Teams ready for Friday Night Lights

[attach]2308[/attach]It’s coming.

The game that everyone who has ties to East York Collegiate Institute or Leaside High School talks about all season long is set for Oct. 8.

Friday Night Lights is back for its fourth season at East York and already head coach Glenn Edwards is starting to hear the buzz for the evening game starting at 7 p.m.

“One of the biggest challenges we have as a coaching staff is keeping the players’ attention,” he says. “We have two to three games to play before we even get to Friday Night Lights and we have to focus our attention on each and every one of those games.”

What makes Friday Night Lights unique is the majority of high school football games take place during the afternoon, making it difficult for fans to come out.

The excitement and intensity an evening game brings is drawing attention from the whole community, and players too.

While players on both sidelines are focused on the game, Edwards sees them peeking into the stands to see who is watching them play.

“When the game is actually started you will have some players checking the stands to see who is there and the teammates talking about where there parents are,” he says. “They are still paying attention to the game, but every once and a while they are stealing a glance over to the stands to see where their friends and family are sitting.”

Being able to put together a game like Friday Night Lights takes a lot of commitment from the school and the community.

Edwards is grateful to see so many teachers and volunteers get behind the unique initiative.

“Last year was our fourth year back doing the Friday Night Lights game and what we are finding is it takes a lot of planning and teacher coordination to pull off this game,” he says, adding they have a number of teacher volunteers who devote their time that evening.

“We don’t do any of this without the teachers and the community coaches. We are always looking for community coaches because time restraints are difficult. These people are the life blood and the success of any sports team, whether it is here at East York or any other school in Toronto.”

So what makes a game on a Friday night under the lights so special?

The answer is two-fold, Edwards explains.

“The hype starts before the game from the community because they are looking forward to it as well,” he says. “As soon as they know someone who either plays on the junior or senior team, they are looking forward to the game and asking the player when the Friday Night Lights game will be.

“The other side of it are the players who come into the program who have never played football before are wondering what Friday Night Lights is, or have had relatives who have played here before and are wondering when they can buy the tickets.”

Since East York began playing football under the lights, Edwards has seen a number of other schools start up their own version of the games either on Friday nights or on Saturdays.

“We are starting to see more and more games pop up, which can definitely be a scheduling nightmare, on a Friday night or a Saturday,” he says. “While many of the other schools may try to copy the Friday Night Lights theme of our game, it is always a special game because we started it here at East York.

“It is always difficult to schedule these types of games because you have to get the referees, who also do CIS (Canadian Interuniversity Sport) games as well as high school games.”

Heading into this year’s match, Edwards is expecting another competitive game.

“I think … last year’s win by Leaside at the Friday Night Lights will set the stage for a real good rivalry coming back (this year),” he says. “Leaside has always been a very good team and we have been fortunate that the breaks went our way in the past, but last year they didn’t.”

While it rained last year, Edwards wants his players to be prepared for whatever Mother Nature brings their way.

“We know we have to have all of our units (offence, defence and special teams) going full throttle and if we don’t, Leaside will take advantage of those mishaps,” he says.

“They are that good of a team that we have to be up and aware of our surroundings the whole time or Leaside will take advantage of it and we will find ourselves on the wrong side of the game again.”