In Football, Losing a Holiday Is Reason to Celebrate

Thanksgiving is a family-oriented day, of course, and as Olson hinted, many high school football players whose seasons are still alive have spent more time in recent months with their football family members than with their real ones. So seeing "your boys" on Thanksgiving feels as natural as seeing aunts and uncles and cousins around the dinner table.

After all, you must like one another a lot; otherwise, the team probably wouldn't have been cohesive enough to advance this far. And former teammates also are in town and might drop by practice or attend the coming game.

"It's just a good feeling to see all the old guys come back and show how much of a good program we had," said Arundel senior receiver Alec Lemon, whose team will be practicing today for the second Thanksgiving in a row, with a Maryland 4A semifinal at Linganore tomorrow night. "There are a couple guys that come back for homecoming and Senior Night and stuff, but for Thanksgiving, everyone's back on break unless they're playing a [college] sport."

Some schools, such as Westfield and River Hill, put out a huge Thanksgiving breakfast spread prepared by team parents. Meier, now the principal at Robinson, was more of a king-size doughnut and hot chocolate man for his teams' seven Thanksgiving workouts.

When Meier's former school, Chantilly, was going to practice on Thanksgiving two years ago, he e-mailed Chargers Coach Mike Lalli to express how special those Thanksgiving practice memories are to him, and perhaps to encourage a younger coach to make sure to relish the experience.

"Most great teams develop a sense of family," Meier said. "Really, as a coach, it's not so much that a loss in the playoffs ends your season. It disbands your family. To be practicing on Thanksgiving, you have the morning with your football family and the afternoon with your biological family."

Wilde Lake Coach Doug DuVall bypassed practice one Thanksgiving so his team could hand out food in Baltimore. Now, to underscore the significance of the day, he asks his players to go home after the Thanksgiving practice and call a relative they have not spoken to in a long time. Who knows, it might be a relative they would have otherwise seen if not for the Thanksgiving practice.

Parents in powerhouse programs generally know not to make Thanksgiving travel plans. But sometimes players and parents are surprised to learn that their team will be practicing on Thanksgiving.

DuVall recalls this exchange between players from several years back:

"If we have practice on Thanksgiving," one asked, "what do we do about Thanksgiving dinner?"

"Don't worry," a teammate replied. "KFC is open until 5 o'clock."

Varsity Letter is a weekly column about high school sports in the Washington area. E-mail Preston Williams at williamsp@washpost.com.