Pac-5 football has been gone for two years, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t any interest- a few Mid-Pacific students have been trying to bring back the football program.
“I started this movement because we have to get a football team and need to get this going,” sophomore Larkin Nakasone said.
Larkin Nakasone has played an integral part in bringing football back. He and a few other students have made a petition and got a large number of groups of people who would be interested in participating to sign. So far he has gotten over 40 signatures.
“I just want to play football and play for the school,” Larkin said.
Larkin and the group of people he’s gotten just want to play for the school and bring this sport back.
Kyler Agan, a mutual of Larkin’s has talked to one of the board members of school about this unsuccessfully.
Larkin’s aim is merely to bring Pac-5 back to school and represent Mid-Pacific to include more sports at the school.
Unfortunately, some larger authority figures interfere with his goal.
“When it comes down to big decisions regarding the athletic program, then it comes to me,” School President Paul Turnbull said.
Turnbull is in his 11th year as president of Mid-Pacific and doesn’t really take part or have concern over little decisions. However, when it comes to something such as removing a whole program, his decision is vital in the process.
“Yes. I had a say in whether Pac-5 was coming back here because it affected not just our school but others,” Turnbull said.
Since this was a big decision regarding not just Mid-Pacific but other schools as well, he ultimately had a big say in whether or not the program would be maintained.
“There were about 40 or so football players as a part of Pac-5,” Athletic Director Scott Wagner said.
Before Covid hit, there were many Pac-5 participants. This included players from Mid-Pacific and other schools that practiced on the soccer field.
Most of the students that participated in Pac-5 were from other schools and didn’t respect the campus as if it was their own. Despite the energy it brought here, it just wasn’t benefiting the school as much as it should have.
“Most of them weren’t even Mid-Pacific students, and they didn’t have the same respect,” Wagner said.
Despite these problems, there were many other positive experiences with Pac-5. The entire program has won some awards such as the “prep bowl” and have had special students that excelled when they played for the team.
Still, other factors led to the Mid-Pacific not participating.
“There was a decline in the number of participants and no schools were allowed to play because of social distancing,” Turnbullsaid.
Since Covid hit, There was a drop in the participants and people weren’t allowed to play because of social distancing. After Covid was over, it only made sense to end the program because of the dwindling number of participants and other factors that affect the program.
“After the pandemic, we had about 11 players left that were still interested,” Wagner said.
Before the pandemic the program was doing well and it wasn’t until after players and schools had to abide by the social distancing rule and protocols. Which was a pretty big drop for the program and everything about it.
“Next time sign-ups and registrations were, I would say we had about seven or so participants left,” Wagner said.
After the pandemic had ended, it didn’t make sense to enroll back into the program. It also took up the locker rooms, the wrestling room, and other facilities to keep up the program.
athletic trainers, coaching staff, and all those kinds of people that make this all happen. Expenses played a big role for football because it took a lot of money.
“Keeping all this in mind, We really made the decision that we were going to sunset our participation,” Wagner said.
With everything that had happened, it really didn’t make sense to keep up football at Mid-Pacific.
“Now instead of playing sports for Pac-5, we’re focusing on playing specifically for Mid-Pacific,” Wagner said.
“If not for the pandemic, football just wasn’t something to continue because of the decrease in participation of different levels and teams,” Turnbull said.
Even if the pandemic never happened, football just wasn’t as successful as the other sports in school and considering all the different expenses and equipment, it just never looked too good.
“Even if there were the number of people needed for the sport, from 7th grade to 12th grade, that would be problematic for us because of the decrease in participation for other sports since this is a fall sport,” Turnbull said.
So even if the school did have the amount of participants interested in playing, sports like baseball, basketball, and all other fall sports would decrease since football would be something that takes up that space which wouldn’t be too good for school.
Also if our school didn’t have a good infrastructure to host these games, then those athletes would have a negative experience with not good quality equipment, good trainers, and good facilities then that could lead to injuries.
“So even if we did have that right amount of participants now, we still wouldn’t get back into that game. Based on everything that has to go into this sport. Which is why it has been out all this time too,” Turnbull said.
“You would need 40-50 athletes per team, intermediate and varsity. I just don’t see that happening,” Wagner said.
With all that was said, it wasn’t just about the money, it was about the students interested and all that needed to participate in the program.
All efforts are being put into other sports associated with Mid-Pacific because it was shown that students wanted to be associated with the school rather than Pac-5.
“Just because football isn’t an option, doesn’t mean there aren’t other good options, and I would encourage anyone and everyone to get involved with all the other good opportunities we have here.” Turnbull said.
