Wednesday saw another successful rendition of the Agganis All-Star games come to an end. And even if the football game was not the most competitive one ever, a lot of interesting things came out of it.
Going through the program, and seeing the many games, and astronomical amounts of money the Agganis Foundation has awarded in scholarships, you almost forget how far it has come in the last 30 years.
Thirty years ago, in 1992, Edward M. “Ted” Grant became chairman. To that point, the foundation was a successful, if modest, entity. Did that ever change under Grant. He is really the sole reason the games exploded the way they did into a weeklong festival of athletic events.
For example, in 1992, the foundation had awarded, since its inception, $642,000 in scholarships. By the time Grant handed the keys to Andrew Demakes, two years ago, that figure was close to $2 million (it is over $2 million now).
Grant also found funds from different sources. One major one was the Thomas A. Yawkey Foundation, which, thanks to his efforts, awards four annual scholarships to deserving Boston students. At the same time, the number of scholarships locally expanded to the 17 that were awarded this year.
When Grant took over, the principal fundraiser for the foundation was the annual football game. The first thing he did was establish a baseball game, and from there, it exploded into nine games — football, baseball, softball, boys and girls soccer, basketball, and lacrosse.
Grant also created scholarships in memory of Lynn-area figures whose efforts on behalf of young athletes went over and above their job definitions, among them, the late Patrick J. McManus, and the late Item Sports Editor Edward H. Cahill.
He also established the Agganis Hall of Fame, which recognized not only founding fathers of the games, but individuals each year who have helped keep them alive.
If there was ever a mover and a shaker when it comes to the Agganis Games, it was Grant.
One long standing tradition for the Agganis Football Game has been the awarding of the number 33, which was Agganis’ number at Classical and Boston University. Ideally, though not always, that number goes to a Lynn kid, if there is one.
This year, No. 33 on the South squad went to Jesse Maggs, the quarterback for Lynn English. And Maggs did the number proud too, running for one of the two touchdowns the South scored in Wednesday’s game. Maggs is headed to Endicott in the fall.
Jason Romans of Bishop Fenwick wore No. 33 for the North squad. He will attend Curry this fall.
The highlight for me, however, came in the softball game when Gloucester’s Natalie Aiello did her best Enos Slaughter impression.
For those who were not alive when the dinosaurs roamed the earth, Slaughter was a member of the 1946 St. Louis Cardinals who beat the Red Sox in the World Series by scoring from first base on a single. The play was known as “Slaughter’s Mad Dash.”
Aiello was sent in to pinch run in the top of the seventh inning with the North trailing by a run. The first thing she did was steal second. Then, on a sacrifice bunt, Aiello took off for third and, without stopping, sprinted home to score the tying run in a game that ended that way — 9-9.
Much like the celebrated Harvard-Yale football game of 1968, this one felt like a victory for the North.
