The high school football season just wrapped up, and no city teams made it to the state championships earlier this month. But one team from Elmhurst in Queens is already looking ahead to next season.

With each whistle, each hit, each broken huddle, the team gets one snap closer to making history.

“At Newtown, you rarely get to be the first to do anything,” said Wayne Crawford, head coach of the Newtown High School football team.

What You Need To Know

While coaches have been pushing to bring football to Newtown High School in Queens for decades, a recent survey found many students were now interested in playing football

Most of the guys on the team have never played football before, so this past fall was all about teaching kids the game, both on film in the classroom and in pads on the field

The team won’t play its first game until next fall, meaning several seniors showed up to practice all season long knowing they’ll graduate without ever having played a game for Newtown

Newtown is expected to have a full schedule next fall, and is still waiting on the Public Schools Athletic League to decide what division they’ll compete in

At Newtown High School or anywhere else, for that matter.

But rarely isn’t never.

“We’re 128 years old. There’s been people here for 128 years doing everything that could possibly be done,” Crawford said. “So the fact that I have an opportunity to be the first head coach in the history of a school that’s 128 years old, it’s just a magical thing.”

Crawford’s been Newtown’s basketball coach for nearly 25 years. But a recent survey found the students wanted football.

“So we said, ‘This is something we want to do. We want to bring football to Newtown,’” Crawford said.

And Crawford knew just the guy to enlist for help.

For James DeSantis, bringing a football program to Newtown has been something he’s been trying to do since 1990, when he started as the school’s gym teacher.

But the principal at the time wasn’t on board. So DeSantis taught at Newtown and coached football at other high schools in Queens.

After 34 years, he retired last year. But then his phone rang, and it was Crawford. And DeSantis didn’t even hesitate.

“It’s something special about Newtown,” DeSantis said. “I’ve been a few different places since. There’s nothing like it.”

This past fall was all about teaching kids the game, both on film in the classroom and in pads on the field.

NY1 asked Newtown sophomore Akeem Pompey if he was getting used to those pads.

“A little bit,” Pompey said. “A little uncomfortable still.”

Most of the guys are totally new to the sport, including Pompey.

“It’s my first time playing football. I’ve never played football before,” Pompey said.

But his arm stands out, and right now, he’s the leading candidate to play quarterback next year.

“I guess everybody was throwing footballs, and then they see me throwing and they were like, ‘I’m a quarterback,’” Pompey said.

The team won’t play its first game until the fall, meaning seniors, like Ramses Frias, showed up to practice for the entire season knowing they’ll graduate without ever playing a game for the team.

“I’m the roots, you know, we’re just sprouting, we’re just little seeds,” Frias said. “And in the next couple of years we’re going to be growing and growing and growing.”

The interest in football at the school is already growing. NY1 cameras were rolling as a student showed up to his very first practice.

“So this is your first day, so you should be involved in the drills, but the non-contact stuff,” Crawford told him. “And after a couple days, then you start getting your helmet, then you get your shoulder pads. It doesn’t happen all at once — this isn’t Christmas morning, you don’t get everything all at once, you earn it.”

It’s a lesson Crawford and DeSantis know all too well. And because they didn’t give up, they earned the right to teach these students the lessons only football can.

“It’s going to teach them some stick-to-it-ness, and how to navigate the world,” DeSantis said. “It really is a reflection of what your life’s going to be like. Sometimes you’re going to get knocked down, you got to get up.”

Some days, they still have to remind themselves this decades-old dream of theirs is actually happening.

“Coach D and I text each other and we go, ‘Hashtag, we coach Newtown football,’” Crawford said. “And it’s something nobody ever thought, we get messages from former players from when I started in 2000, he gets messages from players from when he started in the ‘90s, like, ‘Let me know when the first game is, we’ll be there.’”

“We have a 128-year history, and this is an aspect of it that was empty,” Crawford added. “So we get to build that history, we get to build that legacy.”

With a new team they hope will change the town for good.

Newtown is expected to have a full schedule of games for its inaugural schedule next fall. The school is waiting on the Public Schools Athletic League to decide what division it’ll play in.

The team is still raising money for a new field with a new scoreboard.

Groundbreaking on the field is expected in the spring, and construction is expected to be completed over the summer so the field is ready to go for the fall.