Facing a possible future without football, Emmet O’Brien Technical High School parents like Sandy Rochon are rallying to ensure their sons can keep playing — by setting up a team of their own.
Athletes at O’Brien Technical High School in Ansonia have previously played football alongside Derby High students on the football field. The schools have shared a co-op football team under the rules of the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (CIAC).
But the CIAC recently changed the maximum number of student-athletes from any one co-op school from 37 to 32. That’s fewer than Derby has, which means to collaboration will likely end after the current season.
The CIAC is still reviewing whether to let O’Brien juniors play with Derby next year.
Either way, O’Brien Tech has to start its own team if students want to continue to play, according to Athletic Director Dan Nemergut.
“There’s no doubt. We’re running with this team next year,” Nemergut said.
If the juniors remain with Derby, O’Brien Tech will start a junior varsity team. If the CIAC does not allow the juniors to stay with Derby, O’Brien Tech plans to start a varsity team, Nemergut said.
Approvals
The school’s principal, Laurie LeBouthillier, received approval from the Connecticut State Technical High School Superintendent for three football coaches, Nemergut said.
But those hires are predicated on the school raising money for all the needed football equipment.
Interest
If the team gets started, it will be the school’s first football team in its 43-year-history.
“I promised my boys no matter what they will have a football team,” Victoria Brai, whose son D.J. is a junior guard on the football team, said. “My son lives, eats, and breathes football.”
There are about 20 O’Brien boys that currently play football, Brai said. But a recent school poll found that 69 would volunteer to field freshman, junior varsity, and varsity teams if O’Brien had its own team, Brai said.
Fundraising
Brai and Rochon, whose son Justin is a sophomore corner, said they need to raise about $50,000.
So far, Brai and about 10 other parents have secured donations of shoulder pads and helmets. Brai said a Stamford woman is interested in donating 1,000 pounds of free weights.
Parents are circulating fundraising letters at local businesses. Brai said a comedy night and a wine-tasting event are in the works.
Rochon, a customer service manager at Sears in Shelton, got her employer to donate a snowblower, which pulled in $450 in a raffle this month. Another fundraiser is scheduled for the same location on Dec. 5, Nemergut said.
Rochon said she’s planning to secure more donations from Sears. She said she’s also got her sights set on other corporations in the Valley. If she can get a big sponsor to put up enough to fund the team, “that’d be awesome,” she said. If other schools want to donate equipment, “that’d be awesome” too.
Nemergut said he hopes state legislators will help out, as he said happened a couple years ago when Platt Tech started its football program.
“One of our mottos for this has been ‘No stone unturned,” Nemergut said. “We are using as much networking skills as we have.”
Brai and Rochon both signaled that they are in it to win it, and not going to stop short of the fundraising goal line.
“The boys know I’ll fight no matter what,” Brai said.
