their coaches, and later even articles on the Internet voiced their opinion. I personally wonder how players even kept motivation to stay on the team. It seemed they were a little more depressed, defeated, and hopeless after every loss. More than the kids needed to make a team would join at the beginning of every year, but by the time the season was over there was just barely enough left for a team. I think the kids that did stay from season to season really believed the program would turn around, and eventually they would be right.
On a frosty, cold November evening, I took my spot in the student section of the bleachers at Patton stadium. I looked around to see friends in heavy winter attire laughing and joking, having a good time. Many fans flooded through the stadium gates and took their seats. This was the fullest I had seen Patton stadium since homecoming the previous year. Everyone was here because the Somerset Eagles (1-8) were in town. We were all riding on the same hope as last year with Bishop Guilfoyle, but this time there was proof in their win/loss record. This would be an even game.
Finally CH took the field to a relentlessly loud roar from our crowd. The team was all pumped up, and we were ready for a win. As they did the coin toss, I looked around to see a spark of hope in everyone’s eyes. Everyone, an entire community, was behind this team. They could not lose.
We lost the coin toss, so the team lined up in kickoff formation, and booted it away. A good tackle was made, and Somerset would start their drive to score on the 25-yard line. Then something that was very difficult to watch happened. They lined up with 5 wide receivers on the outside, snapped it, and passed it to an open man for a 75-yard touchdown pass. 7-0 Eagles. As I stood in the student section, I expected everyone to be quiet after the score, but it just got louder! Everyone cheered vigorously, saying things like “Don’t give up CH!” and “Come on boys!” I found myself joining in; they needed all the support they could get. Meanwhile on the field, CH and Somerset exchanged punts with no one getting anywhere. Right before halftime, having just got the ball back, CH handed the ball off to Jeremy Priester. He ran up the sideline for a 50-yard touchdown run. In the student section we went nuts, and the band played loudly. At halftime the score was tied up 7-7.
For most of the 3rd quarter, neither team really got anywhere. It was actually quite boring to watch, because the fact of the matter was both teams were terrible. Drive after drive, punt after punt. Finally, right at the beginning of the 4th quarter, our quarterback, Caleb Vescovi, threw a ball that was tipped and intercepted. The kid who intercepted the ball ran it back 60 yards for a touchdown. In the student section everyone was speechless, we couldn’t believe what was happening. The whole stadium was dead quiet; people shook their head in disbelief. 14-7 Eagles. The time on the clock from here on out seemed to tick off twice as fast now. No one thought it was fair this was happening, we just wanted our boys to break that terrible losing streak.
Cambria Heights would not get a good opportunity to score again until there were only two minutes left in the game. They started the drive with the ball on their own 35-yard line. Caleb threw a couple good passes and made some good plays, and like nothing we drove the ball to their 15 yard line. We were now threatening to score but there were now only 15 seconds left in the game, enough time for maybe one or two more plays. Caleb quickly snapped the ball and threw it up into the end zone. Time seemed to change to slow motion, as a stadium of people all at once had their eyes on the ball in the air. I clenched my teeth as I watched the ball fall right into our receiver Bryce Brawley’s hands. Touchdown, time expired. The score was all tied up at 14-14. The stadium exploded into a roar of pandemonium and excitement. I personally was pumped up and just so happy we had scored. But the most nerve-racking part of the game was to come, overtime.
Somerset would win the coin toss at the start of overtime, and CH kicked off. From here on out both teams exchanged unsuccessful drives, with nerve-racking deep throws down the field and outside runs. I don’t think I could name a game that I watched throughout high school that was more of a nail biter. The atmosphere was surreal, at every opportunity or good thing CH did people would go nuts.
Ultimately neither team would get anywhere, and the game went to sudden death. The rules of sudden death were each team starts on the 20 yard line and then tries to score. If the first team scores, the second team still gets a chance to score. If one team scores and stops the other team the game is over, if both teams score then another round is played with the same rules. CH and Somerset exchanged easy scores, forcing another round. Once again in the next round CH scored, but Somerset struggled to score, barely forcing the ball in on their last chance. The next round would be different; to start off we easily stopped the Eagles. All we had to do to win was score.
The drive didn’t start well, with Caleb getting tackled for a loss of yardage. It was now 2nd down and 26 yards to the end zone instead of 20. The next play was unbelievable, Caleb threw the ball up for Bryce to get and he did, just short of a touchdown and was tackled on the 2-yard line. On the very next play we tried to run the ball up the middle of the field, only to lose 2-yards with the Eagles breaking up the play. I stood in the stands along with everyone else, very anxious. It was now 4th down and the last chance we would have to score. To my surprise, CH snapped the ball and it was the same play. This time however, the linemen pushed the Somerset defense back like they were hit by a freight train, powered by their will to win. Jeremy Priester the running back followed behind them and leaped into the end zone. Everyone in the stadium roared at once and rushed onto the field. At that moment 12 years of winless seasons vanished into our memory forever. CH won 21-14.
The win against Somerset went down into history as something neither my classmates, the community of Patton, nor I could ever forget. Cambria Heights football against all odds had won their first game since I was three years old in 1996. The incredible comeback victory was talked about for months. It is also forever remembered as the game that single-handedly turned around football in the community. Football in our town now had new meaning; the team represented our town and everything it stood for. At every game here on out there was overwhelming support for the team. Friday night football games were no longer about going for something to do, but instead an opportunity to get out there and support your team. Most importantly, talks of terminating the football program stopped right then and there.
For the rest of my high school years the sky was the limit for Cambria Heights football. My junior year they won 2 games instead of 1, beating Bishop Guilfoyle this time and Somerset again. That year wasn’t exactly what we were looking for, but once again we improved. Finally my senior year rolled around and CH went 5-5 having a .500 record for the first time since 1992, a year before I was born. Even as I write this now CH has started their 2012 season, and they are 2-2. I’m going to go out on wing and say they go 8-2 this year. You can dream, right?
To sum it up, that experience my sophomore year of high school taught me many things. It taught me how influential sports can be, how motivated people can get when they are united together with a common cause, and the meaning of standing for something and believing in it. The first thing that pops into my head when I think of high school is football, so that just shows how influential it has been on me. I’m not even a football player, either. I can’t even imagine the heart, soul, sweat, and blood that go into that game. Our school mascot is a Highlander, which were very steadfast, brave, and ferocious Scottish warriors. The Highlander does not give up; they put 110% into everything they do. I think anyone, if they try, can model their life based on the ideology of the Highlander, I personally try to everyday. Where all Highlanders deep down. Only you can find yours.
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