‘One parish, one city, two teams’

For Jude Sittig, Angelique Credeur, Cory Gatte, Michelle Veillon and the rest of the group from both Southwind and Encore Healthcare to put together a pep rally, a dinner for both the Crowley Gents and the Notre Dame Pios players and an event that drew a couple hundred people in less than 24 hours was pretty special.
However, for the city of Crowley’s high school football fans, this has been a special season.
Both teams are 12-0. Crowley High School is playing Franklinton for a spot in the state 4A semifinals Friday night. Notre Dame will be playing St. Thomas Aquinas for a spot in the state finals that same night.
To say that both teams’ fan bases are fired up is an understatement.
Acadia Parish Assessor James “Jimbo” Petitjean served as the event’s emcee.
“We have one parish, one city and two teams that are undefeated and have done us proud this year,” he said. “Congratulations to both Crowley High Coach (Josh) Fontenot and Notre Dame Coach (Lewis) Cook and the boys on both teams.
“It would be nice to see two state championship banners up atop this stadium next season.”
He then let both coaches speak.
“To have two teams in one small town both being undefeated and going for a state title is incredible,” said Fontenot. “This has been a special season.”
When Petitjean introduced Cook, he recalled that during Cook’s first year as a head coach he played for him at Rayne High School.
“We weren’t very good,” Petitjean laughed. “I wasn’t sure he would want to keep on coaching.”
“I remember thinking that if I could teach Jimbo how to play football that I just may be able to make a career out of this,” replied Cook.
“It’s so awesome to have two teams from the same city going for a state title,” said Cook, who formerly coached Crowley High to a state title in 1989. “The only thing is that the finals are on two separate weekends.
“Hopefully everyone here will be traveling to New Orleans two weeks in a row.”
Jude Sittig, COO of Elder Outreach, which runs both Encore and Southwind Health Care facilities, thanked everyone who showed up for “coming together to show community support.”
Before the crowd dispersed and the players left for a gumbo lunch prepared by Southwind’s Bret Hoffpauir, Petitjean led the crowd in two separate “Who Dat” cheers — one for each team.
“The Saints haven’t given us much to cheer about so I figured we’d use it for y’all,” he said.