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Bangor football coach Vinnie Andrews will coach the Ronald McDonald House team in the McDonald\u2019s Lehigh Valley All-Star Football Classic on June 11. (Jane Therese\/Special to The Morning Call)<\/p>\nThe coaches, players and organizers of the McDonald\u2019s Lehigh Valley All-Star Football Classic often talk about how they\u2019re involved in this game for several reasons, not the least of which is the charity involved.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re doing this for a good cause,\u201d is commonly heard in the days leading up to the game.<\/p>\n
But Joe Henrich, the current Catasauqua football coach and former Bethlehem Catholic mentor, is involved because he experienced firsthand how worthwhile it is.<\/p>\n
Henrich is the coach of the St. Luke\u2019s Children\u2019s Hospital team, which is primarily the team that features Lehigh, Carbon and Monroe county players.<\/p>\n
The other team is the Ronald McDonald House team, which primarily features Northampton County, Palisades and Phillipsburg senior standouts.<\/p>\n
They will play in the 55th annual all-star game at 7:30 p.m., June 11 at Nazareth\u2019s Andy Leh Stadium.<\/p>\n
Proceeds from the game go to St. Luke\u2019s and the Ronald McDonald House charities, annually raising $30,000 a year, and it\u2019s the Ronald McDonald House that entered Henrich\u2019s life more than two decades ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy middle son had a chromosome issue at birth and needed to go by MedEvac to the Hershey hospital and needed to spend the first few weeks of his life there,\u201d Henrich said. \u201cMy wife and I had to spend a lot of time at the Ronald McDonald House. We came to realize what an unbelievable blessing that was to not have to worry about the financial burden of staying somewhere. They treated you like family there. The community people came in to give us support. It was awesome.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn fact, when my mother died, we had a brick laid in their new foundation outside with her name on it to serve as a memorial for us and to honor that place as well,\u201d Henrich added. \u201cMy son is now 22 years old.\u201d<\/p>\n
Henrich talked to his players about the impact the Ronald McDonald House had on his life just to show that when he says the game is played for a good cause, the words shouldn\u2019t ring hollow.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t want to make it about me, but I wanted to share my story with the guys,\u201d he said. \u201cI thought it was important for them to know and it brings the story of the game a little more to life and lets them know what the charities they\u2019re playing for really does.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is Henrich\u2019s second time as a head coach in the all-star game that provides more showcase for the football Class of 2026.<\/p>\n
Henrich has also been a head coach in the Pennsylvania Scholastic Football Coaches Association East-West All-Star Game and was an assistant in the Big 33 Classic. He understands the challenges of bringing a team together in limited time and a few practices.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor many of them, this might be the last game they ever play,\u201d Henrich said. \u201cSo, it is fun and it\u2019s fun to come together with guys you\u2019ve never met. You may know their names, but when you play against them, you\u2019ve never seen their faces. The guys get along.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what this game is about. I played in this game in 1991 and I met guys that remained my friends for many, many years after the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Henrich said that he\u2019s trying to teach the guys new terminology, but added, \u201cIt\u2019s kind of crazy because they all come from completely different systems and their heads are spinning. But this was our first practice and they didn\u2019t want to leave. They kept saying \u2018One more Coach, one more!\u2019 That was great to see.\u201d<\/p>\n
The teams will get just four practices, including Sunday and Tuesday next week with a banquet to follow on Wednesday night at the Northampton Community Center. The game is on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The reduced number of practices has produced more positives than negatives.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we\u2019ve learned with this game is that we don\u2019t have to sit here and beat them up,\u201d Henrich said. \u201cThey used to go full pads all the time and have a scrimmage at the end of the first week. The kids don\u2019t want to come here and beat the crap out of each other and maybe get hurt. They want to come here, have some fun, play some football and our job is to teach them the game, teach them what we\u2019re trying to do, but also keep them healthy. We want them to be able to play in the game and have some fun.\u201d<\/p>\n
Henrich said that what\u2019s interesting is that two of his players, Parkland product JJ Brader and Emmaus standout Peter Sherman, are guys whose fathers he knows well.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve known their dads for a long time and you know guys and all of a sudden, you\u2019re coaching their kids,\u201d Henrich said. \u201cThat\u2019s kind of funny that I am coaching their kids, and it makes me feel old, but it\u2019s also a cool experience.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bangor football coach Vinnie Andrews will coach the Ronald McDonald House team in the McDonald\u2019s Lehigh Valley All-Star Football Classic on June 11. (Jane Therese\/Special to The Morning Call)<\/p>\n
Vinnie Andrews, the Bangor coach, is running the Ronald McDonald House team. The St. Luke\u2019s team won last year\u2019s game, 31-21.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The coaches, players and organizers of the McDonald\u2019s Lehigh Valley All-Star Football Classic often talk about how they\u2019re…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207752,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,304,305,726,432],"class_list":["post-207751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-high-school-football","tag-high-school-sports","tag-sports","tag-top-stories-tmc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}