Covington Catholic Team Retreat

Covington Catholic High School, an all boys HS in Northern KY, had a team retreat with SportsLeader this past Saturday. New head coach, Dave Wirth, organized an incredible day for his players combining faith, family, fun, food and football ... Covington Catholic has a great football tradition - 6 state championships.

The day started with Mass celebrated by Father Robert DeCesare, LC in the Covington Catholic chapel for all 80 of the football players - Sophomores through Seniors.

Then came some meetings, football practice, testimonials from alumni, Dads, a former Pro football player, Bob Crable and an amazingly inspiring talk on integrity by assistant head coach Todd Naumann. What made it that much more impressive was that Todd and his wife just welcomed their third child into the world a few shirt days ago.

The day ended with something truly special. All the players met in the locker room, put on their game jerseys and walked over to the new grotto. They prayed a mystery of the rosary and offered up some prayer intentions to our Lord and our Blessed Mother.

Afterwards they walked out to midfield and had a commitment ceremony. Parents had lined the entire field with luminaries so it really looked awesome. I overheard a few kids say that this was one of the coolest things they had ever been a part of.

Each player walked to the center of the circle with football in hand and announced to the team what they were going to sacrifice and commit to during the season. Then the players received their commitment cards from their mentor coaches.

Being that the 7th-8th grade football program has joined SportsLeader as well we have around 220 young men growing in virtue associated with Covington Catholic.

May our Lord bless all of these young men and their coaches and inspire them to do great things for their families, school and community.

God bless, Lou