NORTHAMPTON — There will be a special gridiron reunion on Thanksgiving.
At 10 a.m. Thursday, at White Brook Middle School in Easthampton, Joe Kocot and the Northampton football team will face Easthampton.
It will be the first time Kocot will coach against the Eagles, a team that he coached for 16 years.
In 1998, Kocot became the first head coach for Easthampton and built the program from the ground up.
Kocot grew up in Northampton, played high school football there, and coached as an assistant for seven years before becoming the head coach in Easthampton.
Kocot retired in 2014, but returned to the sidelines this season.
“When I was at Easthampton,” Kocot said, “I had a job to do and I was a proud papa of that program, and always will be.”
Kocot coached the Eagles to four Super Bowls, winning titles in 2005 and 2010. He stepped away in 2014 because of work obligations.
At the time, Kocot had no intention of returning to coaching, but when the Northampton position opened up, he couldn’t stay away.
“When the (head coach position) came open,” Kocot said, “I saw Coach (Ryan) Parent out in the store and he told me ‘hey if you want to come back to coaching you got an opening,’ and I said no. I went home and told my wife and she said go for it, so I put in for it.”
Kocot kept his old coaching staff relatively the same when he took the job in Northampton. His long-time assistant Steve Dion, whom he coached with for about 19 years, returned as the offensive coordinator.
Kocot also brought his playbook with him from Easthampton; a run-heavy offense with a full house in the backfield.
“When we left Northampton (in 1998), we took the playbook with us and we formed our offense in Easthampton based on what we had in Northampton,” Dion said. “Since then Northampton has changed and now, we are bringing it back.”
The Blue Devils and Eagles are both 5-5 entering the fourth annual turkey day matchup. Northampton leads the series 3-0 and has outscored the Eagles 117-32.
“This (game) is huge,” Kocot said. “The biggest thing is you always want to have a winning season. This is all about having a good time, but being safe and still getting our work in.”
Kocot likes to joke around and have fun with his team, but he wants them to know how important it is to win.
“Go back to school,” Kocot said. “Six wins, if it was a test, we got six right out of 11 questions, that’s below a D, that’s unacceptable. 7-3 is a 70, unacceptable. These kids got to know 8-2 isn’t ready to call the New York Times and tell them to do a story on us; 8-2 is a B. We want 9-1, 9-2, 10-1 and once we get that point across losing is not an option.”
White Brook Middle School is where Kocot and Dion started the Easthampton football program 20 years ago.
“We have to win,” Dion said. “It’s not revenge, it’s kind of like the old dogs now against the young pups that are running Easthampton. It has a little extra meaning to us. … It’s going to be a great game and turkey will taste so much better if we win.”