DAPHNE — Jubilee Stadium’s new turf field at Daphne High School is officially ready for action.

The City of Daphne joined the high school in commemorating the facility upgrades with a ribbon-cutting ceremony Friday night. Representatives on hand included Daphne Mayor Robin LeJeune, city councilmembers, parks and recreation officials as well as Baldwin County Public Schools Superintendent Eddie Tyler.

“We’ve been working on it for so long, a lot of people put it together to make it work,” said the Trojans’ current head coach, Kenny King. “This has been an idea we had back eight years ago and we went to the mayor and to the superintendent and they all worked together.”

Four former Trojan football coaches recognized

Tyler also helped make up a special group of attendees as the four former head football coaches of Daphne High School were all recognized. Tyler was the Trojans’ first head coach from 1989-1993 before David Stapleton took over for two seasons. Steve Savarese served from 1997-2003 and helped bring the first state championship back to Daphne before Glenn Vickrey did the same in his tenure from 2004-15.

“The community came out, it was a big day for everybody. I’m glad the people showed up, glad we had all the participants like the band, cheerleaders and dance team, they all came out (to make it feel like a Friday night),” King said. “And all four former Daphne head coaches all came and attended, that was big for me.”

Tyler speaks from unique perspective

As a former head football coach and the current superintendent of schools, Tyler spoke from a unique perspective when he addressed the crowd.

“What a beautiful facility. I’m not sure how many of you were around 35 years ago, but it looks a little bit different and you ought to be proud of it,” Tyler said. “And I know you are, I know there’s a lot of pride here in Daphne.”

He also shared that 35 years ago is when the decision was made to make the Daphne mascot a Trojan, however that wasn’t a foregone conclusion. They were nearly the Eastern Shore Hurricanes and would have had a similar color scheme to the University of Miami.

“But through a little bit of dialogue, we settled on the Trojans and we settled on the colors,” Tyler said. “And little do people know, unless you were here, that first year there used to be a white horse with a Trojan rider running up and down the field. But then after that season, the school system — sometimes I don’t understand the school system — said you have to stop that for liability’s sake.”

Trojans ride on

And so they were called the Trojans and after the ceremony, the current football team held an intrasquad scrimmage to give the Daphne community its first peek at the squad.

While King acknowledged how early in the process the team still is, he was pleased with the on-field product on the new surface.

“I thought they did OK, we’ve still got a lot of work to do. But you’re talking about this being Practice No. 5 basically,” King said. “This is the first day we tackled to the ground so at the end of the day, there’s some great things we saw, but there was also some things we definitely have to work on.”

The road ahead

The Trojan football team is scheduled for its first home game on Aug. 23 against McGill-Toolen with other home contests scheduled for Sept. 20 (Baker), Oct. 4 (Davidson), Oct. 18 (Fairhope) and Oct. 25 (Robertsdale).

Daphne’s flag football team will be looking for continued success after last season’s inaugural team won their area and region with an undefeated season. The Trojans went on to earn their first state qualification with a spot in the AHSAA Final Four.

Track and field athletes, as well as both soccer teams, will be among the organized teams that will take advantage of the facility upgrades. Daphne High School was one of a handful of Baldwin County Public Schools to make athletic upgrades partially using funds awarded from the Orange Beach split.

Money quotes

“I’m proud because I played on the natural field and as the world changes, generations change so it was time for Daphne to have a turf field,” King said. “I’m proud of the community, proud of everybody that played a part in it.”

“This right here is a testament of peoples’ dreams, hard work and community coming together to make something happen that we were told probably wouldn’t happen,” LeJeune said. “For years, this has been a dream and today it’s finally come true.”