ITEM PHOTO BY KATIE MORRISON
Lynn English running back Daekwon Shepherd gets some work in during Tuesday’s Agganis South football practice at Harry Della Russo Stadium in Revere.
By KATIE MORRISON
REVERE — With one week to go until the 55th annual Agganis All-Star Classic football kicks off at Manning Field, things are coming together for coach Lou Cicatelli and the South All-Star team.
The squad has been practicing since Monday with Revere head coach Cicatelli, and the team is full of talent. Eight players from three Lynn schools made the cut: Daekwon Shepherd and Jeremy Garcia from English, Renzo Pappaterra, Chandler Laguerre and Danny Maria from Classical and Justin Lewis, Jahvon Van and Devin Phean from Tech.
While there’s plenty of talent from the Northeastern Conference on the roster (Saugus’ Brendan Grocki and Winthrop’s Alex Winter, along with Brandon Brito and Pho Tran from Cicatelli’s Patriots), there are tons of players from around the area that Cicatelli hasn’t gotten much of a chance to see.
There’s the four Catholic Central League All-Stars out of Malden Catholic (wide receiver Ben Scarpa, tight end Anthony Scarpa, defensive end James Irving and defensive back Tom Sullivan). There’s James O’Regan, a wide receiver out of Buckingham, Browne & Nichols who is committed to Amherst College. And for now, it’s Pingree quarterback Griffin Beal running the offense.
Beal is the only quarterback on the South roster as of Wednesday. The other QB, Marblehead’s Garret Keough, was injured during the baseball season and will have to sit out the game. Cicatelli said that if he’s tasked with finding another QB, he’s going to go with one he knows well – Revere quarterback Danny Murphy.
“But it’s all up in the air right now,” said Cicatelli Tuesday.
Cicatelli has some experience coaching all-star teams that have prepared him well for next week’s contest. He was on the sidelines for an Agganis game 10 years ago with the North team, and four years ago was the defensive coordinator for the North team in the Shriners game.
“(This game) a blast. It’s a lot of fun,” Cicatelli said. “It’s a great opportunity to get guys together and it’s a great opportunity to make new friends and build relationships that could last forever, because they’ll never forget this experience.”
There’s a personal connection to the Agganis games for Cicatelli as well.
“The big thing is that I try to tell the team the importance of this foundation and give them an idea of who Harry Agganis was,” he said. “My dad got to see him play, and my next-door neighbor was like his biggest fan, that’s all he talked about.”
Cicatelli, who has been holding practices at Revere’s Harry Della Russo Stadium, is still getting to know the team and get a feel for the personnel. But regardless of who’s on the team, Cicatelli is running the practices the same way he would with the Revere squad.
“We try to cover every facet of the game during the nine days,” he said. “You can’t leave any stone unturned in these games, especially special teams. I’m one of those guys who believes in getting special teams in early and often because sometimes you run out of time and don’t do it. It’s coming along.”
