Teams help boy with Williams syndrome channel Aaron Rodgers
Posted: Sunday, Nov 8th, 2015
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Gage Kennington plays football for the seventh grade Star Valley Braves and he has Williams syndrome, a rare disability found in about 1 in 20,000 Americans, according to the Williams Syndrome Association.
Williams syndrome is a developmental disorder, affecting many parts of the body and it usually comes with cardiovascular problems. However, children with Williams syndrome are often very social and energetic, and Gage is no different.
“He’s one of those kids that has an infectious personality and always makes everyone around him smile,” Reed Pebbles, one of the coaches for Star Valley, said.
Kennington, dressed like any other football player, came to every practice the Braves had this year. Although his condition will not allow him to participate fully in the contact sport, Kennington is just like any other kid playing football.
“All the other kids were extremely supportive of him,” Pebbles said. “The kids have gone to school with him for eight years now — kindergarten through 7th grade — they were all familiar with Gage and he communicates with those kids as well as any kids without disabilities.”
Kennington tried out for the team earlier in the year — in his first year of football — and the coaches never thought twice about him being there.
“(Gage) came out for the team and we saw no reason why he shouldn’t be one of the team members and we just invented things as it went,” Ballard Johnson, another Star Valley coach, said. “He’s just like any other all-American kid, he just wanted to have a great football experience like all kids his age; that’s their dream.”
The coaches of Star Valley wanted to put Kennington in the game, but had to talk to the opposing coaches they played to make sure everything would run smoothly. The coaches had to agree that Kennington wouldn’t get hit and that he would have a chance to score a touchdown as the quarterback.
According to Johnson and Pebbles, they never ran into an opposing coach that was wishy-washy about the subject — all were very supportive.
“We appreciated all the other schools for what they did. No one ever questioned it and they were all on board with it,” Pebbles said. “It was a great experience.”
Rick O’Driscoll, coach for Davis Middle School, the seventh grade team in Evanston, was approached by Star Valley coaches about the situation before the game on Monday, Oct. 5, and his kids were more than happy to help out.
“It wasn’t a big deal to the kids no one said, ‘Oh, but what if it’s a close game,’ no one said anything like that. They just said, ‘Sure, we’ll do it,’” O’Driscoll said.
Johnson remembers the first time his team and Kennington ran the play earlier in the year.
Coach Johnson went out to the huddle with Gage after calling timeout to make sure he was comfortable and he knew what to do.
As Johnson started walking to the sideline, leaving Kennington in the huddle with his other teammates, Kennington turned to Johnson.
“Coach, I’m living the dream!” Kennington said.
Not only did he know what to do, but he knew how to celebrate too.
“After every time Gage would score,” Johnson said, “he would kind of spike the ball and do that discount double-check move,” (the move Aaron Rodgers is so famously known for, if you’ve ever seen a State Farm commercial).
“We just all got a kick out of that and all the kids would high-five him as he came off the field,” Johnson said.
Kennington played in all but one game this season, including the game against DMS in Evanston.
The play was cleverly named “Glory” by O’Driscoll and the Evanston coaches. With about two minutes remaining in the football game, enter Gage Kennington.
Wearing number 12 like his idol, Aaron Rodgers, Kennington set up under center to take the snap.
The call was either 17 or 18 sweep — the play for a quarterback keeper to run right or left and up the sideline.
With Evanston players diving at his feet, Kennington ran almost the length of the field — 80 yards or so — for Star Valley’s only score of the game.
“He was just elated every time (the play happened),” Johnson said. “The opposing team would always show great sportsmanship. They would run alongside him and a few of them would dive at him like they were going to tackle him. He would always come off the field and say, ‘Boy, I about got tackled on that one.’”
Every time Kennington entered the game this season, he scored a touchdown.
“Most of the kids went home and that was the first thing they told their parents,” O’Driscoll said. “There are things more important than football.”
The Star Valley team and its players were inspired by what Kennington was able to do throughout the year.
“Even though Gage has these unique challenges, he’s an extraordinary kid,” Johnson said. “He has a great smile and just has a zest and energy for life that’s just amazing. We’re kind of all inspired by how he takes things on and football is just one of those examples.”
His condition comes with a list of different disabilities that he contends with on a daily basis, but it has never kept him away from his glory on the football field.
“It just shows that there are some really good hearts out there,” Johnson said. “It’s pretty neat when everyone can come together like that, beyond the sport itself, to just do something good for someone.”
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