Offensive line has given Pelham football stability despite constant shuffling

When Saturday's Division II championship game gets underway, it will mark a bit of a milestone for the Pelham High School football team.

Sure, it will be the Pythons' fifth consecutive title-game appearance, as the program has won the last two D2 titles and two more in D3 before that.

But it will also be the first time this season that coach Justin Hufft has had the same seven players starting on the offensive line in consecutive weeks.

"It’s been an unusual year in a lot of ways," said Hufft, who is also the athletic director at Pelham. "I think the amount of guys who have been in and out due to injuries and illnesses, there’s just been a run of it, and the fact that the team has been able to kind of achieve at a high level has been because of the next-man-up thing.

"Whoever we need to step up, steps up. They’re smart kids, they know different positions, they’re willing to learn. We are able to teach it to them in a way that they’re able to grasp, and they play hard together."

There have been a couple of linemen who haven't missed a game yet, like junior Brody Pellerin, who has started every game at center, and senior Joe Ferreira, who has bounced around to fill almost every position on the line.

And then there have been guys like Billy Nicolls, who went to the coaches before the playoffs and offered to switch from running back to right tackle when another hole opened up.

"Seeing one of our pretty boys step up to the line, get in the trenches, and play with us, it was really cool," Pellerin said of Nicolls. "We’ve also had a lot of guys step up, too, and they’ve learned quick and performed at an excellent level. I’m really thankful for them."

With the offense Pelham has run for most of the year, it has needed to get good play from the offensive line to get to where it is. The No. 2 Pythons will take on No. 4 Souhegan in the D2 title game at 1 p.m. Saturday at Pinkerton Academy in Derry.

"We’re in a double wing offense most of the time and you need the line to play well to run it effectively," Hufft said. "We’ve had guys go out. We had a guy go to the ER because of his appendix on the day of a game, so we lost a starting lineman that way. Talk about building the plane as you fly it, and we’ve had to do that a few times, and the kids have responded."

In last week's 47-21 win over Trinity in the semifinals, Steve Harvey, Pat Muise, Omar Ortiz and Mark Waden filled out the rest of the spots on the line to help Pelham run for 261 yards and five touchdowns.

"We’ve had a lot of people step up, a lot of positions swapped on the line," Ferreira said. "We had good blocking that night and it was cool to see. It was one of our better games. It feels pretty amazing to do what we’ve got to do."

In the middle of it has been a first-year coach who, before the season started, was only at the high school to help paint the hallways.

Sam Kowal had never been a coach of any kind before this fall, but after playing on the offensive line at the University of New Hampshire, he'd hoped to get involved at some point.

"Starting out, coming into this school district, I’d had a ton of knee surgeries, so I wasn’t really moving around that first year or two," said Kowal, who has worked in the district since 2021. "After that, I was really looking into getting into coaching. The previous coach (Tom Babaian) had the whole staff filled out and wasn’t really looking to add on too many. I was waiting for my chance and it just popped up over the summer."

When Babaian stepped down during the offseason, he was replaced by John Trisciani, who was looking for coaches to add to the staff. He and Hufft, who was also new to the district, heard they had a former UNH lineman in school over the summer, they approached Kowal.

"It felt like I was back in my normal role," he said. "Instead of playing, I can teach kids, which really helped me out. I’m used to the teaching aspect, but now coaching, I feel like I’m at home."

Hufft, who took over as the head coach when Trisciani stepped down before the first regular-season game, feels the transition has been so smooth, he doesn't think of Kowal as a first-year coach.

"It doesn’t occur to me much and I think that tells you it’s been seamless," Kowal said. "There’s no issues. I don’t think of him as a first-year coach. He doesn’t carry himself like one. He just picks up on things so quickly and he’s so natural with the kids, I think the fact that he knows what he’s coaching helps. He carries himself well and I think the kids respond to it. Despite having no experience coaching high school kids, it seems as if he’s done it his whole life."

The players feel like Kowal is a big reason why they've been able to have success despite the constant changes.

"It’s been amazing," Pellerin said. "He’s an amazing coach. He’s taught us so much on the line, having a completely new scheme we’ve learned from him.

"There’s been a lot of pressure on us, seeing what we’re picking up from. We took it in stride and we showed everyone we weren’t going to lay down."

The Pythons have one more opportunity to show that and another opportunity to make history.