When Timote Tonga huddled up his Birmingham High of Lake Balboa football teammates at the end of the final practice of the summer, neither he nor coach Ed Croson had any idea how the experiment would go over with the team.
Croson had spent most of the practice tying up the loose ends before the first game of the year. Substitution patterns, defensive packages, signals, that kind of stuff. He gave a little speech, then handed the floor over to Mote.
"Guys, we're going to work on our pregame chant," Croson said, authoritatively, knowing there would be a few snickers and groans that accompanied this announcement. "If we're going to do this, we're going to practice it and do it right."
Mote stepped forward. This was a new role for him, as a junior and a first-year starter. Last year, this chant was led by three senior All-City offensive linemen, so it went over with the guys pretty well. People thought it was cool. A real Tongan war chant. They didn't always know what they were saying or doing, but it sounded tough, so they got into it.
But now it was Mote leading the chant. A little junior. People liked him, but they just didn't know him as well. And when you're going to do a chant and a dance that only looks good if everyone is really into it, it helps to feel like the biggest, baddest guys on the team are leading it.
Mote started in with the chant, the haka as it's called all over Polynesia, and only about half the team joined in.
After about 30seconds, a few guys in the back started laughing. He was losing them. The two other Polynesian kids on the team looked a little worried, and started chanting louder. Last year, when there were nine "Polys" on the team, this went over better. Team chemistry develops when you're not really looking, in ways you don't really plan. A million things go into it. Some are small acts, others grand gestures. Some happen beneath the surface, over time, detectable only after they've created a reaction. For the Patriots, this was one of those moments. Croson was about to jump in, but star running back Milton Knox Jr. beat him to it. He didn't say anything. He just started having fun with it, like he does with just about everything. And once the team captain got behind it, the rest of the team followed. "That was cool," said offensive lineman Josh Periera, whose family is Samoan. "It made me realize this team is here to help me out. Like I'm not just one person in this big group. I'm a part of it." This year, Birmingham only has a small group of "Polys" in the football program. About 60 percent of the team is black, 20 percent is Latino and the rest is white, Polynesian or "other." That kind of diversity puts an unknown variable into the process of developing team chemistry. But somehow, through a million little acts like the one Mote, Knox and Croson performed at the beginning of the season, it's all seemed to work out. "We're all different (types) here," said senior defensive end Malik Jackson, who is black. "But we all just want to win. And to win, we've got to come together be a team." Jackson admits that he wasn't thrilled with having to learn the haka at first. For one, it's not a simple dance or chant, so when someone messes up, it's pretty noticeable. But he went along with it, and now says he kind of likes it. "It's pretty cool," he said. "I think it's intimidating." Over the years, Birmingham has become something of a magnet for talented Polynesian football players. "My other brother went here and just fell in love with the school," Periera said. "And my older cousin, Luke Laolagi (who went on to play at San Diego State) played here, too. It's really comfortable here." Croson and his coaching staff are happy to have them. "I remember one time, one of our Polynesian players, David Ikahihifo, broke his wrist," Croson said. "I went to the hospital the next day to check on him and there were like 20 people there with him." Brothers, cousins, aunts, uncles. "Then I went back the next day and the same 20 people were there. I said to them, `It's really neat you guys all came back over here to be with David,' and they were like, `What do you mean? We didn't come back. We all slept here.' "That was cool." Shaggy Sitani is a freshman on the junior varsity team. His older brother, Tavita, played for Birmingham two years ago, Mote is his cousin and he's related to junior tight end John Fifita on his mother's side. He explains the family dynamics of his culture this way: "All us Polys consider each other cousins, even if we don't really know how we're related," he said. Last year, the school even started a Polynesian club, and assistant coach Dino Dinelli was the group sponsor. "I loved it," Dinelli said. "We'd play traditional music, they'd teach everyone the Polynesian dances and the kids would always bring in lots of food. Everyone loved it." And then there's the chant. Croson was actually the one who came up with the idea after watching Long Beach Poly do a pregame haka. "We saw them do it, and it was intimidating as hell," Croson said. "So I went to (offensive linemen) Henry Lui and Joe Misini and said, `Hey, could we do something like that?' "Joe's mom said that was a chant to conjure up the spirit, the warrior spirit, and that if you do it, you can't lose." That's one way of putting it. Another is the way Mote tells it. "What we're going out there is saying some bad things to (the opponent). We're saying, `We're going to mash your heads up.' That's the translation," Mote explains. "The chant came from way back when our ancestors used to go to war. It was used to intimidate the other warriors." Knox just thinks it's cool. "I ain't going to lie, when I heard Long Beach Poly do it, I was scared," he said. And so the Patriots do the chant - black kids, white kids, Latinos, Tongans, Samoans, Filipinos - and then they go play football.
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