The success the York football team has enjoyed the past few years hasn’t resulted in it resting on its laurels by any means.
Coach Don Gelsomino’s squad has been hard at work during a busy summer schedule.
York recently returned from a three-day away trip to the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Prior to that, the Dukes competed in the Naperville North 7-on-7 tournament and will be partaking, weather permitting, in four joint practices over the next two weeks.
The Dukes, who went 6-4 a year ago and qualified for the Class 8A state playoffs, are slated to have joint practices with Wheaton-Warrenville South, IC Catholic Prep, Naperville Central and Chicago St. Patrick.
“We try to use all four of our allotted joint practices,” Gelsomino said. “We didn’t do the Week Zero scrimmage last year (an IHSA-allowed scrimmage the week before the first game). The joint practices are a good way to see a lot of things in a controlled setting. You can work on situations and individual drills. You work on what you need to work on and it’s 11-on-11, of course. It’s nice to see your guys in specific situations against another team. You are doing it against someone else, which is always helpful.”
York reached the semifinals of the Naperville North 7-on-7 event, losing to Glenbard West by a point. “It was a good, competitive game against Glenbard West,” Gelsomino said.
Gelsomino added York’s linemen also performed well in the lineman challenge (typically attached to 7-on-7 events). “The linemen did pretty good,” he said. “Overall, we had a nice showing.”
Gelsomino said he’s noticed one thing in particular this summer.
“So far, the kids are kind of hungry,” he said. “Last year, we had a decent season. We wanted a little more out of it. The seniors want that. We’ve seen good things. They want more. The players are hungry and they are working hard for it. They want to make a good run. They want to make a deep run and they are going for it.”
Gelsomino reported York has about 190 kids currently in the football program and figures once the freshman component shakes out, that number will balloon closer to 200. Currently, there are 67 freshmen during this summer session, he added.
“Our numbers are healthy. The attendance has been good,” he said. “The kids are sharing responsibilities with other sports with baseball and the basketball team is coming off a huge run last season. We’re working with the other coaches in the different sports to make sure these players are as prepared as they can be for their specific sports.”
Gelsomino said the summer overnight trip with its new destination to Whitewater this year, was a big hit.
“It’s always a good trip. We’ve been doing it for a while,” he said. “It’s a great team bonding experience. One thing we do is take the kids’ cellphones away. It forces them to talk to people and keeps them busy, but there is not a lot of downtime anyway. There are a lot of team activities like a softball tournament and time at the pool. They have fun and they are talking to each other, which is so much more important than the football stuff. They were engrossed in a football environment for multiple days. It was very valuable for them to come together like that.”
Gelsomino shares his players’ thoughts about the potential for a promising season on the horizon.
“They are capable of it,” he said. “We play in a great conference and have two tough non-conference opponents, but in the end we have to focus on ourselves and being as good as we can be. Same as this group, the coaches will go hard into it. If it all comes together, we have the potential to make a run — if everybody buys in and everybody goes all in. There are so many variables in high school football. At the end of the day, we will see where it all ends up.”
York is 17-7 under third-year coach Gelsomino. The 2024 York team finished second in the state in Class 8A. The Dukes are in search of their sixth playoff appearance in a row this fall.
