By DAVE O’SULLIVAN Publisher The tide is turning. August 20, 2011 started out the way just about any other summer day, in any other year past, had. Hot, sunny, nearing the end of high school football training camp. The Mainland Regional players headed off to Old Country Buffet in Mays Landing for lunch to close out a long week of workouts. Then, suddenly, it wasn’t just any other summer day at the Jersey Shore. Four Mustangs players — Casey Brenner, age 17 at the time, Nicholas Conner, 16, Edgar Bozzi, 16, and Dean Khoury, 15 — were killed in an automobile accident on the Garden State Parkway. Four other Mainland players who were in the vehicle were injured. The deaths hit the Mainland community like an uppercut to the jaw. Families instantly grief-stricken. Mothers and fathers losing sons, brothers losing brothers. The agony and sadness was palpable throughout the entire area. National news organizations sent reporters to tiny Linwood to tell the story, a story that should never have to be told. The tide is turning. The thing about some stories, however, is they continue to unfold, long after the first few pages are written. Sometimes when you think a story is over it branches out in new directions. The initial shockwave from the death of four teenage boys with seemingly their whole lives ahead of them eventually gave way to an outpouring of support from surrounding schools, communities and families. It was the kind of life event that while very few have personal experience with, nearly anyone could empathize with what the families involved were going through. Death comes to us all, but there are times when we are not prepared for it. August 20, 2011 was one of those times. 
A young girl places a flower into the ocean as a memorial to the four Mainland Regional High School football players who lost their lives in a car accident in August of 2011. (Glory Days Magazine photos/Dave O’Sullivan) Anyone who has ever lost a loved one knows how difficult a process it is to get through. Grief, heartache, a sadness you’ve never felt before, anger — these are all emotions that flood the body’s systems, almost like a mini tornado going on inside your head. It can take years, sometimes, for people to adjust to life without their loved ones. Some are never able to. I lost both my parents before the age of 26, and spent the second half of my 20s almost in a daze. Life as I had known it was changed forever. I went through all the emotions, the stages of grief. In the end, what I found comfort in was knowing that Mike and Noreen O’Sullivan had done the best job they could in raising eight children, and for me not to go out and do the best I could, strive to reach my dreams, would be a disservice to the foundation our family was built upon. The tide is turning. Football is a game of attrition. It’s a game that demands mental toughness, physical toughness, the ability to adapt, and the ability to play through pain. Life, in many respects, is the same. Life doesn’t ask you how you want things to turn out. You have to be able to adapt to its changes in order to be successful, in much the same way football players must adapt during the course of a game in order to have a chance to win. Football also teaches life lessons. It teaches you to lean on the people around you when times get tough. That we are all in this thing together. It teaches you that when things aren’t going your way, when your back is up against the wall, that’s when you have to fight the hardest and give the most effort. The Brenner, Conner, Bozzi and Khoury families have had to fight hard the last four years to keep it together; to move on and continue to live their lives despite being dealt the toughest blow that life can dish out. Surely there have been times when it felt as though it was 4th-and-25 on their own 25-yard line in the game of life. Those families had to dig deep into their playbooks to come up with a way to keep the chains moving. And they have done so, with the help of a great many people. The tide is turning. 
Following the accident, families of the victims gathered at the beach in Longport to grieve, remember the boys, and support each other. What started out as a small gathering is now an event that attracts more than 100 people each summer, and has become a way for family and friends to celebrates the lives of the players. The sea can be a magical place for many people. It has an ambiance that the finest restaurants would love to capture, if it was possible. It’s a place where you can lose yourself, where time stands still. The simplicity of the waves continuing to roll into shore, as they have done for eons, helps put life into perspective. And the message is simple — life continues to move forward, and the time we are given to enjoy it should be spent wisely. Not long after the accident in 2011, families of the boys gathered on the beach in Longport — sort of their own little safe harbor — and spent time grieving, remembering, hugging, and just being there for each other. In the four years since, the crowd every August has grown into the hundreds and now there is a Paddle Out event. A brief memorial every summer on the open sea for boys who spent their lives near it. And with each year that passes by there is a little bit less grieving and a little bit more celebration, a few more smiles and a few less tears. As Ted Khoury, father of Dean, explained, it is a simple way for people — anyone who has lost someone close to their heart — to gather, remember and celebrate the lives of those loved and lost. As Ted put it, “grieving is mandatory. Suffering is optional.” The tide is turning. There still is plenty of grief to deal with for the families involved. But, hopefully, with each passing year the story will continue to branch out and continue to give the ones it reaches the hope for a better tomorrow. Contact Dave O’Sullivan: sully@acglorydays.com; on Twitter @GDsullysays [adsense]
Family, friends of Mainland football players who lost lives in 2011 find strength in numbers at Memorial Paddle Out event
