Wearing o’ the green a lucky charm for Holy Cross

By Ron Brocato
Sports, Clarion Herald
 

Kermit, the lovable frog on the once-popular children’s show “Sesame Street,” bemoaned his ambivalence toward his color in the song “(It’s Not Easy) Being Green.”

The late Henry Rando, former Holy Cross head football coach, wouldn’t have agreed more when he opened a box of green jerseys in a failed motivational effort to inspire his troops in a 1978 game against archrival Jesuit that ended in an ego-crushing 36-0 defeat.

No one ever saw those jerseys again.

Fast forward to Oct. 15, 2021, when Nick Saltaformaggio, Holy Cross’ 24th head coach, unveiled sets of green jerseys for the Tigers’ homecoming game against Archbishop Rummel. Lo and behold, Holy Cross won the game, 28-21, to snap the green jinx.

Salt’s charges had lost the previous week to Jesuit by the lopsided score of 51-7. But since Holy Cross had not beaten Rummel since 1995 – a span of 21 games – the victory over the Raiders was significant.

So, unlike the Rando experiment that became a debacle 43 years ago, the Wearin’ O’ the Green will not become a one-and-done occurrence under Saltaformaggio. He plans to break out the green jerseys for every homecoming game, with a greater goal in mind.

“One day I hope to use them twice in the year: for homecoming and when we play for a state championship,” he said.

Now, that’s positive thinking for the coach of a team that lost its following game to John Curtis, 39-20, and enters the final two weeks of the season with a 3-3 record and a date with the district leader Brother Martin up next.

Original colors

Green jerseys at Holy Cross date back to the beginning  of its football program in 1922. In those early years, Holy Cross was tied to the University of Notre Dame because both were founded by the Congregation of Holy Cross. Both schools’ true colors are blue and gold, but since Notre Dame was known as the Fighting Irish, green also became a cherished color.

Wearing of the green has brought luck before.  It was used effectively in 1948 when William “Buck” Seeber, a Holy Cross graduate and former standout player, was in his fourth year as head coach at Fortier.

His team lost its season-opening game to Port Arthur, Texas, 24-0. Having worn the green at Holy Cross, Seeber ditched the traditional Columbia blue and silver jerseys for a set of greens. His team responded by winning the nine remaining games, which included a 20-0 victory over Lake Charles High for Fortier’s only state football championship.

Seeber moved on to coach Terrebonne to a state title in 1952, then to De La Salle where he led the Cavaliers to the 1961 Class 3A runner-up before becoming director of the New Orleans Recreation Department (NORD).

But Rando wasn’t so lucky when he took over a floundering program at Holy Cross. The talent cupboard was bare.

After losing the first six games of the season entering the traditional meeting with Jesuit, the Tigers wore blue jerseys for the pregame warm-up. Then, under cover in the Tad Gormley Stadium locker room, Rando opened a box of greens and explained the Notre Dame tradition to his players. But obviously less than inspired and short on talent, the green wasn’t so lucky as Jesuit won easily, 36-0, and Holy Cross went on to lose all 10 games.

But Saltaformaggio had luck on his side and an equally young Rummel team on the opposite sideline when they met this season. Forget that Rummel held a 38-13 series edge over the Tigers since 1996 when the Raiders started their 21-game win streak. Holy Cross entered that game at Yulman Stadium with a 2-2 record. Rummel had won three-of-four games. Hurricane Ida left both schools idle through the first two weeks of the season.

The Holy Cross coach lamented that had his team been able to play against West Jefferson and De La Salle as scheduled those weeks, “I honestly think we would be 6-1 right now, with Jesuit as our only loss,” he said prior to the loss to Curtis.

But the win against Rummel has instilled a spark of optimism regarding his future as coach of his alma mater, whether it is wishful thinking or an omen of good things to come.

“Our seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade teams haven’t lost a game in three years,” he said. “And the win over Rummel is a tangible sign of the upward mobility of our football program. I’ll have 74 returning players and 61 returning twice.”

As for the green jerseys, “They represent the spirit of Holy Cross and the brothers of Holy Cross. I actually had them last year but didn’t take them off the shelf because of COVID-19.”

Saltaformaggio could have used them in 2020. After beating Chalmette, 56-7, the young Tigers lost their last six games and had two more games against Archbishop Shaw and Brother Martin canceled by the pandemic.

rbrocato@clarionherald.org