NastySlot
11-09-2009, 01:23 PM
I wanted to share this article about an amazing young man that was special to a lot of people...he was a very polite and kind young man...he was great friend to my daughters........the other people in the article are all friends of mine and Im proud to know them all.
‘Win for Quinn’
By Joe Harrington
The Daily Times
Published November 9, 2009
FREDERICKSBURG — It doesn’t take long to get a sense of what makes Fredericksburg special. Main Street is flooded with authentic German Beirgartens, German bakeries and souvenir shops tied together by a World War II museum.
A school house that dates back to 1846 sits next to City Hall, and up a block from there stands St. Mary’s Catholic Church and school.
Like the city itself, it doesn’t take long to see that the school’s 152 years of history comprises a rich part of its identity. As distinct as Fredericksburg’s character, one 13-year-old boy, his face gleaming with a new smile after just having his braces removed, showed how important and how interwoven sports, religion and community are to this town off Texas 290.
On Sept. 9, Quinn Kott — the first six-sport athlete at St. Mary’s Middle School and the son of a former Fredericksburg High School quarterback and current city employee — died following a stroke over Labor Day weekend.
The St. Mary’s football tradition
At the beginning of the season, parents didn’t know what to expect from the St. Mary’s Middle School football team. They hadn’t lost a game in two seasons and hadn’t allowed a touchdown in more than a year. Having lost the star player, Seth Studebaker, now a freshman at Fredericksburg High School, the new season was a mystery, aside from one factor — Quinn Kott.
“He was probably the best athlete we had,” said St. Mary’s coach Rick Loth. “Last year, he played on the A-team in basketball. He was the starting shortstop up on the baseball team. He was the guy.”
Quinn was the returning playmaker on the football field. Whether it was at wide receiver or running back, he was sure to be a fixture on the team, and only his modesty kept him from being a team captain.
“The reason he didn’t make captain, come to find out, is because he didn’t vote for himself,” said Quinn’s father, Brad Kott.
Loth knew what type of team he would have. A borderline obsession with winning had the coach watching tapes of opponents and preparing for every game as if it were the Rose Bowl. He knew the talent he had, and his close relationship with Quinn and the rest of the team was going to will them their goal of a 27-0 record.
“Winning is ... it’s addicting, just as losing is,” Loth said. “If you win, you expect to win, and these kids expect to win. Obviously, there’s a ‘never give up, never say die’ type of deal. (The team doesn’t) get nervous or distracted when they do get behind (in a game).”
The work ethic being taught on St. Mary’s football field is off the charts. Kids come in for film sessions, practices are intense and discipline is the game being played. Jump off sides during a game, run “belly-flops” in practice. No show-boating, no up-staging, just plain, detailed-oriented football.
Quinn embodied that, forcing his mother, Sheryl Kott, to drop him off an hour before practice just so he could talk to Loth. After all, he was one of the school’s best athletes. Whether it was football, basketball or baseball, Quinn had a reputation to uphold. A reputation that was built around true myths, like Quinn picking up golf on a whim only to win his flight at his first tournament.
Quinn was excited for the season to start and ready to prove this team wasn’t going to be the one to break the winning streak.
“They were nervous though,” Brad Kott said. “They didn’t want to be the ones that lost that first game. Quinn was a kid that was very confident in who he was. He wasn’t his brother (Griffin), who was super, super fast, and was the football guy. He wasn’t Seth Studebaker, but he was Quinn.”
His efforts on the field said it all. He scored four touchdowns in the first game of the season.
The long weekend
On Sept. 5, St. Mary’s won another game. Quinn didn’t score a touchdown in the first half. By the second half, Quinn was moved to running back and scored as the Apaches won another game.
After scarfing down pizza at Mr. Gatti’s after the game, Quinn and his friend Jamie Jarreau went back to the Kotts’ house. They stayed up late, doing whatever eighth grade boys do, happy about the win and probably disappointed that earlier that night Brigham Young had defeated Oklahoma University, where Quinn’s older brother Griffin was a freshman.
Sunday was a bad day.
Quinn complained about a headache, saying he wasn’t feeling well, but the family had been invited to the Jarreau’s for a barbecue.
