By: Matthew Terio
It was my Junior year, our record was 9-2. It was the D2 State Championship game at Gillette Stadium versus Catholic Memorial. The scoreboard read 28 – 7, and there were only thirty seconds left in the game.
I stood in the huddle trying to catch my breath. The cold December air hit my lungs like ice every time I inhaled. My helmet felt tight on my head, and sweat was dripping down my face mask even though it was freezing outside.
“One drive left. Let’s finish this one for the seniors,” Tommy said.
We knew we weren’t going to win, but we weren’t going out without a fight.
I got in my stance and reached for the ball with my right hand and aligned the laces with my fingers, getting ready for the cadence.
The crowd was screaming, but I was so focused on the game that it felt like background noise—the adrenaline made everything feel both loud and slow at the same time.
Tommy got under center and started his cadence. “Down set… Green 18, Green 18, Set Hut!”
I snapped the ball.
Tommy turned and faked the hand off to our running back, and he looked toward the right side of the line. Our senior wide receiver was covered, but it was 4th down, and he had one last play left. Tommy threw it high for a 1-on-1 jump ball, and it was incomplete with the other team’s safety hitting him low, causing our senior wideout to fall on his head, getting concussed.
Then the whistle blew.
For a second, I didn’t move. I just stood there on the turf, trying to figure out what happened. When I looked up, I realized the season was over, and yet again, we lost another state championship.
In front of me, I see all my teammates crying, and the opponents cheering.
At first, the stadium was weirdly quiet.
Then their fans started going crazy.
Their sideline stormed the field, celebrating. Players were jumping around, helmets flying everywhere. Meanwhile, our team just stood there like someone had pressed pause on us.
I went over to shake hands, and I kept thinking the same thing over and over.
This isn’t fair, it’s a private school vs. a public school.
The coach talked to us after the game and, with tears on his face, he looked defeated. He wanted us to win so badly and told us how life isn’t fair, and we’re all just a bunch of fucking dogs that fight to the end.
“Come on, Matt,” said Danny, my tight end who always pushed me to be better.
“I’m so impressed with how well you did this season. I honestly thought you sucked, and you really surprised me.”
I grabbed my helmet and pads with tears going down my face and sharp pain in my neck, and went as quickly as I could to our bus.
We were all silent on the bus, except that we were all thinking to ourselves about ways we could have changed the outcome, but none of us could think of anything.
All I knew was that the other team was lifting the championship trophy while we walked back to the locker room.
Nobody talked when we got inside.
Usually, the locker room is loud after games—guys joking around, music playing, people yelling about big plays. But this time it was silent except for the sound of shoulder pads hitting the floor.
Someone kicked a locker, and it slammed shut with a bang.
I sat down and slowly untied my cleats. My socks were wet and smelled like turf and sweat.
The coach stood in front of us for a minute without saying anything. Then he finally spoke.
“I know this hurts,” he said.
He paused and looked around the room.
“And honestly, it should.”
A few guys nodded.
“But remember this feeling,” he continued. “Because next year you’ll decide what it means.”
He folded his arms.
“You can let this break you… Or you can let it push you.”
That night, the seniors thanked all the underclassmen for the season they helped them with.
I remembered to myself that I couldn’t go out like this next year and dreamed that night about how next year my teammates and I will be holding that trophy.
Next year wouldn’t end like this.
Most people think football players just relax once the season ends.
That’s not really how it works.
A few weeks later, I started going to the weight room before school. It was still dark outside when I got there at six in the morning. The gym lights buzzed overhead, and the place smelled like rubber mats and metal weights.
Our new team was hungry for a state championship, and it was only January.
We started the lifting off with zercher squats. Nobody liked these, but pain was irrelevant to us.
Rep after rep.
Every time my legs started shaking, that score popped into my head again.
I couldn’t end my senior season without a state championship. By February, the weight room was full almost every morning before school.
Linemen were bench pressing in one corner. Receivers were doing pull-ups. Someone always had music blasting from their speaker.
