Football Town: Barrow, Alaska | Sneak Preview

[Music] the grandeur and richness of alaska's beauty is a reflection of nature's genius glacier garb mountains stretch to the horizon braided rivers meander through valleys carved out eons ago alaska is vast and magnificent but its beauty is balanced by a sometimes punishing climate 320 miles above the arctic circle lies the northernmost town in the united states when the sun sets in mid-november it isn't seen again until late january and temperatures can reach 40 below [Music] this town at the top of the world is called barrow alaska and on this blue tundra just a touchdown pass from the arctic ocean play as the one and only arctic high school football team in america the barrow whalers oh nice we're no huge football program compared with texas or alabama or california this is football at the top of the world barrow alaska a town so isolated it's not connected by road to the rest of alaska nearly five thousand people live here sixty-one percent of them the nupiad eskimo native to this part of alaska they've survived thousands of years by living off the land subsistence hunting fishing and wailing as a community they continue to embrace the ancient their heritage and cultural traditions they also embrace the modern high school football [Music] [Music] it is 6 15 in the morning folks it's another balmy august day in barrel the temperature outside is 34 degrees and looks like some freezing rain might be on the way football season is just around the corner don't forget to cheer on your local barrel players go whalers half of the world this is far from massachusetts i tell you it's a different way of living a different way of looking at life sometimes you know 5 000 people live here in barrow we're not on a major road system or anything like that we don't have mcdonald's we don't have the movie theaters we don't have the mall if those things are important to you we have two planes that leave a day you can be on one of them you don't have to be here in 2006 the school district saw that there was a problem with dropout rate in the high school they were asking the students what would they like to have at their school that would help them stay in school and so the kids wanted to have a football program since that time that dropout rate has decreased significantly and it gave kids a reason to stay in school you got to be committed from the start to the end up up up up it's all about our kids here if there's a way that we can keep kids engaged in school and get our kids to learn and grow and become positive healthy adults in our community why not take a chance on it on football i don't hear nobody whining my legs are tight coach my legs are like jelly coach hey there's some schools in lower 48 they have their varsity their jv here we have less than 250 students in our school we struggle to get you know 20 to 30 kids out but we get a quality of football player that is unbelievable from the numbers that we have listen we got small numbers but we're gonna take this all the way all in or all out in late july the snowless ice-free arctic seems almost tame until the wind begins to change and the fall freeze takes hold all right here we go you got to hurry get lined up just running vertical vertical just yards away from the field the arctic generates a negative wind chill giving a blistering new meaning to the term 12th man this wind is like a beast today playing in cold weather it's a whole different ball game this is game weather yeah there's a toughness that kids have to develop here that you just don't have anywhere else go don't be last don't be last don't be last being able to play football where you probably would least expect football to be there's such an honor just makes you want to go harder i play the running back position here in barrow we go through a regular practice every day no matter how cold it is up here it gets snowy rainy and really windy last year we kicked it off one time against the wind and it passed the 50-yard line and then it came back and i caught it it was so cool and it makes it much harder to throw so we're more of a running team or short passes at home that's a tough throw in the win the world sees us as a frozen land they would think how can people live up there where there's 24-hour darkness for like a month and it's very cold polar bears and they live off of subsistence subsistence living is living off your own land living off the resources you can find uh you know we fish seal walrus the bowhead whale which takes like the whole community to help with one well so that we may divide it amongst the whole town subsistence living is an honor you're being able to do what your ancestors were able to do it's been passed down to each generation i've been eskimo dancing since i was able to walk there's a rhythm and you have to have a rhythm on the football field and small dancing guys get low and stomp [Music] [Applause] i really think the culture and heritage is more important than football it'll always be here but we need to always remember that our culture and heritage some of it is dying and we need to work hard to keep our culture alive and make sure the generations after us know it [Music] it is a big serious movement to the team i can be doing cultural stuff while doing football i just want to go through the season and be a different person than i was in the beginning and win a [Music] championship [Music] three weeks before the opener coach houston faces a familiar coaching dilemma a quarterback controversy it's always a gamble in your choice of picking a quarterback um eager to see who who wants it the most run it out run it out let's go beautiful there you go come on good job last one ve now there we go there we go this is burning i'm excited going into my senior year i'm moving from being a running back to a quarterback he's a diaper chair i have two younger brothers they're the best siblings i can ever ask for are you guys gonna go to practice with me and we're all really close we kind of have to be since we live in a small house and we're all crammed together my family likes watching me play football i think they're really proud of me breathe really breathe got to breathe get it up get it up david get it up [Music] throughout my freshman and sophomore year i regret not working hard enough so i started as hard as i can trying to get stronger and smarter and better come on