It's 'burn the ships' time for Blind Brook football team
September 4, 2024 at 10:57 p.m.
Blind Brook football's "Burn the Ships" time was fast approaching full speed ahead.
It was days before the Blind Brook football team played its history-making first home game as a merged team with Edgemont Friday (9/6) at 6:30 p.m. against Irvington on their new home field at Edgemont, and Trojans head coach Darren Perillo knew exactly what to say.
"I will remind the Blind Brook kids of how aware they are of taking something for granted," he said. "We lost football once...cherish the opportunity to play the game. Burn the ships."
Explaining the link
That link takes some explaining, from the obvious to the not so obvious.
The obvious: Blind Brook dropped football last year because not enough would-be players came out for the team, and to try to do so would endanger the safety of the students involved. But Athletic Director Kimberly Saxton wanted the 10 to 12 boys who came out for the first days of practice to have a chance to play the game they loved. So she sought a merger with a school of similar size and academic and athletic background. And thought she had one.
Section 1 turned the merger down for bureaucratic reasons. But there was no quit in Saxton, and she continued to seek mergers with other schools for this year, Port Chester, Putnam Valley, Hastings and Edgemont among them.
Port Chester turned them down after a survey showed the area's parents didn't want the merger. Putnam Valley was too far. But time was on Blind Brook's side this time, and Section 1 finally approved Edgemont.
The saddest words
"Telling the team that our merger was rejected twice last year was the hardest thing I have ever done in coaching," Perillo recalled. "I had a senior literally crying and I couldn’t help him. It was terrible, so this year was much better telling them we had an approved merger."
It was a win-win situation, a chance to be part of a similar small-sized program that wanted them, needed them and the 11 Blind Brook players who would fit into the Edgemont offense and defense. It would result in a solid roster of 25 players. It would be a chance to make new friends. And it would be a new beginning.
But it wouldn't be easy. Because football practice is every day from 4 to 6 p.m. at Edgemont with the Blind Brook players responsible for getting themselves to and from practice because the district does not provide busing for merged programs.
Hitting the road
That usually means the parents carpool to get the players to Edgemont with the campus at 200 White Oak Lane atop a hill on the Scarsdale/Edgemont border, about a half hour away. And that amounts to a commute to a different campus, a different school, a different world really, although the football yard markers and goal posts on the gridiron are the same.
And that brings us to the not-so-obvious "Burn the Ships" reference.
It is the name of a meaningful song performed by an Australian Christian pop duo that was released on Christian radio in the U.S. on Aug. 30, 2018, peaked at number 3 on the U.S. top pop Christian charts and drew its inspiration from a historical incident dating back to the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1519. That's when a Spanish commander named Herman Cortes landed his ships on enemy shores unaware of his awaited arrival. But to make sure his men were committed to their mission, he proclaimed: "Burn the ships." And they did. That was the "no retreat" theme of the song on an album that also featured songs like "Never Give Up" and "Fight on, Fighter."
Being all in essential
"Essentially it means being all in on whatever you are doing," Perillo said. "And we are."
That's why Perillo and his Trojans as well as the Edgemont Eagles have adopted "Burn the Ships" as their motto.
Perillo, an ex-Archbishop Stepinac High School football and baseball player who graduated from that White Plains school in 1998, then went on to graduate from SUNY Oneonta, got his masters in English Lit from Lehman College and became a teacher and freshman football coach at Stepinac during his early steps on his career path. He is now in his 24th year of coaching football, the last 12 at Blind Brook. And he believes in motivation whether it be on the football field or in the classroom at his high school alma mater where he teaches English, has been a guidance counselor and a moderator of the school newspaper.
It was at Stepinac where he played for the legendary coach Mike O'Donnell who later gave him his first coaching job there in 2003. He was surrounded by established as well as future head high school coaches like Patsy Manganelli (now Bronxville head coach), Chris Halstead (now the Port Chester head coach), Joe Venice (Yonkers Force head coach), Jeff Michael (the merged Pearl River/Irvington head coach) and many more.
The coaching tree
So many more that Stepinac is like the local high school version of the collegiate coaching tree that Lou Saban established during his heyday at Alabama. Manganelli and Halstead both were also Blind Brook head coaches back in the day. Perillo stayed on at Stepinac until his friend and fellow Section 1 coach Tom Itri was hired as the head coach at Blind Brook in 2013 and asked Perillo to join him.
"And I've been coaching at Blind Brook ever since," Perillo recalled. "I learned an incredible amount from all those guys. And became head coach in 2020."
It's been what he calls a rollercoaster ride ever since. "All good times, great kids and great community, but up and down as far as team size goes," he said.
And then, of course, there was the merger after Blind Brook dropped football last year.
"As far as the merger goes, the hardest part has been adapting to the new facilities...Coach Pape (the Edgemont head coach) and the Edgemont staff have made the transition seamless so far," Perillo said. "He needed players, and we needed players and a place to play. He had an offense, and we would install our defense. So we matched up perfectly. We adopted the 'Burn the Ships' mentality, We have created team chemistry through mini-camps and clinics in the winter. And we will continue to build that team chemistry throughout our season."
Leading Trojan players
Starting with Irvington under the Friday night lights. That's when the Blind Brook players will truly merge with Edgemont in game conditions for the first time with Trojans senior fullback/defensive lineman Carmine Casino and sophomore running back John Marino the Blind Brook big guns and roster depth coming from Charlie Hammer, Chris Persaud, Elon Katz, Harrison Kuznetzow, Rocco Brunetti, Jayson Lowe, Mathew Taveras, Evan Lombardo and Daniel Glantz.
Perillo, ex-Yonkers boy made good, married to childhood sweetheart Dana, father of five kids aged from 3 to 13, coach of five tee-ball teams as well as Trojans head football coach, will be looking for his next coaching favorite moment.
"My favorite moment coaching isn't one specific thing," he said. "And winning and losing means absolutely nothing to me. I have won some big games and lost lots and lots of games. Those moments don't matter in the end. I love when a player does something he/she never thought they could do, and the look they give you after is the best moment coaching. That is what all coaches, if they are there for the right reasons, will remember...I am just glad my kids are getting an opportunity to play the game, make their own memories and new friends."
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