WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — John Agostini says his high school football coach was the most important influence in his life except for Agostini's own parents.

 

 

For Agostini, that moment came not long after Allen made the Mount Greylock Regional School eighth-grader feel special by inviting him to be the only member of his class to play on the varsity team.

 

"After football season had ended, I encountered a different John Allen, an angry John Allen," Agostini recalled on Wednesday morning. "I was in the very small weight room we had at Greylock at that time. I vividly remember John Allen entered the weight room. He had fire in his eyes. And, worse yet, he had rolled up papers in his hands.

 

"The papers were a list of people who were on the honor roll. While waving those papers at me as if they were a tomahawk, he informed me that my sister's name was on that list. My name was not. Coach then proceeded to go up one side of me and down the other without giving me a chance to respond. He then stopped and, in a much calmer voice, he said something that hurt me more than anything else. He told me he was, 'disappointed,' in me. Coach Allen was not somebody I wanted to disappoint.

 

"At that moment, John Allen absolutely ruined my day. But looking back after all these years, I understand something: He may have ruined my day, but, in a very real sense, he gave me my life."

 

Agostini, a 1971 Mount Greylock graduate who served more than 20 years as a Superior Court judge, delivered the eulogy for Allen, who coached football at Mount Greylock for 39 years.

 

On Wednesday morning, scores of his former players from the 1960s into the 21st century formed an honor guard outside Sts. Patrick and Raphael Church to welcome Allen's wife Jane, who carried her husband's urn into the church where they both were communicants.

 

Before the arrival of their former coach and his family, some of those alumni shared their reflections on John Allen. And, like Agostini, they remembered a man who was about more than Xs and Os and wins and losses — a man you did not want to disappoint.

 

"I loved [playing for Allen]," said 1973 Mount Greylock graduate Ken Larson. "It was the camaraderie. He got the most out of every player. You never wanted to disappoint him. He was such a great man, a great coach. You had total respect for the guy, respect for his knowledge of the game and respect for him as a man. He was just a phenomenal role model, and that's what I remember the most, just working really hard for the guy."

 

Larson, who now lives near Plymouth, was one of many former players who traveled to be together, reminisce and honor the former coach and teacher.

 

He said Allen's own work ethic made him the kind of person you couldn't let down.

 

"He was always working out," Larson said. "He was running the cross country trail. He was working hard. He gave it his all, and, with his example, we were trying to do what he wanted us to do. You knew he expected the same out of you."

 

Tom Falivene, class of '72, remembered Allen for his intensity, his character and his attention to the student-athlete as a person.

 

"Winning and losing football games was not the most important thing to him," Falivene said. "He understood, and he made sure everybody else understood, that there were other things that were more important. He cared about all of the players as students and as members of their families and all of that."

 

Falivene made the trip from Denver, Colo., to attend the celebration of Coach Allen, who died on Sept. 2 at age 87.

 

Josh Hunt, a 2001 Mount Greylock graduate, had a shorter journey from Lanesborough.

 

"He was a pillar at Greylock," Hunt said of Allen. "He was an understanding man, always willing to listen, always had a nugget of advice for anybody and a hard-working guy.

 

"He was very caring for the players as well. He was always looking out for the well-being of everyone."

 

1975 Mount Greylock graduate Carey Alton now lives about four hours away in southern Maine, but he still has family in the area and still ran into his former football coach, who always remembered Alton.

 

Alton remembered a good friend of his family and a great guy who also happened to be a great coach.

 

"He loved football, and he knew football better than almost anybody you'd ever meet," Alton said. "He just loved it, and he would correct you without putting you down. He was just an outstanding person, and I think that drifted into his coaching. It couldn't help but drift into his coaching role.

 

"He was just really something outstanding."

 

Agostini's eulogy touched on some of the on-the-field accomplishments that made Allen's career stand out and made him an inductee in the Massachusetts High School Football Coaches Hall of Fame.

 

But he spent more time talking about the coach who never saw a youngster as "uncoachable" and never had a problem if a student did want to quit football and would only ask that he, "try something else."

 

"Coach, I hope you understand the difference you made in the lives of your students," Agostini said, addressing Allen directly. "I hope you know that the lessons you taught didn't end when practice ended or when the football season was over or when we graduated from Mount Greylock. They followed us. They became a part of us. And we carried them into our marriages, our families, our professions and our communities.

 

"There are generations of men walking around today who are better husbands, better fathers, better citizens and better friends because, at one point in their lives, they played football for John Allen.

 

"Coach, your victories are documented, your championships are noted, the undefeated seasons are acknowledged, and the winning streak still stands. But none of those successes represent your real record. Your real record is written in the lives of the people you coached, taught, encouraged, disciplined, challenged and refused to give up on."