david is eager to play quarterback that's it man i like that i don't see that again i like this so much again but he has a stinky attitude sometimes especially when he makes a mistake hey david let's go man get ready hey get david out of here he wants to just stand around and wait he don't want to play football today a quarterback you get down you throw an interception you know a lot of mishaps happening i want somebody that's not going to lose it here we go you two switch hop up tribe go quarterback here we go perfect here you go try i feel like i could start at quarterback this year but i really won't know until me and david start battling out for the starting position but i really think i could beat him out i have a good arm i got good speed i said drive adams he may be one of the best athletes we have in school david go quarterback i don't like the angle that he has to take to get there every time we're gonna change that okay i'm ready to play quarterback because i already know all the plays so pretty confident there you go nice ah pick the wrong quarterback it could be a disastrous season for you nice nice nice that looked good right there i moved here three months ago alaska is just a new place a new home a new home for me this is the well bowling it's pretty big yeah you know all i want to do right now is take a swim yeah but i can't the water's too cold i was raised in anaheim california i was born back in the island somewhere i was back in california we have a stoplight yeah you guys don't have any signal stuff back in california i used to be a troublemaker alcohol drinking smoking was the answer to everything anger violence with my older brother um when he got stabbed that's when he hit me because uh i never expected any of my brothers and sisters to get hurt i came up here to switch my life around and um live with my uncle my cousin tj who's also on the football team and their family come here you're doing prayers [Music] once that came the barrel i knew things were going to be different what's up john when i got off the plane i was like wow i'm actually in barrel what am i doing and then the milk 10 to 12 bucks you know back in california you know how much milk cost four bucks go go go when i play i'm not only playing for myself i play for the family i carry with me okay let's work hard though who commit be champion just running vertical vertical ah look at that thing sneaking through your hands catch the tip right with only two and a half weeks left until the first game of the season frustration mounts as coach houston contends with the team's tardiness and lack of commitment commitment is important because we have small numbers on our team i mean you know today we got kids who chose to be late when you're tasked to do a job with small numbers then we need you to show up every day because there's somebody that's counting on you hey bring it up what what time is it 10 30 what time are we supposed to be out here today huh are we late today why are we late today man anybody have an answer is that commitment huh if i got to get my ass up and be here by that time who should be here before me but anything else like work think they're gonna allow you to come in half hour later well they're gonna send your ass packing man like i only want to be here right now with you that's all i ask for ounce of respect us coaches man we come out here to be here with you to give you something to pass it on to you take a knee expense sometimes we bring coaches that can help us out with game planning scheming preparation you guys got to get excited about who you are as individuals if you can't do that you're never going to be a good football player you got to put e on everything you're involved in excitement encouragement empowerment education it's only where you're gonna get better the better your attitude is the higher you go the lower you're and the worse your attitude is you're not gonna go very far man i don't want that for you being in the lower 48 we take a whole lot of things for granted me too much when you understand what it takes for them to survive up here i mean if they can hunt a whale and live in these conditions then football is a cakewalk good move good move that's the plate right there say hi come on great effort that's good effort let's go in just two weeks barrow will open the season against juno douglas a team that ranked second in the state last year here we go again for coach houston the question is are the whalers ready here we go hey man good day we're gonna take it one game at a time it's time for us to get some bear meat our first game is against juno douglas which is a bigger school i think they may be like three times the size of who we are they're a good program first time that we're ever playing them it's gonna be a challenge and if our boys come to play and use the talents and the gifts that they've been given we will do well those who commit will be what it's okay that's what we're talking about man we gotta get this machine and football all to work in unison biggest hopes for this season is getting the message across to the young men about what it takes to be committed to a team a family a community to their school this season i want to stay committed and come out and do big things also get better as a person not just a player on the field it's my last year i want to work as hard as i can i don't want to regret anything it's tough to compete in a place like viral alaska but if we can help create better people we have a better community and a better place to live if we can get that message across i'll be happy however the season turns out all right brother hold on three one two three one on the next episode of football town barrow alaska starting two a days hell week two great athletes nice we want to see one of them playing quarterback knock my damn glasses off i just don't want kids to see that action and think that it's okay to do go get on the bus go

Channel: NFL Network

Views: 318,390

Rating: 4.925199 out of 5

Keywords: sp:vl=en-US, sp:st=football, sp:li=NFL, Barrow, Alaska (US State), Football Town, NFL Network, NFL, National Football League (Sports Association), American Football (Sport), high school, blue field, polar bear, barrow alaska, barrow, northernmost, town, alaska, cold, american football, frozen

Id: qZ5lTUlQ4r0

Length: 16min 48sec (1008 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 18 2015