With Help, Football Returns to Carney
August 25, 2016
By Dennis Grall
Special to Second Half
CARNEY — The football players dutifully go through their drills in blistering heat, showing energy and enthusiasm as they tackle what is basically a brand new sport.
Carney-Nadeau High School returns to the high school gridiron tonight for the first time since 1973, with an assist from some Upper Peninsula schools and another team known for its green and gold colors, the Green Bay Packers.
The 8-player team visits Ewen-Trout Creek for the first of eight road games this season. The small northern Menominee County school does not have a football field.
Actually, until around Thanksgiving 2015, the school did not have a team. Some parents approached the school about instituting football last fall, with the recent inception of the 8-player game playing a big role.
Helping fuel that fire was neighboring Powers North Central, which switched from 11-player to 8-player for the 2015 season and romped to the division’s MHSAA championship to complete a 13-0 season.
Jim Belec, who helped bring the football idea to school officials, became head coach and quickly picked up Dan Koffman as an assistant for the self-funded program.
Then the work began. And as the pieces started falling together, C-N students began showing interest in playing the sport.
Belec, who coached the youth football Sharks in nearby Stephenson, said, “You’ve got to have a lot of patience” working with players who have little or no experience. “You have to remember it is their first time out here, but at the same time you’ve got to remember you have to catch them up.”
He installed a basic offense and defense. “If you can’t do the basics, you don’t have much to stand on,” said Belec as he watched his players run through various drills. “They’ve got the want-to.”
He said basic drills included safety features such as keeping the head up while going in for a tackle and reminding defenders to wrap their arms around the ball carrier. “You can definitely tell the kids who have played in the past and who haven’t,” he said.
About half of the 17 players have some experience, including three who played at North Central under a co-op arrangement.
“I’m realistic. Starting off we have a lot to learn,” said Belec. “I hope we are far enough along to be competitive right off the bat.”
That wasn’t the case when the Wolves played 11-player football from 1970-73, when they posted only one win before dropping the sport. They played the 8-player game for a couple of years before that period, before those opponents also moved to 11-player football.
“Our first goal is to have fun,” said Belec, noting some players expressed playoff hopes while some hoped for perhaps two wins. “There are wins on the schedule to be had as long we work hard.”
The hard work and dedication have been on display since preseason practice began, but it will take live action to see how much progress has been made. At the outset Belec said, “They would come off the ball and they would all stand up right away. Little things like that can be taught.”
The Wolves received some equipment and uniforms from nearby Menominee High School and from Rock Mid Peninsula High School, which dropped 8-player football after the 2013 season.
Most obvious is the equipment and gear donated by the NFL’s Green Bay Packers. Brand new gloves bearing names like Randall Cobb arrived along with shoes, shoulder pads, pants, thigh pads, knee pads, girdles and state-of-art helmets. “The ones (pants) with blood stains were valuable,” said Koffman.
The items were arranged for by Belec’s wife Cindy, who attended school in Stephenson with Sandy Roubal, who is the corporate giving coordinator for the Packers.
“It’s been motivating and exciting to have the Packers involved,” said Koffman. “They gave us sizes that would fit our kids (along with some shoes that were much too large).”
The self-funded program has hooked up with Donors Choose, a fund-raising operation that enables people to make donations toward specific areas. Sixteen new helmets were paid for right off the bat from those donations.
“Financially we are viable,” said Koffman, noting everything on their wish list has been donated. “We didn’t have to do anything. We’re still in awe. Everybody has been outfitted. We have just been thrilled.”
C-N superintendent Adam Cocco was sporting a huge grin while watching his new squad practice recently. His dad, Robert, was quarterback of the school’s last team.
He said it “seemed insurmountable” when Belec first asked about fielding a team last fall. “The more we looked at it, the more we chipped away. It kind of came together. It is all self-funded. That speaks to the level of support from the community.”
Tight end John Berg, one of the seniors, figured, “I might as well go for it because it is my last year of school.”
Tailback Dylan Kuehl said, “It was hard at first but we’ve pulled together, and the practices have gotten a whole lot easier.” A wrestler with the Bark River-Harris High School team as part of another co-op, Kuehl added, “We are setting high expectations for each other. It would be pretty cool if we could win four games.”
Fullback-linebacker Kyle Hammerberg played Pop Warner and junior varsity football at North Central. “I like helping everyone on the line fire off the ball,” he said. “I tell them to look at the ball and not listen to the count. If you watch football you feel it is a lot easier, but once you’re in the game it is a lot harder than you think.”
Denny Grall retired in 2012 after 39 years at the Escanaba Daily Press and four at the Green Bay Press-Gazette, plus 15 months for WLST radio in Escanaba; he served as the Daily Press sports editor from 1970-80 and again from 1984-2012. Grall was inducted into the Upper Peninsula Sports Hall of Fame in 2002 and serves as its executive secretary. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for the Upper Peninsula.
