In Tony Riopelle’s 11 years as athletic director, he has fought for football to be introduced as an offering for student-athletes. Since West Shore’s 1998 inception, football has remained off the athletic roster, one of only two Brevard Public Schools high schools which does not maintain a football team. This year could change that statistic. A vote will take place during homeroom Friday, August 16 to determine whether a girls’ flag football team will become West Shore’s first foray onto the gridiron.
“I was really pushing for this,” Riopelle said. “We have people on staff who want to coach it, and girls who are all about it.”
The vote will gauge interest in various girls’ spring sports, allowing Riopelle to decide whether the flag football program will be added, and if a different girls’ sport must be cut from the spring roster.
“We have two main objectives with the poll,” Riopelle said. “Number one: make sure we have enough interest in flag football to add it. Number two: find out if we [have to] drop one of the other spring sports.”
In taking the poll, prospective girls’ spring sports athletes will rank their interest in the four sports which could be offered: track and field, tennis, lacrosse, and flag football. The former three have been staples of West Shore’s athletic program for many years, with flag football as the only newcomer.
“We don’t want just anybody’s opinion,” said Riopelle. “I don’t want somebody just going on there, ranking whatever, and they’re not even going to play sports.”
With no head coach for the flag football team set in stone, one faculty member interested in the position is teacher Austin Glezen.
“I just love everything football,” Glezen said. “I was at my high school when they started flag football in Hillsborough County. I saw the beginning of what it could be, and then ultimately what it became by the time I left.”
Custodian and bowling team coach Derrick Hamilton also said he is vying for the position of West Shore’s first football coach.
“To me, it’s just a no brainer to vote for flag football,” Hamilton said. “We’ve got girl athletes here, which we always have, and I think the addition will be a major plus for our school.”