All 'Coop! Coop!' as he thanks Lake Park coach
Winfred Cooper got the opportunity to say thanks Friday night, and he did so with a smile that could have stretched from end zone to end zone at Elgin High School's Memorial Field.
"Thanks ... thanks," beamed Cooper as he shook hands with Lake Park junior varsity coach Nana Agyeman after the first quarter of Elgin's homecoming football game against the Lancers.
Cooper then raised his index finger in the No. 1 salute to the Lake Park players on the sidelines, who in turn gave him a rousing ovation. And finally he ran back across the field to the Elgin sidelines, with the Maroon student body chanting "Coop! Coop!" all the way.
Cooper, who is autistic, won fame this week after the Daily Herald published a story about him scoring a touchdown in a JV game against Lake Park last weekend. Since the touchdown and the story, Cooper has become quite the celebrity while also bringing a positive vibe to the school and community.
He was even honored at Elgin's homecoming pep rally Friday afternoon, where he was presented a framed version of Thursday's Daily Herald story by Elgin Area School District U-46 superintendent Jose Torres.
It was Agyeman's idea to set up a play Cooper could score on, but Agyeman stressed that Cooper had to do the work.
"I told my wife, if Coop hadn't caught the ball none of this would have happened," said Agyeman, who starred on the football field for Lake Park and the University of Illinois and is now in his second year as a full-time coach at the Roselle school. "We teach our kids there's opportunity for everyone. It's not just about winning. This is a learning experience for everyone. There's sportsmanship involved and there's community involved. These two rival schools have learned something about life because of this."
Elgin High Principal Dave Smiley, who coached against Lake Park head coach Andy Livingston when Smiley was a coach at Streamwood, continued to stress the positives that have come from the Cooper story, and he thanked Lake Park as well.
"I'm not surprised it was Lake Park. Andy and I go way back and if there was one school in the Upstate Eight Conference I would expect to do this it would be Lake Park," Smiley said. "This is just a tremendous understanding of what we're doing. Sometimes we lose perspective. ... We all do. But this keeps things in perspective. (Lake Park) has it and we have it."
What was Cooper's wish for homecoming?
"I'm going to tell the coaches I want to score another touchdown for Elgin," he said.
And even though that didn't happen in the Maroons' loss to Lake Park Friday night, the one touchdown Cooper did score has touched the lives of many.