Despite challenges, East Bridgewater graduate enthusiastic to coach his old football team

East Bridgewater High's first-year football coach Greg O’Sullivan meant it when he said his team is ready to play anytime and anywhere.

This summer, the Vikings have been practicing in front of the high school as the athletic field is being replaced. For the past few weeks, the team’s temporary practice location has been in the outfield of one of the school’s baseball fields. It’s about 50 yards long, uneven, and narrow with limited space to run.

The team is also entering this season with roughly 36 players on its varsity roster. The conditions have been far from ideal for O’Sullivan’s team so far, but that hasn’t stopped his players from wanting to compete.

“We don’t care where we play. We don’t care who we play,” O’Sullivan said. “Whether it’s on grass, it’s on turf, it's in the parking lot, these kids are ready to play.”

With small numbers this season, O’Sullivan said it will be crucial for the team to stay as healthy as possible. While the Vikings head coach said the grounds crew at the school has done everything they can to keep the grass in decent shape, some players are getting banged up from the uneven surface.

“Obviously staying healthy is the name of the game for anybody, but (it’s) making sure that everybody understands multiple positions,” O’Sullivan said. “If we can be just a little more multi-faceted, that will really help us.”

With progress on the turf field still moving along, East Bridgewater will spend at least the first two weeks of the season on the road. According to O’Sullivan, the team’s game against Seekonk on Sept. 27 is up in the air as to if the Vikings will play at home or not. The game is currently scheduled to be played at Seekonk, but O’Sullivan said that the school has agreed to come to East Bridgewater if the field is ready.

The hope is that the turf is ready for Oct. 4 so that the team can have back-to-back home games against Rockland and Middleboro and host a third home game against West Bridgewater on Thanksgiving.

More: Who starts at No. 1? South Shore high school football preseason top 10 rankings

More: Find all South Shore, Brockton-area high school football coverage right here

“They’re ready. Everything’s going to be on the road for now, so they’re not going to know any different," said O'Sullivan.

“We’ve seen the adversity early, and we just keep rolling through it,” he added.

Growing pains

In a normal first year for most new head coaches, challenges include getting to know dozens of new players, installing new playbooks, and figuring out the best ways to build relationships.

For O’Sullivan, on top of all that in his first year at East Bridgewater, he also is dealing with a limited practice field, a roster size of under 40 players, and might not get to coach a game at home until October.

But that hasn’t stopped him from energizing the team ahead of the season.

“I’m a big high enthusiasm, positivity guy,” O’Sullivan said. “I believe what happens, happens, and you just got to keep running through it and that’s what we’re going to do.”

Helping O’Sullivan in his situation is his familiarity with the program, and his experience learning under other successful coaches on the South Shore.

A native of East Bridgewater, O’Sullivan graduated from the high school in 2008. He came back into the district last year after coaching in Plymouth.

O’Sullivan coached at Middleboro under Pat Kingman as well as Chris Whidden at Plymouth North. He has also coached at M2 Quarterback Academy under owner Mike McCarthy for the last six years.

“I’ve been learning from football guys across the board,” O’Sullivan said. “I’m super lucky to be exposed to some of the great minds.”

Now at East Bridgewater, O’Sullivan also has an experienced coaching staff behind him. His defensive coordinator was there when he was a sophomore, and Jim Gambee, one of the assistant coaches, was a running back at East Bridgewater in 2002.

“I’m surrounded by a bunch of really good coaches,” O’Sullivan said. “It makes my job a lot of fun.”

Having an experienced coaching staff has made it easier for the players to buy in, O’Sullivan said.

Though depth is an obvious challenge, O’Sullivan is confident that the team has a lot of talent at the top of the roster. He added that there will be nine seniors leading the team this season, but there are underclassmen who have become vocal leaders as well.

He said that players are constantly coming up to him, volunteering to play at other positions where there is a need.

As a coach with a heavy players-first philosophy, O’Sullivan’s approach is already paying dividends with his players, despite the adversity they have faced early on.

“They don't care where they’re playing, they just want to be on the field,” O’Sullivan said. “They trust each other. They love each other. They want to win for each other. And they all want to get the best out of each other.”

This article originally appeared on The Enterprise: Despite challenges, East Bridgewater graduate enthusiastic to coach his old football team