“He didn’t feel good at about 4 p.m.,” Brad Kott said.
“He said he was dizzy,” Sheryl Kott added.
Quinn lied down for a while. At 6 p.m., Brad Kott went to wake Quinn.
“When I went up, he said, ‘I’m not feeling that good, dad,’” Brad Kott said. “And I said, ‘Well, get in the shower anyway.’ It was one of those things. I wasn’t being mean to him, but you got to get in the shower and normally you’ll feel better. The headache will go away. Anyway, the other boy, Jamie, came down and said, ‘There’s sounds coming from the bathroom.’”
The Kotts found Quinn on the bathroom floor. They rushed him to nearby Hill Country Memorial Hospital. Quinn was then moved to Methodist Children’s Hospital in San Antonio on Monday morning where a MRI was done.
The Kotts were told at 10:30 a.m. that Quinn had suffered a massive stroke. It was the last thing the original doctors believed it could have been, according to Brad Kott. There was hope that Quinn would recover after a shunt was put in to relieve pressure on the brain. On Tuesday, the Kotts received the news that their youngest son’s brain stem was dying, and it was irreversible.
They went to bed that night knowing they would lose their son the next day.
The aftermath
Word spread through the community that Quinn was seriously ill. On Monday, players entered the locker room expecting practice but were told of Quinn’s condition and immediately headed to the chapel. They were joined by the volleyball team, faculty and parents.
“We walked into the locker room, and coach Loth met with the football boys first and told them what was happening. Then he came in and told us what was happening in the volleyball locker room. Then we all went across and prayed and reflected,” said Lorraine Studebaker, mother of St. Mary’s running back Sammie Studebaker and a substitute teacher at the school.
The football team prayed Monday and Tuesday. Touchdowns, tackles and turnovers were far from their minds. Loth spent hours at the hospital with the Kotts waiting for good news and bracing for bad.
He wasn’t the only one. The hospital filled up with people from Fredericksburg.
“The waiting room at Methodist Children’s Hospital was an overflowing of love and support from this community,” Sheryl Kott said. “They were there because they loved Quinn, and they loved us.”
Friends, teammates and neighbors joined the Kotts and Loth in the waiting room, filling the seats to the point that doctors and nurses were asking the Kotts if some could leave.
It didn’t happen.
At 11:38 a.m. on Sept.9, Quinn was brain dead.
During those two days, some pondered over an unspoken and trivial question: What does the team do? After decades of coaching, years of building the St. Mary’s program from the ground up, Loth was now questioning his desire to get back on the sidelines.
“I was ready to walk away the day it happened,” Loth said. “I didn’t never want to coach again. I told my wife that.”
Loth’s wife, Tammie, asked him what his main goals were in teaching the kids.
“And I’m like, ‘Well, to be better husbands, to be a better father, you got to go to work everyday,’” he answered. “And she said, ‘And now you’re going to go tell them you’re quitting? Because something bad happened, you’re not going to go to work?’
“And so I went to work,” he said.
On the day Quinn died, the St. Mary’s football team went to work, not only because it was the mantra they played by, but because it’s what Quinn would have wanted.
“And it wasn’t a normal practice,” Loth said. “But we got out on the field, we stretched and ran plays — no contact — no anything, just to try to put our boots on and go to work.”
Fredericksburg High School football coach and athletic director Dean Herbort let players out of practice to attend church. He became flexible, and most importantly, became part of the healing process. Herbort insisted that his team honor Quinn the rest of the year by wearing the No.11 on the back of their helmets.
“(Quinn) never stepped foot on a Fredericksburg public school campus, and (the team) still has 11 on (their) helmets,” Brad Kott said.
Members of the St. Mary’s team traveled to the high school and placed a sticker on each helmet.
The funeral was held on Sept.11. The town nearly shut down as hundreds attended.
Quinn’s funeral was held three hours before what would have been the third game of the season for St. Mary’s, a road game against Mount Sacred Heart.
Win for Quinn
Following Quinn’s death, the football teams were in disarray. Fredericksburg lost a tough game at Liberty Hill just five hours after the funeral, while St. Mary’s canceled its game.
The next week was a challenging and difficult time for both Fredericksburg teams.
