From the Bench: Del Norte High honors military veterans with camo jerseys

By Michael Bower

Athletics at Del Norte High School has taken huge strides through its first three years of competing at the varsity level.

The girls lacrosse program has captured a San Diego Section Division II title, the girls volleyball program hosted a SoCal Regional playoff game and several teams have already won league championships.

But it isn’t only winning and losing that defines a high school athletic department. In fact, any coach or athletic director will tell you prep sports are a vehicle for teaching young student athletes how to succeed in life and in the real world.

If you were out at the Del Norte football game last Friday night, then you would know the school is succeeding in that area, too.

The Nighthawks’ varsity and junior varsity football teams celebrated Military Appreciation Night by wearing specialized military camo uniforms with a different name of a military veteran on the back of each jersey.

At the end of the game, each of the 52 veterans represented on a uniform were announced and either them or a representative in their honor were handed the jersey to keep.

“We had more players than 52 so we put ‘Freedom’ on the back of some of the jerseys,” Del Norte athletic director Mike Giaime said. “Then when the Marine Corps Color Guard came out we actually gave them a jersey, too.”

The Bench was even more impressed when it found out the idea and a lot of the fundraising was done by Del Norte football players Kayden Clements and Marc Gallant.

“We saw that Dana Hills High did it and we really liked the idea,” said Clements, who proudly wore the military camo with his grandfather’s name, Sgt. McCoy, on the back. “I thought it was a great way to show our appreciation for the military and I have a lot of military in my family so I really wanted to do it.”

Unfortunately for Clements, he broke his thumb the week before and was unable to play in the game. Before the game, he was still upbeat and excited about handing the jersey to his grandfather afterwards.

“I already have so much respect for that man,” he said. “I love that guy so much and it is going to be amazing for me to give him this jersey.”

The Bench and everyone it spoke with that evening thought the uniforms, made at a special discount rate by Full-Gorilla Apparel, looked amazing.

The jerseys had a mixture of Del Norte’s school colors (gold, white and blue) and a Nighthawk on both shoulders.

Clements said the cost of the jerseys was around $1,500 thanks to the discount. He said they were able to raise about $2,000.

Many of the donations came from parents of players and from the 4S Ranch Community. Some paid $100 to have a jersey made with one of their veteran family member’s names on the back.

“There are a lot of people that live in our community that support the military,” Giaime said. “San Diego is a military town and a lot of the veterans are getting older and haven’t been recognized properly and even some of the ones that fought in our latest conflict haven’t been recognized.”

Clements and Gallant may have started a tradition at Del Norte that is here to stay. At least that is the hope.

“I hope this is not a one and done,” Giaime said. “I want this to be an annual thing. The kids went beyond themselves and that is part of our mission at our school, being globally aware ... and the kids take that to heart. You can’t just have a mission and not live it. They live it.”