One morning, our coach had us doing zercher squats, where you place the bar in between your arms and squat until your elbows hit your knees. I remember this day very specifically because I pushed myself so much that I ended up throwing up outside the weight room in the hallway. I just finished a rep of zercher squats, and before I did the rep, I didn’t feel good at all, but my teammates were making me go, so I couldn’t bail out. When I finished the rep, I immediately started walking towards the bathroom, but it was too far away, and running would’ve made me throw up faster. That’s the day I remembered the most over morning lifts.
By the time summer practices started, the whole team felt different.
It was the end of August, and the heat was brutal. The sun beat down on the field, and the turf felt like it was burning through our cleats.
The team was up in camp Mataponi, located in Naples, Maine
The coach blew his whistle.
“Again!”
We ran another set of sprints across the field.
My lungs felt like they were about to explode.
Tyler jogged next to me and laughed.
“Remember when we thought the season was the hard part?” he said.
I shook my head.
“Nope. This is worse.”
But deep down, I knew something.
All this work was building toward something.
One day, at the end of camp, the Seniors initiated some team bonding with the underclassmen through boxing matches inside our cabins. Little did we know this was going to be a big mistake.
A week later, when school started, we began to notice football student athletes being removed from class and meeting with the administration. Chatter began swirling throughout the circle of players, videos from past camp experiences were being presented, and the concern among players began to rise. Outside of academics, practice resumed as normal, with a growing worry in the back of the minds of all players. One day, after practice, the coach informed us of mandatory hazing training once a week for the remainder of the season, resulting from the boxing at camp.
Shortly thereafter, our boxing matches were all over social media and local news stations. The matches were being referred to as hazing, and many locals affiliated with the school became ’very concerned,’ while others felt the District was ‘overreacting.’ The KP football program had always made headlines because of its winning track record, but now the headlines were for the wrong reasons.
Despite our coach’s suspension, the first game was electric. The stands were packed, the band was playing, and the whole team had this energy that was hard to explain. We won 35-0, and this feeling of euphoria carried us for the entire season.
We kept winning, week after week. By the middle of the season, we were 7–0, and people around school started talking about how good our team looked. But inside the locker room, nobody really talked about it. We all remembered the year before and our Super Bowl loss. We were laser-focused, not getting caught up in the now, but focusing on the season going forward.
One afternoon after practice, Tommy sat next to me while we were taking off our pads.
“Feels different this year,” he said.
I nodded.
It really did.
By December, we were 12–0.
And somehow, we were heading back to the same stadium for the state championship again.
Walking onto that field felt strange. The same bright lights were shining down. The same cold wind was blowing across the field.
For a second during warmups, I just paused, looked around, and said to myself.
“Oh yeah, we’re definitely winning this game.”
When the game started. Marshfield started hot with a game-opening touchdown drive to put the score to 7-0.
We got the ball and ran it right down Marshfield’s throats and tied it up to 7-7.
The game stayed close the whole time. Two minutes left in the half, with the score 14-14.
Everyone in the stadium was standing.
The quarterback dropped back to pass.
And saw Davey, our wide receiver, open 40-yards downfield and catch a bomb pass from Tommy.
This put the score to 21-14 at the end of the half.
We started the second half off strong, scoring three more touchdowns, feeling unstoppable.
One play I remember the most was when my team was driving down the field 5-yards at a time, and the other team was getting tired of the abusive running game. I was just not stopping, and I drove my opponent, who lined up across from me, and picked him up off his feet and drove his back into the ground. I looked back at our sideline, and my coach was going crazy, giving me the happiest look I’ve ever seen from him.
The fourth quarter came, and I could feel the trophy in my hands because there was no way Marshfield was stopping this team.
We ran down the clock some more, and with happy vibes from everyone, we started counting down.
And then it finally happened. We were state champions, and in that moment, I knew all that hard work would finally pay off.
When they handed us the championship trophy, it felt heavy in my hands. Everyone was taking pictures and celebrating, but I just stood there for a second, looking around at my teammates.
All the early mornings.
All the workouts.
All the running in the summer heat.
It all started with that one play the year before.
The one where we came up one yard short.
And weirdly enough, I realized something in that moment.
If we had won that game junior year we probably wouldn’t have worked as hard as we did afterward.
Sometimes falling short is exactly what pushes you to come back stronger.
And I remembered what it felt like last year in the locker room, seeing all the seniors crying and the coach telling us, “But remember this feeling, because next year you’ll decide what it means.”