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” Loth said. “To lose a kid, I’d never want any coach to go through it. To see the kids every day, you get one of them up, and you turn around, and there’s three more of them down. You go home, and you don’t sleep ... you don’t eat — you don’t do anything. You’re just trying to figure out ways to make their day better.”
By the end of the week, grieving had turned into motivation for both football teams.
Fredericksburg faced Comfort in its first home game since Quinn’s death. The stadium was packed. During the week, Fredheads, the Frederickburg student fan group, made and sold T-shirts bearing the No. 11. After making more than $400, with proceeds going to a memorial, there was hardly a person in the stands that didn’t have a Quinn Kott tribute.
“Every piece makes Sheryl and I ...,” Brad Kott begins to say.
“We’re so humbled,” Sheryl Kott finishes.
“It doesn’t take away our pain, but it helps you deal with it when you know ... that’s the joy of this community,” Brad Kott said.
Those same shirts were visible on Saturday at the St. Mary’s game against San Antonio St. Luke. After 13 days, the Apaches took the field carrying a No.11 jersey.
“Everywhere they go, they take that jersey,” Brad Kott said.
The Apaches dominated in a way that No.11 would have liked, romping to a 52-8 win.
A team that had won 22 straight games finally had found a goal: Win for Quinn. Finish what he helped build.
“What we tried to explain to (the team) is that they were part of the healing process to the whole community, because people were going to be watching how they did,” Loth said. “And we continue to be successful. People were going to know that we were OK and would let them start their healing process.”
They moved along, and each week the Apaches were reminded of their teammate.
“When we went to an away game and they would do the prayer and the announcements beforehand, they would always mention their sympathy for this loss,” Lorraine Studebaker said. “For some of his best friends, it was a motivating factor to do well, but yet almost every game it was mentioned and even as a parent I was just reminded again.”
Closing
At the beginning of the season, Quinn begged Loth to reschedule their game against St. Matthew’s to Saturday, Sept. 26 — his birthday. The coach didn’t heed the request, and the game remained on Friday.
On that very day, rain pounded the Hill Country, forcing the game to be postponed — till Saturday.
St. Matthews proved to the toughest game on the schedule, a game that Quinn would have loved. When it was all said and done, St. Mary’s won 39-30, but few remember the game’s score, because sitting in the stands for the first time since the death of their son were Brad and Sheryl Kott.
“We hadn’t really decided if we were going or not,” Brad Kott said. “But I said, ‘If we want to spend (Quinn’s) birthday with Quinn, that’s where he’ll be.’ (The team) wanted to do something for us so badly. They’re carrying around his jersey all year. Quinn was theirs to. They needed an outlet. So after the game, they wanted to win so bad, they came over and gave us the game ball. And everyone of them hugged us.
“It’s tough to see his best friends, but what you’ve got to understand, is he is in them.”
A month later in San Antonio, St. Mary’s, with a No.11 jersey hanging on the sideline, finished the season undefeated, winning 30-0 over Mount Sacred Heart.
“It’s very satisfying — I mean the whole thing — it’s a neat deal,” Loth said. “I’m just blessed to have the kids we have, the parents we have. It’s the community and the kids — that’s what it is — not the coaching staff. It’s not the color of our uniform or anything, it’s the community.”
While the Apaches finished the season flawless, Quinn’s flawless body helped people live. Because he was in perfect condition, Quinn became the ideal organ donor. So far, Quinn’s organs have been donated to several people, from a 49-year-old man to a 9-year-old girl.
“We decided that Quinn would definitely want to donate his organs,” Brad Kott said. “A little girl got his liver. Two different people got kidneys, and someone else got the lungs and two people have received corneas. He was perfect for that because organ donation, you can’t be in a car wreck — you can’t do that. You’ve got to be alive. There was nothing a matter with Quinn. He was laying in that bed with a tube in his mouth, not a scratch on his body.”
“Just perfect,” Sheryl Kott said.
It doesn’t take long to figure out what type of town Fredericksburg is. But it takes one scrawny kid nicknamed “Sticks,” who literally looked like an 11, to show Fredericksburg’s heart.
