The Upper Dublin football team traveled to Florida to play Coconut Creek (Fla.) at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. The Flying Cardinals won 36-28.
John Lee called it a ‘once-in-a-lifetime chance,’ and that might well be the best way to describe his Upper Dublin football team’s trip to Florida for the opening weekend of the season.
The trip was highlighted by the Flying Cardinals’ 36-28 win over Coconut Creek in a game that was delayed more than two hours because of a storm and ended at 1:20 a.m.
“After we won, coach said, ‘Take a look around and soak it in,’” senior Matt Thompson said. “Playing at Wide World of Sports at Disney Resort and playing at one o’clock at night. It was a cool experience. We’ll never do that again.”
“It was just amazing,” Lee said. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance to go down to Florida as a team.
“Not many people are going to be able to say they do that and just coming out with a win - that tops it off.”
The groundwork for the trip was laid when Upper Dublin opted out of its contract to play Central Bucks West in its season opener.
“Last December, they flew us down and showed us what’s going on,” coach Bret Stover said. “In January, they came up, and we kicked off. We started our fundraisers.”
The team’s flight left at 7 a.m. last Thursday, and four hours later, the Flying Cardinals were practicing in the sweltering Florida heat.
“The facilities were amazing,” Lee said. “They were grass fields, but they played like turf, looked like turf. It was awesome.”
There was time to visit Disney World, and that evening, the team had a private dinner that overlooked the fireworks show.
“It was about the game, but it was also about bonding this group together,” Stover said. “That was one of our other missions.
“We wanted these guys to be out of their element. When practice ends, they go home, but when practice ended (in Florida), we all have to coexist, we all have to get along. For 53 high school boys, that’s not always easy, but I think it brought us together.”
Stover had been given options when it came time to choose his opponent last February.
“Basically, what they do is try to pair you with someone who’s comparable,” the Flying Cardinals coach said. “They gave me a couple of teams that were 1-9 and 0-10 last year that we could have gotten a definite win from, but that wasn’t what we were looking for.”
Stover opted for Coconut Creek, a 6A school from Florida where there are eight classifications. The Cardinals’ coach sent a tape of last year’s opening round district game against Abington to Coconut Creek, and he received a tape of Coconut Creek’s final game of the season last year.
“We both agreed we were comparable,” Stover said. “In the interim, they had three Division One signees transfer into their program.
“Of course, you can’t account for that, and of course, we didn’t have Division One signees transfer to Upper Dublin, but we were committed and we were going to do it.”
Included in those recruits at wide receiver were Emmanuel Greene (with offers from Clemson, Cincinnati, Temple, and Florida Atlantic) and Binjimin Victor (Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Miami, Florida State offers). And that's just the beginning of a list that includes Trayvon Mullen (Notre Dame, Alabama, Clemson, Kentucky and LSU offers), Alexy Jean-Baptiste (Temple, West Virginia, UCF offers) and Malek Young (Florida State, Ohio State, Clemson, East Carolina and Cincinnati offers).
It took no time at all to realize that Coconut Creek didn't take Upper Dublin all that seriously.
“They opened the week before us, so we had their game tapes,” Stover said. “They had our Methacton scrimmage.
“Their coach actually called me last week and said, ‘Hey, could you send me your varsity tape because you sent me your freshman tape.’ I said, ‘Coach, sorry, that’s my varsity.’ I said, ‘They’re my guys. We’re getting better every day.’”
The players, according to Lee, took that comment in stride.
“That didn’t really get a lot of guys riled up because we’re kind of notoriously a small team,” the senior fullback said.
Game day on Friday was not without its setbacks. Upper Dublin’s game was scheduled for 9 p.m., but a two-hour lightening delay set kickoff back until 11:10.
“We’re in a holding process,” Stover said. “It’s not like you’re just showing up at the field. You’re on a charter bus, you have a pregame meal.
“We’re sitting in Planet Hollywood in downtown Disney. We’re supposed to leave there at six. We just basically drug our feet, and we didn’t leave until 7:30. We got to the complex, and it was raining sideways, and they hadn’t kicked off the first game, so we stayed in the air-conditioned bus for another hour.”
That sort of distraction could have spelled disaster, but Stover pointed to the leadership of his seven seniors and credited them for keeping the team focused.
“Number one – you’re out of your rhythm that you’d normally have on a Friday night in Pennsylvania,” he said. “Not once did we hear kids complain. They sat and were in their zones until game time. We came out and we were ready to play.
“I told them in pregame – this is one of two things. It’s an excuse to go out and play poorly or it’s a reason to focus and go out there and play well. They did go out and play well.”
If the team needed any incentive, they got it before the game.
“One of their kids walked up to my assistant coach and said, ‘Hey coach, you ready to lose tonight?’” Stover said. “It was good fuel.”
“We were pretty fired up about that,” Lee said.
Coconut Creek took the opening kickoff and marched down the field, but the Flying Cardinals came up with a stop inside their own 20. They proceeded to march down the field but came up empty.
This time Coconut Creek capitalized, going on top 7-0, but the Flying Cardinals remained confident.
“Once we got that (first) stop and then we drove down the field – they got a turnover and scored, but once we drove down the field, I think we really settled in,” Thompson said. “We all understood that we could actually win this game and hold our own with this team even though they had impressive players on the outside with one kid going to Alabama.
“Our coaches had been harping on us that this team is just another high school football team and they’re nothing too mighty or too crazy.”
The Flying Cardinals – who scored 20 points in the second quarter – trailed 21-20 at the intermission – but knotted the scored 28-28 after three quarters and won it in the fourth quarter.
“They key for us was just thinking that we could beat them and going in there with a mindset that we can actually hang with this team and beat them,” Lee said. “It definitely sparked our confidence because we realized we’re probably not going to be facing those kind of skill guys again, but we still have to keep working.
“No one is going to lay over for us. Truman is going to be tough this week. We have to keep working hard in practice.”
Junior quarterback Ryan Stover had a big game, connecting on 15-of-20 passes for 208 yards. Thompson was his favorite target, finishing with eight receptions for 96 yards. Gary Fields had two catches for 44 yards.
Lee had an impressive day carrying the football, finishing with 107 yards and two touchdowns on 15 carries. Kaleif Lee, who was named KSA’s offensive player of the game, had 14 carries for 46 yards and two TDs while Evan Scott had two carries for 22 yards.
Middle linebacker Henry Winebrake was named KSA’s defensive player of the game.
The team arrived back at their hotel at 2:30 a.m., and the following day, the jayvee played a team from Colorado.
“Everybody played, everybody saw the field,” coach Stover said. “You have a split staff at jayvee games on Mondays, but we had a full staff coaching the jayvee kids as well, which was really good to see. They work hard too. I was really happy that everybody got on the field and felt part of the experience.”
The UD coach believes the experience will help his team down the road.
“I think we will have the confidence now that we can step up with anybody,” he said. “We’ll see what we can do.
“What we have to do now is get everybody rested because it was an exhausting trip.”
Exhausting perhaps, but it was a trip of many highlights. Lee didn’t have to think long when asked for his best memory.
“The bonding was great,” he said. “But overall, I’m going to have to go with the win. Just beating that team was awesome. It was a great atmosphere down there.”
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