By Cambria Roth
Rebecca Merrell, Lindsey Kariker, Hannah Roth and Jason Pallister stand on the sidelines, watching the Silverton High School football team fight for a win. Roth fetches water for the exhausted players, Merrell keeps track of the offensive stats, while Pallister records defense and Kariker wraps ankles and helps with anything medical.
“There is a sense of family there even for us. Games are still intense and even if they lose, we lose with them,” Merrell said. “It is like a huge family with a whole bunch of brothers.”
Widely overlooked, the four team managers are the operation behind the Foxes football team. At practice they hand out jerseys, wrap ankles, pump up footballs, enter stats, keep up with housekeeping work and anything else that they can do to make the coaches’ jobs just a little easier.
“My favorite part would have to be handing out jerseys,” Roth said. “We hang up all of the seniors’ jerseys in the locker room and it’s just fun to be there when everyone comes in because they are all excited for tomorrow night’s game and pumped up.”
The managers attend every practice, game and team dinner. They join in the team tradition of eating at the Towne House in Silverton after every home game. Merrell and Pallister even joined the team trip to Montana.
“There were lots of intense volleyball games, rafting down rivers and climbing up rocks,” Merrell said. “It was so much fun to bond with everyone.”
As managers they have the opportunity to feel connected to the team.
“The intensity on the sideline, Friday nights under the lights, hearing the drum line is all phenomenal because it’s so intense down there with the guys,” Merrell said.
Not only is being a manager electrifying on those Friday nights but it is helping all of them prepare for what they would like to do in the future.
“I wouldn’t mind being a coach for the YMCA one day, so this helps me interact with people and get prepared for that,” Pallister said.
Kariker has been involved with the Sports Medicine program at Silverton High and would like to someday be a physician’s assistant.
“This is a really cool way to volunteer and help out because I love being involved with sports even though I don’t play,” Kariker said.
After being a manager for three years, Merrell has decided that she would like to carry this on to college. “It would be great to major in sports management,” Merrell said. “I don’t know the specifics yet, but if I could go to the NFL and do this too it would be fantastic.”
The group has benefitted in other ways as well. The locker room message at halftime isn’t lost on them.
“The speeches from the coaches are really inspirational and are life lessons, not just talks to get the team to win,” Kariker said.
“It gets emotional and you can see it in the guys’ faces that they are really trying to focus and find it in themselves to win the game.”
