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A
year and a half ago, not only was there was no
evidence of a football team from Harlem’s
high schools, but a high school football team
in Harlem wasn't even a thought.
But by last November, the Harlem Hellfighters
Football team had appeared – and not out
of nowhere.
This summer, when the Hellfighters report to practice,
an 8-game New York City Public Schools Athletic
League slate awaits in the fall. It will be the
first competitive PSAL football season for a high
school team from Harlem in over a half a century.
It all started with an off-handed question. It
was end of summer 2002 and former NFL wide receiver
Duke Fergerson, who'd been coaching youngsters
at a Harlem community center, asked one of the
young men which team he’d be playing with
next fall.
That’s when Fergerson found out there were
no football teams in any of Harlem’s schools,
and hadn't been for sixty-two years.
An idea took root.
And Duke Fergerson found himself sitting down
and talking with students and their parents, exploring
the idea of having a high school football team
from Harlem, one comprised of student athletes.
What he heard was overwhelming enthusiasm. He
picked up the phone and called on friends, who
called friends.
Duke reached out to District 70 Assemblyman Keith
Wright of Harlem, who offered his support. Soon
Wright and Fergerson were attending meetings with
NYC Schools Chancellor Joel Klein. They needed
a waiver from the Department of Education allowing
more than one public school in Harlem to organize
into a collective Harlem High School Football
team. And got it. The team was now "official."
Next, the team needed sponsorship. The neighborhood
school was the highly rated Frederick Douglass
Academy on West 148th Street. An athletic affiliation
was formed. The team now had a base of operation.
In December 2002, the call for football players
was sounded at the thirteen high schools attended
by Harlem's youth: First practice was set for
May 22, 2003.
In the months leading up to that first practice,
Fergerson secured the right to use the name of
the legendary Harlem Hellfighters – the
all-black volunteer 369th Infantry Regiment that
fought heroically in World War I – a gesture
that acknowledged the larger significance of the
creation of a football team from Harlem.
On May 22, 2003, Duke Fergerson waited at Colonel
Young Park on 145th Street and Lenox Avenue to
see who would show up.
Forty-seven youngsters came to that first practice
and the legions would grow to 87 over the weeks
and months. The team had very little equipment,
no games on the horizon and no academic exceptions.
Each player had to qualify in the classroom. And
the cuts came. But the young players continued
to show up after school every day to practice
for a season that didn't yet exist. They would
soon learn of the power of vision.
During this period, Fergerson was introduced to
legendary College Hall of Fame coach LaVell Edwards
of Brigham Young University and a friendship developed.
Since then, Edwards has connected to the Hellfighters'
mission, offered a guiding hand and become a mentor
to the team. Paul Fernandes, the athletic director
at Columbia University, has also became a staunch
supporter and advocate.
The fall schoolboy grid season was well underway
when word came down from the PSAL sanctioning
play for the Hellfighters. Fergerson started looking
for games.
Then, in October, when a hazing scandal ended
Mepham High's season, several Long Island schools
suddenly had open dates. One, Garden City, needed
a homecoming opponent. The Hellfighters had their
game.
Three days before the game, the Hellfighters still
had no uniforms. Fergerson had called former Dallas
Cowboys teammate Roger Staubach for advice. Staubach
wound up helping Fergerson get a $10,000 grant
from the NFL Youth Football Fund. Uniforms would
arrive the day before the game. The Hellfighters
could submit a complete roster.
On Saturday, Nov. 1, the Harlem Hellfighters boarded
a bus for their first game in team history and
headed out to the suburbs of Long Island.
Down 34-0 in the final minute, the Hellfighters
kept driving and scored their first touchdown
on the games' last play on a double-tipped pass.
Asked what impressed him most about the team,
Coach Duke, as he is now called, said: “Their
faith. For them to come out every day to practice
and keep their focus before there was even a schedule
was an act of faith that showed their true potential.”
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