“It’s definitely helping us,” Sheryl Kott said. “Without the support of our friends, the community and family, we wouldn’t have gotten to our ... this is our eighth week without Quinn.”
http://www.dailytimes.com/story.lasso?ewcd=7d97066478879d24
‘Win for Quinn’
By Joe Harrington
The Daily Times
Published November 9, 2009
FREDERICKSBURG — It doesn’t take long to get a sense of what makes Fredericksburg special. Main Street is flooded with authentic German Beirgartens, German bakeries and souvenir shops tied together by a World War II museum.
A school house that dates back to 1846 sits next to City Hall, and up a block from there stands St. Mary’s Catholic Church and school.
Like the city itself, it doesn’t take long to see that the school’s 152 years of history comprises a rich part of its identity. As distinct as Fredericksburg’s character, one 13-year-old boy, his face gleaming with a new smile after just having his braces removed, showed how important and how interwoven sports, religion and community are to this town off Texas 290.
On Sept. 9, Quinn Kott — the first six-sport athlete at St. Mary’s Middle School and the son of a former Fredericksburg High School quarterback and current city employee — died following a stroke over Labor Day weekend.
The St. Mary’s football tradition
At the beginning of the season, parents didn’t know what to expect from the St. Mary’s Middle School football team. They hadn’t lost a game in two seasons and hadn’t allowed a touchdown in more than a year. Having lost the star player, Seth Studebaker, now a freshman at Fredericksburg High School, the new season was a mystery, aside from one factor — Quinn Kott.
“He was probably the best athlete we had,” said St. Mary’s coach Rick Loth. “Last year, he played on the A-team in basketball. He was the starting shortstop up on the baseball team. He was the guy.”
Quinn was the returning playmaker on the football field. Whether it was at wide receiver or running back, he was sure to be a fixture on the team, and only his modesty kept him from being a team captain.
“The reason he didn’t make captain, come to find out, is because he didn’t vote for himself,” said Quinn’s father, Brad Kott.
Loth knew what type of team he would have. A borderline obsession with winning had the coach watching tapes of opponents and preparing for every game as if it were the Rose Bowl. He knew the talent he had, and his close relationship with Quinn and the rest of the team was going to will them their goal of a 27-0 record.
“Winning is ... it’s addicting, just as losing is,” Loth said. “If you win, you expect to win, and these kids expect to win. Obviously, there’s a ‘never give up, never say die’ type of deal. (The team doesn’t) get nervous or distracted when they do get behind (in a game).”
The work ethic being taught on St. Mary’s football field is off the charts. Kids come in for film sessions, practices are intense and discipline is the game being played. Jump off sides during a game, run “belly-flops” in practice. No show-boating, no up-staging, just plain, detailed-oriented football.
Quinn embodied that, forcing his mother, Sheryl Kott, to drop him off an hour before practice just so he could talk to Loth. After all, he was one of the school’s best athletes. Whether it was football, basketball or baseball, Quinn had a reputation to uphold. A reputation that was built around true myths, like Quinn picking up golf on a whim only to win his flight at his first tournament.
Quinn was excited for the season to start and ready to prove this team wasn’t going to be the one to break the winning streak.
“They were nervous though,” Brad Kott said. “They didn’t want to be the ones that lost that first game. Quinn was a kid that was very confident in who he was. He wasn’t his brother (Griffin), who was super, super fast, and was the football guy. He wasn’t Seth Studebaker, but he was Quinn.”
His efforts on the field said it all. He scored four touchdowns in the first game of the season.
The long weekend
On Sept. 5, St. Mary’s won another game. Quinn didn’t score a touchdown in the first half. By the second half, Quinn was moved to running back and scored as the Apaches won another game.
After scarfing down pizza at Mr. Gatti’s after the game, Quinn and his friend Jamie Jarreau went back to the Kotts’ house. They stayed up late, doing whatever eighth grade boys do, happy about the win and probably disappointed that earlier that night Brigham Young had defeated Oklahoma University, where Quinn’s older brother Griffin was a freshman.
Sunday was a bad day.
Quinn complained about a headache, saying he wasn’t feeling well, but the family had been invited to the Jarreau’s for a barbecue.
“He didn’t feel good at about 4 p.m.,” Brad Kott said.
“He said he was dizzy,” Sheryl Kott added.
