Diehard Trojans practice for canceled grid season despite Section One brass nixing proposed merger
September 28, 2023 at 1:00 a.m.
It was a simple mantra that cut to the heart and soul of a complicated matter with teenaged logic piercing the games adults play with rules that change kids’ lives.
"We want to play football. We need to play football. We will play football," said Robby Carey, the high-scoring senior running back for the Blind Brook Trojans.
Senior running back Robby Carey has attracted interest from Division 3 colleges and hopes to be playing football for one of them next year.Courtesy of Robby Carey
He spoke shortly after a Trojans football practice this past week for a game the team will never play.
Summing up sentiment
He summed up the sentiments of the handful of diehard Blind Brook football players practicing for a season that has been canceled.
"We are going to put in the practice time regardless of the Section One decision," Carey said.
He was referring to the recent Section One decision to cancel the proposed football merger between Blind Brook and Hastings.
"I'm not going to let anyone take football away from me, and the rest of us feel the same way,” Carey said, explaining that he "has been playing football practically all my life, or at least from the time I was five when I started playing football in the Rye Town Football League, played modified football all through Middle School, and started for the Blind Brook varsity from the time I was a freshman."
Players to watch
He didn’t just start but excelled, scoring five touchdowns in a single game last year against Woodlands while sitting out the entire fourth quarter during a season when the Trojans made it into the semi-finals of the sectional playoffs for the first time in something like 30 years.
He was good enough to attract interest from Division 3 colleges like SUNY Cortland, Morrisville and Muhlenberg during a football talent showcase.
And in a pre-season survey by Lohud's scholastic sports experts, he and his junior Trojans running back buddy Carmine Casino were singled out as among the best Westchester players to watch during the upcoming season.
But the season wasn't meant to be.
Low turnout numbers
When the official pre-season practice started Aug. 21, only 12 players showed up for the initial session, hardly enough for the Trojans to attempt to play a regular season safely.
So the very next day, Blind Brook Athletic Director Kimberly Saxton began to explore the possibility of a merger at a meeting of athletic directors, and Hastings looked like a good fit. The Boards of Education at both schools approved. The athletic directors from both schools submitted their applications for the proposed merger to Section 1, the area's scholastic sports governing body, and waited for what looked like a done deal to be approved.
In the interim, the Blind Brook football season was canceled. And the Trojans practiced on their own with their coaches, two days on the field, two days in the weight room, one day at Hastings acting as an unofficial scout team at scrimmages.
"It was all set for us to merge, we even had a parents’ caravan of cars organized to take us to the regular weekday practices at Hastings about a half hour's drive away," Carey said.
Left in tears
What happened next left Carey in tears.
It happened at a Tuesday practice at Blind Brook on Sept. 19. There was an unusually long water break for the players to hydrate in the hot weather. Those breaks usually last a few minutes. This one lasted closer to 10. And when the coaches finally called the players over, Robby was fully expecting them to announce the merger had been approved. Instead, they were told the merger had been turned down.
"I broke down in tears," Carey recalled. "I refused to leave the field. Football was and is such a big part of my life. My grandfather played Army football on a special forces team. My father Robert played for Goshen. My mother Julia was a drum majorette for Harrison. I come from a big Italian family on my mother's side and all my uncles, the Contralto side, played football for Harrison. My twin sister Sophia stars for the Blind Brook volleyball team. And all of a sudden, I was robbed of my senior year football season. I wasn't going to let that happen. And neither are my buddies."
Carmine Casino (with ball) displays the prowess that illustrates why he is considered one of the area's best running backs.Courtesy of Carmine Casino
So Carey, Casino and a hard core of their buddies keep practicing on their own including senior offensive/defensive tackle Eduardo Almeida (who also hopes to play D3 football) and promising freshman John Marino and Dan Glantz. Other Trojans working out include Chris Persuad, Matthew Rigano, Bennet Cuesta and Matthew and Charlie Hammer. They don't know where or when they will next play football. They just know they want to, need to, will.
Blind Brook AD speaks
"It's hard knowing other teams are playing, and we aren't," Carey said. "But we have worked hard and will keep on working hard and trust that somehow things will work out for all of us."
While the players continue to practice, work out and wonder, Saxton, the Blind Brook athletic director, pieced together the chronology that clarified the timeframe that went into Section 1 nixing the proposed merger while planning her next step for a possible football merger next year.
"I am disappointed in the decision, as I wanted to give my boys the best opportunity to play this season, and that’s what I fought to do," she said. "I literally did everything I could do on my end, even submitting supporting documents in hopes the executive committee would possibly approve the merger, but to no avail. My heart goes out to these 11 individuals and especially my two seniors who do not get to finish out their high school football career, playing the game they love."
She said she first learned of the merger turndown via a phone call from Section 1 last Monday, Sept. 18, and awaited a written notification as to the reasons why. The coaches told the team the merger was off on Tuesday, Sept. 19. Saxton received the written notification Wednesday (Sept. 20, the same day Westmore News received it via email after the paper made repeated requests to Section 1 for that decision).
In an email in response to a query from this writer, Saxton wrote:
"I received written explanation Sept. 20, for the following reasons:
*Only one of the three Conferences endorsed the proposed merger application.
*Class B football utilized pre-season rankings and placed teams accordingly, as part of their effort to provide a fair and equitable schedule for all schools within the classification.
*The challenges involved in reviewing an application for a new, first-year (Varsity) merger when a season is already underway. Specifically, in this case, the impact on other schools when schedules have already been created and the season has begun.
*The potential impact on competitive balance by adding student-athletes from a Class B school.
*The overall impact to the Class A and Class B postseason schedule and qualifying standards. More specifically, the uncertainty of how the results of their games and their opponents would be quantified in the existing qualifying standards.
*Cross-classification scheduling was voted down earlier this year when building the 2023-24 football schedules."
She said she would begin working towards a new football merger once the numbers are released.
Carey and Almeida hope to be playing D3 college ball somewhere next season. Carey will play lacrosse for the Trojans once the LAX season starts. Casino, Marino, Glantz et al hope to play football for the Trojans somewhere next year. And the hardcore Trojans continue to practice football after school for a season that will never be even as they hope there will be football in their future somewhere.
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