Mills’ Tribute Draws Inspired Gathering
BOBBY ARDOIN
St. Landry Now.com Editor
(Photos By Freddie Herpin)
Perhaps there are many descriptions which could be attached to the Mickey Mills-inspired event held Friday evening just beyond the entrance to Donald Gardner Stadium.
Tribute, reunion or memorial.
No definition was necessary for the nearly 100 men and women who assembled for two hours of impactful remembrances of their former football and baseball coach who died in June.
It was instead a time to catch up, relive and explore those athletic experiences intertwined with the memory of their coach, who brought athletic tradition along with a football and pair of baseball championships during his 20-year reign as head coach and athletic director at Opelousas Catholic and the Academy of The Immaculate Conception.
Orchestrated by former OCS all-state football player Steve Dupuis, the gathering included food, snacks, a variety of beverages and an encouraging salute to the current Vikings’ football players as they disembarked from their team bus and walked to the dressing room to prepare for the St. Edmund contest.
Later there were pregame and halftime introductions for former players and coaches on the field where Mills provided signature moments, winning records and district championships.
Some guests like Dupuis, Vance Robichaux, Rusty Bellard, Al Martin and Jay Dean arrived wearing their OCS purple and gold or AIC navy blue and white high school football jerseys.
Conversations naturally recounted past games, individual plays and explicit details about decades ago athletic performances that again became poignant.
Inevitably though the talk about what once reflected the undeniable evidence that Mills was usually there, significantly involved and usually presiding as maestro, master motivator and choreographer of it all.