Quinn lied down for a while. At 6 p.m., Brad Kott went to wake Quinn.
“When I went up, he said, ‘I’m not feeling that good, dad,’” Brad Kott said. “And I said, ‘Well, get in the shower anyway.’ It was one of those things. I wasn’t being mean to him, but you got to get in the shower and normally you’ll feel better. The headache will go away. Anyway, the other boy, Jamie, came down and said, ‘There’s sounds coming from the bathroom.’”
The Kotts found Quinn on the bathroom floor. They rushed him to nearby Hill Country Memorial Hospital. Quinn was then moved to Methodist Children’s Hospital in San Antonio on Monday morning where a MRI was done.
The Kotts were told at 10:30 a.m. that Quinn had suffered a massive stroke. It was the last thing the original doctors believed it could have been, according to Brad Kott. There was hope that Quinn would recover after a shunt was put in to relieve pressure on the brain. On Tuesday, the Kotts received the news that their youngest son’s brain stem was dying, and it was irreversible.
They went to bed that night knowing they would lose their son the next day.
The aftermath
Word spread through the community that Quinn was seriously ill. On Monday, players entered the locker room expecting practice but were told of Quinn’s condition and immediately headed to the chapel. They were joined by the volleyball team, faculty and parents.
“We walked into the locker room, and coach Loth met with the football boys first and told them what was happening. Then he came in and told us what was happening in the volleyball locker room. Then we all went across and prayed and reflected,” said Lorraine Studebaker, mother of St. Mary’s running back Sammie Studebaker and a substitute teacher at the school.
The football team prayed Monday and Tuesday. Touchdowns, tackles and turnovers were far from their minds. Loth spent hours at the hospital with the Kotts waiting for good news and bracing for bad.
He wasn’t the only one. The hospital filled up with people from Fredericksburg.
“The waiting room at Methodist Children’s Hospital was an overflowing of love and support from this community,” Sheryl Kott said. “They were there because they loved Quinn, and they loved us.”
Friends, teammates and neighbors joined the Kotts and Loth in the waiting room, filling the seats to the point that doctors and nurses were asking the Kotts if some could leave.
It didn’t happen.
At 11:38 a.m. on Sept.9, Quinn was brain dead.
During those two days, some pondered over an unspoken and trivial question: What does the team do? After decades of coaching, years of building the St. Mary’s program from the ground up, Loth was now questioning his desire to get back on the sidelines.
“I was ready to walk away the day it happened,” Loth said. “I didn’t never want to coach again. I told my wife that.”
Loth’s wife, Tammie, asked him what his main goals were in teaching the kids.
“And I’m like, ‘Well, to be better husbands, to be a better father, you got to go to work everyday,’” he answered. “And she said, ‘And now you’re going to go tell them you’re quitting? Because something bad happened, you’re not going to go to work?’
“And so I went to work,” he said.
On the day Quinn died, the St. Mary’s football team went to work, not only because it was the mantra they played by, but because it’s what Quinn would have wanted.
“And it wasn’t a normal practice,” Loth said. “But we got out on the field, we stretched and ran plays — no contact — no anything, just to try to put our boots on and go to work.”
Fredericksburg High School football coach and athletic director Dean Herbort let players out of practice to attend church. He became flexible, and most importantly, became part of the healing process. Herbort insisted that his team honor Quinn the rest of the year by wearing the No.11 on the back of their helmets.
“(Quinn) never stepped foot on a Fredericksburg public school campus, and (the team) still has 11 on (their) helmets,” Brad Kott said.
Members of the St. Mary’s team traveled to the high school and placed a sticker on each helmet.
The funeral was held on Sept.11. The town nearly shut down as hundreds attended.
Quinn’s funeral was held three hours before what would have been the third game of the season for St. Mary’s, a road game against Mount Sacred Heart.
Win for Quinn
Following Quinn’s death, the football teams were in disarray. Fredericksburg lost a tough game at Liberty Hill just five hours after the funeral, while St. Mary’s canceled its game.
The next week was a challenging and difficult time for both Fredericksburg teams.
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” Loth said. “To lose a kid, I’d never want any coach to go through it. To see the kids every day, you get one of them up, and you turn around, and there’s three more of them down. You go home, and you don’t sleep ... you don’t eat — you don’t do anything. You’re just trying to figure out ways to make their day better.”
