H-ton Booster Club Raises Thousands for Blue Devils
Katie Reilly always finds a way to make learning new skills and practicing them fun. She did it last winter as the Blue Devil JV girls’ basketball coach when she won nine games and Coach of the Year honors and she did again this past spring as a Huntington varsity girls’ lacrosse coach. Expect it one more time at the Huntington Booster Club’s girls’ basketball camp for those entering grades 3-9.
The Huntington Booster Club’s online store has returned for Blue Devil fans. An assortment of new items are available for purchase along with some of the most perennially popular pieces of apparel. The store will remain open through February 11 so order now.
The Huntington Booster Club’s annual dinner at the Head of the Bay Club last Thursday night was an upbeat affair. A large crowd of coaches, parents, alumni and friends of honoree Paul McDermott turned out to support the Blue Devil athletic program.
Get ready to party with the Huntington Booster Club. The organization’s annual gala is set for Thursday, October 28 at the Head of the Bay Club in Huntington from 7-11 p.m. Tickets are on sale now.
The Huntington Booster Club will hold its fourteenth annual dinner on Thursday, October 28 at 7 p.m. at the Head of the Bay Club in Huntington Bay. The organization will Paul McDermott, a 1980 Blue Devil alum who as head coach led the high school boys’ lacrosse team to three county championships and a pair of state titles.
The Huntington Booster Club is interested in working with one or more Huntington High School students who would like to intern with the organization during the 2021-22 school year.
Through the years, the Huntington interscholastic athletics program has played an important role in the lives of students and community members. An integral part of the department of physical education, organized athletics in the Huntington School District dates back more than one hundred years. Since the inception of sports teams here, our students have won every possible honor bestowed on high school athletes.
The Huntington Booster Club has been established to promote and encourage extracurricular activities, particularly athletic sports, for the students of the Huntington School District. The goals of the Booster Club are to provide financial support for annual awards, purchase of equipment, summer sports programs, and refreshments at athletic events and sports awards nights. The primary focus of the Booster Club is to financially enhance the district’s physical education and athletic department budget in support of all sports. This is accomplished through annual membership dues and other fundraising throughout the course of the year. To fulfill our goals we ask that all families, particularly those with student athletes at Finley Middle School and the High School, support the athletic programs in the district by becoming a member of the Huntington Booster Club.
Over the last 13 years many committed volunteers have worked to establish and operate the Huntington Booster Club. The primary purpose of the Booster Club is to support the student athletes of Huntington High School and J. Taylor Finley Middle School. Towards this end, the Booster Club has strived to assist all of our school district's sports teams, coaches and student athletes.
The Booster Club has successfully raised nearly $1.2 million which has been used for many purposes from funding grants requested by individual coaches to building new weight rooms at Huntington High School and Finley Middle School to helping to underwrite the new physical education curriculum at the high school. The Booster Club has recently brightened up many of the high school fields with Blue Devil graphics and provided scoreboards to high school and Finley fields. A list of grants that have been made over the past 12 years is available online.
In order to maintain and strengthen the Booster Club, we are asking you to team up with us to help grow our membership. Your help and support are crucial to the continuation and growth of the Huntington Booster Club. We have found that many of the parents of our athletes are not aware of what the Booster Club does and how they can help. In fact, many of the parents of our student athletes are not members of the Booster Club. Accordingly, we are requesting that each of you become members of the Booster Club and also purchase a field banner by completing the applications available online. Additionally, the Booster Club can work with your team at either the high school or Finley, your team captain or your parent representative to fulfill your team’s specific clothing and spirit wear needs. The Booster Club can assist your team to find and order any items to meet your team’s requirements. Indeed, the Booster Club is the only vendor that can be used by the coaches and teams of the high school and Finley Middle School to supply and sell spirit wear for all our teams. All profits from such sales are used entirely to support our sports programs.
The Booster Club exists solely to support the student athletes of the Huntington School District. Further, our merchandise is available for purchase at all major sporting events, town parades and Huntington High School.
Please join the Booster Club and attend our events. Feel free to contact me directly with your ideas. Learn more about the Booster Club by visiting www.huntingtonboosterclub.com.
Sincerely, Joe Mattio, President, Huntington Booster Club