By Kyle Coppola
South Lake High Football Team Volunteers For Groveland Cleanup
The South Lake Football Team volunteered to clean up Groveland this past Saturday, joining other volunteers as part of the Keep Lake Beautiful initiative. Head Coach Brad Lord emphasized the importance of volunteering and community service, stating, “Not only should a football team be a brotherhood, but it should also be about helping the community. The most important thing is teaching these young men not only how to play the game but how to conduct themselves off the football field as well. I think some of that gets lost these days; I want to make sure that we teach these young men how to give back to the community,” said Coach Brad Lord in a recent interview.
South Lake High School hired Coach Brad Lord last season. Lord had spent time with Foundation Academy and has come onboard to try and help bring South Lake Football back to prominence. The year before Lord came on as a head coach, South Lake went 0-10 as a program. This season, South Lake won their first game in over a year and ended up winning two games.
(Members of the South Lake High football team at a recent Christmas parade. They are excited to begin practice in a few weeks for Spring Football season.)
No matter how you look at it, it is a step in the right direction. “We had a great group of guys last year, including Kevens Charles, who was dominant. It was only his first year playing football, so that was a lot of fun seeing him develop as a player.” This spring, South Lake will look to get stronger in the weight room and aim to win more games next season.
(Coach Brad Lord far left has been adament about getting his players involved in community events.)
It’s great to see the team-building exercises that Coach Lord has the boys taking part in. Many of the lessons learned at Foundation Academy are being applied to South Lake High School, which is a positive step. Now the question will be if South Lake can improve in the 2024 season. We will get our first glimpse of the team in just a few months when they take to the field in May for their spring football game.
Kyle Coppola was born in Newton, Massachusetts and received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communications from Curry College in 2016. After traveling to Florida on a family vacation, he decided he could not get enough of the warm weather and made the move from snowy Massachusetts to central Florida 8 years ago.
For the last decade Kyle has gained valuable experience in social media content creation, marketing and sales, writing, video production, sports announcing and even broadcasting for local radio stations, such as FM 102.9 in The Villages and FM 91.5 in Massachusetts. Every year he volunteers at The Villages Charter High School as a play-by-play sports announcer for the football games as well as a public address announcer for the basketball games, including the annual Battle at The Villages Tournament.
Outside the office Kyle is a husband and father to two beautiful girls along with their cat. In his spare time he likes to spend time with his family, travel, play golf and swim. He is also a huge sports junkie and even bigger motorsports fan and loves to attend racing events when he can.