By the end of the week, grieving had turned into motivation for both football teams.
Fredericksburg faced Comfort in its first home game since Quinn’s death. The stadium was packed. During the week, Fredheads, the Frederickburg student fan group, made and sold T-shirts bearing the No. 11. After making more than $400, with proceeds going to a memorial, there was hardly a person in the stands that didn’t have a Quinn Kott tribute.
“Every piece makes Sheryl and I ...,” Brad Kott begins to say.
“We’re so humbled,” Sheryl Kott finishes.
“It doesn’t take away our pain, but it helps you deal with it when you know ... that’s the joy of this community,” Brad Kott said.
Those same shirts were visible on Saturday at the St. Mary’s game against San Antonio St. Luke. After 13 days, the Apaches took the field carrying a No.11 jersey.
“Everywhere they go, they take that jersey,” Brad Kott said.
The Apaches dominated in a way that No.11 would have liked, romping to a 52-8 win.
A team that had won 22 straight games finally had found a goal: Win for Quinn. Finish what he helped build.
“What we tried to explain to (the team) is that they were part of the healing process to the whole community, because people were going to be watching how they did,” Loth said. “And we continue to be successful. People were going to know that we were OK and would let them start their healing process.”
They moved along, and each week the Apaches were reminded of their teammate.
“When we went to an away game and they would do the prayer and the announcements beforehand, they would always mention their sympathy for this loss,” Lorraine Studebaker said. “For some of his best friends, it was a motivating factor to do well, but yet almost every game it was mentioned and even as a parent I was just reminded again.”
Closing
At the beginning of the season, Quinn begged Loth to reschedule their game against St. Matthew’s to Saturday, Sept. 26 — his birthday. The coach didn’t heed the request, and the game remained on Friday.
On that very day, rain pounded the Hill Country, forcing the game to be postponed — till Saturday.
St. Matthews proved to the toughest game on the schedule, a game that Quinn would have loved. When it was all said and done, St. Mary’s won 39-30, but few remember the game’s score, because sitting in the stands for the first time since the death of their son were Brad and Sheryl Kott.
“We hadn’t really decided if we were going or not,” Brad Kott said. “But I said, ‘If we want to spend (Quinn’s) birthday with Quinn, that’s where he’ll be.’ (The team) wanted to do something for us so badly. They’re carrying around his jersey all year. Quinn was theirs to. They needed an outlet. So after the game, they wanted to win so bad, they came over and gave us the game ball. And everyone of them hugged us.
“It’s tough to see his best friends, but what you’ve got to understand, is he is in them.”
A month later in San Antonio, St. Mary’s, with a No.11 jersey hanging on the sideline, finished the season undefeated, winning 30-0 over Mount Sacred Heart.
“It’s very satisfying — I mean the whole thing — it’s a neat deal,” Loth said. “I’m just blessed to have the kids we have, the parents we have. It’s the community and the kids — that’s what it is — not the coaching staff. It’s not the color of our uniform or anything, it’s the community.”
While the Apaches finished the season flawless, Quinn’s flawless body helped people live. Because he was in perfect condition, Quinn became the ideal organ donor. So far, Quinn’s organs have been donated to several people, from a 49-year-old man to a 9-year-old girl.
“We decided that Quinn would definitely want to donate his organs,” Brad Kott said. “A little girl got his liver. Two different people got kidneys, and someone else got the lungs and two people have received corneas. He was perfect for that because organ donation, you can’t be in a car wreck — you can’t do that. You’ve got to be alive. There was nothing a matter with Quinn. He was laying in that bed with a tube in his mouth, not a scratch on his body.”
“Just perfect,” Sheryl Kott said.
It doesn’t take long to figure out what type of town Fredericksburg is. But it takes one scrawny kid nicknamed “Sticks,” who literally looked like an 11, to show Fredericksburg’s heart.
“It’s definitely helping us,” Sheryl Kott said. “Without the support of our friends, the community and family, we wouldn’t have gotten to our ... this is our eighth week without Quinn.”
http://www.dailytimes.com/story.lasso?ewcd=7d97066478879d24