REAL TEAM WORK: Soccer players raise money for team after cuts

Nov. 16, 2007: When cuts in the school budget forced the elimination of all but varsity sports teams in the athletic program, a group of student-athletes set out to raise money for the junior varsity soccer and basketball programs.
 
By FRED HANSON
The Patriot Ledger

RANDOLPH -- Matthew Tavares, the girls soccer coach at Randolph High School, remembers the spring meeting when he told his players that some wouldn’t be with the program next year.

The reason had nothing to do with their play; it was because cuts in the school budget forced the elimination of all but varsity sports teams in the athletic program.

“It was horrible to look at that group and see girls that I wanted to play soccer, athletes who played other sports and who wanted to give soccer a try, and have to say that I have nothing for you,” Tavares recalled.

The 30 students in the room started brainstorming, and an idea took shape to raise the money to field a junior varsity squad. Tavares, who works in the administration office at Gillette Stadium on event days, was able to get two New England Patriots tickets and a parking pass from his boss, Jess Enos, the executive assistant to the stadium’s general manager.

The tickets were raffled off and raised $2,200 – about two-thirds of the cost for fielding the team.

Selling the raffle tickets “became a competition for some of them,” Tavares said. “Everything was sold by the students. What impressed me most of all was the varsity players jumping right in and selling tickets to help out their friends on the junior varsity team.”

The students are still working on fundraising, trying to cover the final $1,100 for the soccer team and to begin raising money for a girls junior varsity basketball team. This time, they are moving into the apparel business with their own line of Randolph High School Blue Devils T-Shirts.

“Everybody likes the T-Shirts,” said Tina Mata, a junior who plays soccer and is one of the student representatives to the school committee.

The shirts are $15 each and will be on sale at the Thursday’s Thanksgiving Day football game against Rockland. If they run out of inventory, orders will be taken for the shirts.

Most of the cost for the junior varsity team is to pay the coach, Tiu Hok, and to pay the game officials. The JV players rode the same buses to away games, so there was no additional transportation cost.

Tavares said the effort is helping the students acquire some business skills – and build school pride.

On the field, the team won only two games this season. With a team of 13 players and 11 on the field at a time, it meant “most of us were playing a full game,” said Samantha Gomes, 15, a sophomore.

“We just got tired the second half” when playing against teams with a deeper bench, said Christina Pierre-Louis, a goalie on the junior varsity team.

Tavares said having a junior varsity team allows players to develop skills against opponents of similar ability, making the overall program stronger.

Gomes, who is also on the swim team and plays softball, said the junior varsity team gave her the chance to try soccer.

“I always liked soccer, but never had the opportunity to play,” Gomes said.

Fred Hanson may be reached at fhanson@ledger.com.