PHOTO: (Top) Carney-Nadeau work on agility during a recent practice. (Middle) Assistant coach Dan Koffman shows some of the donated equipment provided by the Green Bay Packers. (Below) The first Carney-Nadeau football team since 1974 will take the field this season as a self-funded program. The team includes: front row from left, Hunter DuPont, David Green, Alex Rhode, Bryce Montague, Arturo Rangel and Dylan Kuehl; middle, assistant coach Dan Koffman, Kyle Hammerberg, Brett LaFord, Norman Collins, head coach Jim Belec; back, James Imhoff, Jordan Belec, Calvin Haddock, John Berg and Jordan Lindstrom. (Photos by Dennis Grall.)
Forest Park's Playoff Tradition Began with Statement-Making Title Run
By
Jason Juno
Special for MHSAA.com
November 29, 2024
CRYSTAL FALLS — The Crystal Falls Forest Park football team played in its 15th Football Final last weekend, tying it for fourth-most championship game appearances in MHSAA history.
The first came back in 1975, the very first year the MHSAA conducted a football postseason tournament.
The Trojans already had a strong tradition before that, but champions were only mythical then, based on records, strength of schedule and opinions.
Forest Park players were excited to hear about the chance to prove it on the field, said Bill Santilli, the team’s standout running back that season.
“We had high expectations,” said Santilli, who also took the Trojans to seven Finals as their coach, leading them to the Division 8 title in 2007. “The team that we had put together my senior year, I felt we had a lot of really good athletes and our school had a strong tradition of football back then through the 60s and early 70s.”
Only four teams in each class made the MHSAA Playoffs that first year. So when Forest Park lost to Norway – a physical team that finished the season undefeated – 14-13 during the regular season, the Trojans thought their playoff hopes were pretty dim.
Their schedule, though, was made up of mostly larger schools and the point system rewarded them for it, making Forest Park the region’s Class D representative.
The Semifinal final game against Posen was scheduled to be played in Traverse City on Nov. 15, the first day of deer season. One of the coaches joked they had never missed a first day and he was going hunting.
The only hunting they did that day was for a spot in the state title game, and they traded bagging a buck for blanking Posen 67-0.
“Their credit was they had a strong running game,” Santilli said. “They had been beating teams by quite a margin throughout the season. We just played and did a great job of what we had to do by our game plan.”
Up next was Flint Holy Rosary in the Final at Western Michigan University the next Saturday.
“I would say we had a confidence as a team, based on the confidence of our coaching staff, based on the confidence of our Semifinal victory,” Santilli said. “We were ready to play.”
Beyond seeking the thrill of a championship, the Trojans wanted to prove how good the football was in the Upper Peninsula. Players kept track of high school football results throughout the state – this being well before the internet made finding news and results so easy, they looked to the Detroit Free Press — and found teams in the larger metropolitan areas were more highly-touted.
“We wanted to prove that there were some good football teams in the Upper Peninsula that in my opinion seemed to get overlooked,” Santilli said. “I think it was not only our mission to win that first state championship, but also our mission to make a statement that we play good football.”
Forest Park won 50-0.
“Just the feeling to play and win the inaugural event, to be able to have the memories, to talk about it, to play so well and to hold onto that state championship trophy, the real, true state championship trophy, we didn’t think there was anything better in our lives,” Santilli said.
No team reached 50 points in a championship game again until 1994; no one exceeded it until 2002.
“We played extremely well,” Santilli said.
The Trojans led by that score going into the fourth quarter. They were able to put the second unit in and watch those teammates preserve the shutout.
“We just had a good group of athletes, we all got along, we had guys that knew their role, they were all very good at their positions and we just gelled as a group,” Santilli said. “We had really good linemen, we had tough hitters on defense, we had defensive backs who could cover a pass and yet had the speed to come up and make tackles on the line of scrimmage. We had an offensive running game that I would describe as consistent and powerful. And if we needed to throw, we had a good quarterback and receivers.”
Santilli, a 5-foot-9 senior, was double and triple-teamed, according to MHSAA accounts of the game, and he still rushed for 178 yards and three touchdowns on 37 carries. He finished with 226 points for the season, including 46 in the Semifinal, setting an MHSAA single-season record at the time. Quarterback Rich Mettlach tallied 148 yards through the air, with 103 to Bryan LaChapelle.
Forest Park’s defense was dominant, holding Holy Rosary to minus-32 yards rushing, 78 passing and just four first downs.
“They told us the competition got tougher the farther south we got,” coach Richard Mettlach said afterward. “We like it down here and may come back next year.”
Santilli was the first Class D player to earn a spot on the Detroit Free Press all-state Dream Team, according to the U.P. Sports Hall of Fame, which welcomed Santilli in 2005. His 1,865 rushing yards were a state record, the Hall of Fame indicated.
He said he received much of the recognition that season because he was the ballcarrier, but he credited his teammates with making it all possible.
“I got the recognition only because of the other guys with the jerseys with the same team name on them,” he said.
Forest Park football has been good ever since.
They beat Flint Holy Rosary again the next year in the Class D title game, although the score was closer, 14-6. Rosary came out on top in 1977 with a 21-20 win over Forest Park, and the Trojans fell 38-14 to Detroit St. Martin dePorres in the 1978 finale.
PHOTO From left: Forest Park’s Bryan LaChapelle, coach Dick Mettlach, Dick Mettlach Jr., and Bill Santilli pose with the first Class D championship trophy Nov. 22, 1975, at Waldo Field in Kalamazoo. (Photo by Bill Santilli.)