Suitland Coach's Influence Stretched Far Beyond the Football Field
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"During the holiday season, we lost one of our colleagues, a friend, a teacher, a father to most of you: Coach Lynch. So at this moment, I would like for Suitland High School to stop everything that we're doing and have a moment of silence for Coach Lynch."
The second after Suitland Principal Mark Fossett made his request via the school's public address system at 9:52 a.m. Monday, sirens screamed past the school, a rude intrusion to a display of respect that had halted conversations in hallways and frozen at least one student in the middle of a flight of stairs.
Then again, the timing of the wailing siren was fitting because few events could have jarred Suitland as much as losing football coach and athletic director Nick Lynch, 43, in a fatal car accident at 2:30 a.m. on the last day of the 2008, about a mile from his home. In that announcement, Fossett referred to Lynch as "the backbone of the school."
Friday evening, hundreds of Suitland students and community members gathered at a vigil for Lynch on the school's football field, which has been renamed in his honor. But Monday was the first day back to school after the holiday break, and for some, the first time to encounter the stark message on the school's marquee:
We Love You
Coach Lynch
Rest In Peace
And the first time to not see Lynch in the hallway, in a classroom, in his office, in the weight room, in the cafeteria working his usual shift, in guidance Chairwoman Angela Gaskin Stewart's office with his usual 1 p.m. lunch crowd, in the main office, on the football field.
Lynch's name was on a 2004 state championship banner at the front of the school and on a list of coaches outside the gymnasium. But Monday, the guy who had seemed to be everywhere at Suitland for 13 years was nowhere to be found.
"For some reason, I still expect him to show up and come around the corner," senior defensive back-running back Anthony Bush said that day. "When I got here, nah, he's really gone."
