Northampton ‘had an angel watching over’ it in victory
Konkrete Kids rally past Stroudsburg days after death of beloved assistant coach
John Toman’s Northampton football team trailed Stroudsburg 14-0 after one quarter Friday night at the Mountaineers’ Ross-Stulgaitis Stadium and was still down 14-7 at halftime.
But Toman had a calm about him as he talked to his players at intermission.
“We weren’t playing that bad,” Toman said. “Their running back [Andre Reames, Jr.] is the best back we’ve faced and he broke two touchdown runs on us. We had a blown assignment here and there, but we weren’t playing that bad.
“We didn’t yell and scream at the kids. We said we needed to correct a few things and make some adjustments.”
Northampton had something else going for it: The Konkrete Kids were playing with Mike Gurdineer in their hearts and minds.
Gurdineer, a middle school teacher at Northampton and the team’s offensive coordinator, died two nights earlier after a battle with COVID-19. They didn’t want to let him down.
In honor of Gurdineer, Northampton scored 28 unanswered points in the second half and broke away to a 35-14 Eastern Pennsylvania Conference North Division victory to remain undefeated.
At one point in the second half, Toman, who considered Gurdineer his best friend, became emotionally drained and had to sit on a bench along the sidelines for a few minutes.
It was probably the most difficult period of time in his coaching career, but considering the way his players and staff handled the extraordinary adversity, it was one of his proudest times as well.
“I didn’t want to put pressure on the kids and tell them they had to win the game for Mike or anything like that,” Toman said. “I know they wanted to win for him. I didn’t have to add any more pressure.
“Mike would have wanted us to go out and do what we love to do, and that’s play football. So that’s what we did. But I felt like we had an angel watching over us.”
Toman and Gurdineer were both in their first seasons coaching together at Northampton, but they spent more than a decade together at Southern Lehigh.
They became much more than coaching colleagues.
“We spent most weekends together and our families have done vacations together,” Toman said. “We did Disney World trips twice together. He was my best friend and his wife, Melissa, is my wife’s best friend.
“Melissa joked that Mike would never hang up the phone on her except when he wanted to talk to me. He’d say, ‘John’s on the phone, I’ve gotta go.’ We’re very close and that’s why this has been much more difficult than just losing a member of your staff. “Mike was family.”
When Toman resigned after leading Southern Lehigh to a District 11 championship in 2019, there was little doubt Gurdineer would resign as well, even though his stepson, Blaze Curry, was a part of the Spartans program and is now a senior captain.
Gurdineer was especially proud of Southern Lehigh’s 2019 team because he helped to develop many of those kids as the program’s middle school coach.
While Toman spent the 2020 season as an assistant coach at Allentown Central Catholic, Gurdineer didn’t coach anywhere, but he became a middle school teacher at Northampton.
While the search was going on for the new Konkrete Kids coach after Kyle Haas resigned to become the Bethlehem Catholic head coach, Gurdineer worked with the players and kept them together until his friend Toman was hired and could officially work with them.
“A lot of the kids knew who he was even before I got there because he taught there and he was around all the time,” Toman said. “He actually ran for the show for me until I got there because we had to deal with COVID and not everyone could be in the building.
“Then when I was hired, I
couldn’t get there from Central until like 3:30, so he would run the weight room.”
It was a no-brainer for Toman to make Gurdineer the offensive coordinator and also a line coach.
Gurdineer was with the team throughout the offseason and the week of heat acclimatization, Aug. 8-14, but then became too ill to be around the team.
“Mike was so excited to be coaching at Northampton,” Toman said. “One of the things that breaks my heart is that he never got to call the plays in one game. That’s the thing he was most excited about.
“He did such good work in the offseason, getting us ready to go. It breaks my heart he didn’t get that opportunity.”
After Gurdineer died, there was considerable conversation about whether to postpone the Stroudsburg game. Ultimately, though, the team decided to have a practice Thursday night and
go ahead with the game, knowing that Gurdineer would have wanted that.
“It was therapeutic to be together as a family and have a practice,” Toman said. “For just an hour-and-a-half, the coaches and kids had a distraction and something that would take their minds off what they had lost.
“Thursday was such an emotional day, and for them to go out and get back to football was good for them.”
Toman said more difficult days are ahead as Gurdineer’s public viewing and private services are scheduled for Friday and Saturday. The team is scheduled to host East Stroudsburg North on Friday night.
The K-Kids will move forward with Gurdineer’s passion and spirit for the game and life in their hearts and consider themselves fortunate that they got to be with him, no matter how short a period it was.
“Mike was about anything that was good for kids,” Toman said. “If it would help them in any way, he was for it.
’He loved kids and had a special place in his heart for the linemen, but he loved everybody, and there was nothing he wouldn’t do for you. If one of our coaches needed help to do something at their house, he would stop whatever he was doing and he’d be there to help.
“He was always there for you.” And Gurdineer will be with this Northampton football team in spirit as it competes for championships.
“It has been an emotional time and it will continue to be,” Toman said. “I think we’re all a little drained right now, but we’ll get through it because that’s what Mike would have wanted.”