News 25’s 25 Teams in 25 Days: St. Patrick Fighting Irish
The St. Patrick football program is bigger this year, that’s a fact. The Fighting Irish say they’re also faster this year, so how could they not be stronger this year at stop number 23 on News 25’s 25 Teams in 25 Days.
“We definitely have gained numbers, like a lot more. We used to have like 30, and now I think we’ve got like 55 or something like that.”
“We had like 28 people three or four years ago when I first started here.”
“About 20 – 28 people, 30 people. Now we’ve gained 20 more freshmen.”
Defensive end Breton Descher said, “We had 25 people maybe. I mean this year we have close to 50. It’s crazy seeing more people excited to play football for the Irish. I love it.”
Whatever the exact number is, the Fighting Irish sure do have a lot more teammates than they used to. Head Coach Trey Bailey said, “It’s awesome. In terms of coaching, this is the most excited I think I’ve ever been to coach a group of kids because there’s so much room for growth.”
Fourth-year Head Coach Trey Bailey says the program, grades 7-12, has doubled in size since his arrival in 2019 from 46 to 92. Fifty-three of those guys play varsity with enough leftover to field a JV team for the second year in a row.
St. Patrick now deep, but still relatively young with just eight seniors compared to 23 freshmen. “The future of the program is really bright. We’re just very young this year.”
Running back/ linebacker Thomas Salloum said, “We’re a very young team. Probably a half is ninth graders. So as a senior, I like to help them any time I can. Tell them any little small detail to get them better, faster, stronger.”
Quarterback/ safety Otis Brooks said, “I feel like now that we’re here and it’s our last year, I feel like – it’s kind of like we helped build up to this moment, and we’re just helping them learn that it wasn’t always like this, and now that it is, it’s great.”
Otis Brooks and Thomas Salloum should account for the majority of St. Patrick’s offensive production this season. On defense, John Hay and Breton Descher, both tackling machines, and of course, dogs. “Watch out for Otis Brooks. He’s a dog. Breton Descher, he’s a dog. John Hay, woo. He’s going to be in the ice bath later.”
Inside linebacker John Hay said, “I mean looking at Thomas, like, dog. We’ve got a bunch of dogs on our team. We’ve got great receivers, great everything. So having all those guys, like, just imagine, just what we can do.”
This year’s team, which returns 11 starters, is considered to be one of the fastest groups to ever come through St. Patrick, but the Irish are still trying to reach cruising altitude after struggling in their first season back in 3A with a Region 8 mark of 0-4 and an overall record of 1-8, their first season without three or more wins since 2016. “Really proud of the way they battled. The thing about St. Patrick, you go watch the film, the effort is always there. But we struggled up front against bigger kids, and that was a big difference.”
“Definitely. I mean seeing those games and watching the film, just like seeing our play and our play on the field, I mean this year it’s just so much different.”
“We’re ready. Last year, very emotional. I mean it’s just we put in all this work at practice to win one game. We want it this year.”
“We’re just trying to be the best team that we can. We’re trying to prove everyone wrong from last season and show them that we’re a legit team and we’re going to contend with the best of the best, whoever we need to.”
St. Patrick still just one year removed from its first playoff appearance in a decade and two years removed from its first five-win season in more than a decade. Another five dubs and the class of 2023 would match a program-best 14 wins for any four-year stretch since its inception in 2007. “Where do we go from here? How do we continue to build? How do we get from that three wins a year to six wins a year, and then grow it from there? We’re still kind of in our infant stages as a program. But we’re up off the ground. We’re starting to walk. We’re no longer crawling.”
St. Patrick opens up the 2022 season Friday at Resurrection Catholic with a 7:30 p.m. kick time.
Here’s Trey Bailey’s coaches picks. So hard to pick just one place to eat, but his go-to dish around here is the red fish. As for all-time favorite player, who said it had to be football, Michael Jordan for basketball as well as Brett Favre for football and Ryne Sandberg for baseball. Favorite championship moment was 2016 World Series Chicago Cubs.
