The Nashua Hall of Fame 2021 Inductees are, left to right bottome row, Kendall Reyes and Trevor Knight; second row, Al Savage, John Schroeder, and Brad Zapenas; third row Farley Gates, the late Mark Russell, and Amy Ruston; and top row, Kole Ayi, the late Bob DeMello, and Laura Gerraughty. (Photo courtesy of Nashua Athletics)

NASHUA – Finally, they are all official members of the Nashua Athletics Hall of Fame.

A video induction was released on Saturday with an introduction by Nashua Athletic Director Lisa Gingras and then brief interviews with the 11 inductees who, were it not for the pandemic, would have been inducted at an in person ceremony in May of 2020.

However, plaques were sent to the inductees and the interviews conducted with them by Hall of Fame committee members Jason Robie and Nate Mazerolle certainly made Saturday and any time someone watches the video special.

Inducted were former Nashua High football standout Koley Ayi, who went on to win a Super Bowl ring with the New England Patriots, the late Bob DeMello, a highly successful track coach at Nashua; former Nashua High basketball standout and athletic program contributor Farley Gates, who went on to play at the University of San Francisco; former U.S. Olympian and Nashua High track standout as a thrower, Laura Gerraughty Ekstrand; former Nashua South and University of New Hampshire quarterback Trevor Knight; former Nashua North and University of Connecticut football star Kendall Reyes, who went on to an NFL career with three teams, mainly with the San Diego Chargers; former Nashua High football standout the late Mark Russell; former Nashua High track and cross country star Amy Ruston; longtime local youth and high school sports contributor Al Savage; former Nashua North track standout John Schroeder, and former North baseball star Brad Zapenas, who went on to a professional minor league career with the Chicago Cubs.

“I love learning about the history of Nashua, old videotapes, old videos, there’s so much history in Nashua,” Zapenas said. “This (induction) was a culmination of not just me but my entire family.

I was so proud to be the first to be a Titan, so proud to start that new tradition.We kind of had to put Nashua North on the map.”

“It means a lot,” said Ayi, who is also in the UMass Hall of Fame. “When you’re a kid, you just want to go out there and play well. You don’t look to the future and think ‘Maybe I’ll be in the Hall of Fame one day. It’s really exciting.

“Kids don’t do it alone. You need a lot of support, and I had that.”

What stands out was a game his junior year when he made a pick six against Pinkerton for a win and was mobbed by the student body.

Al Savage, 93, says he was so focused on working with youth athletics because there was nothing like that when he grew up in the 1920s.

“I had a great mother and father who cared, but I didn’t have all the activities,” he said. Savage, who along with Fran Tate helped found the New Hampshire Heptathlon/Decathlon, played for legendary Nashua coach Buzz Harvey and remembered the strategy. “Buzz used to say you give us two or three yards a play, four times, we’ll go till we score,” he said. “That was his theory.”

Former Olympian Gerraughty Ekstrand says when she looks back on her athletic career, she doesn’t think of the accolades. “I think of the people,” she said. “That’s where my heart is. … I was lucky I had people who valued me for not hard I threw, but for the type of person I was. Every day I had opportunity to walk away and say I learned something.”

Speaking for the late DeMello was his wife Kathy.

“Every coach coaches because he likes to win,” DeMello said. “But I think he epitomized every coach at the high school level (1983-97 at Nashua) because he was trying to make each individual the best they could be. “He pushed that envelope constantly. I saw some amazing stuff while he was coaching.

“And he cared about the kids. He embraced them.”

Nashua North track and cross country standout John Schroeder, a 2006 North grad, was thrilled.

“It’s such an honor, I’m always humbled when I always see the other people who are getting inducted,” he said. “It’s great recognition for not only myself but all my coaches along the way and my former teammates who brought me along. They can share in this honor because they helped me get there.”

Inductee Farley Gates said his favorite moment as a player was winning the state title in 1980. “We had a phenomenal team, a great group of guys,” he said, remembering he missed most of his senior year due to a broken foot. But Gates realized later in his college career that “I wasn’t as good as I thought I was. … Always say to kids even though you’re good in your space, there’s always someone a little bit bigger, a little bit stronger.”

Former Nashua High track standout Amy Ruston, a 1999 Nashua grad, said the induction “means a lot, it really does. … It kind of brings back a little spirit in me…

“I loved my Nashua High team, I love my girls. … Everybody had big hands and they all reached out and helped.”

The late Mark Russell’s family spoke for the 1966 Nashua grad in the interview.

“What he was really proud of was the Buddy Harvey Award,” his son, Mark, said of an award named after Buzz Harvey’s son, who passed away. “I remember him mentioning how special that award was to him.

“And he said the camaraderie they had on that football team (title team in 1963) was tremendous.”

Reyes, meanwhile, said “it’s a complete honor. I’m definitely excited to join everybody else in such a big class, names of people I looked up to growing up in Nashua.

“The cool thing about it is the other inductees. … These guys were absolutely incredible. I remember going to Holman Stadium and watching the football team. In my mind, that (Nashua) was an NFL football team. That’s what inspired me to play.”

Former Nashua South and University of New Hampshire standout Trevor Knight says his only regret is his teams at South never won a title. Knight, however, won a Grey Cup with Winnipeg in the CFL two years ago.

“When we’d lose I’d watch the game film a hundred or 200 times before the next game,” Knight said. “It’s the little details.

“Something my Dad would always say to me, keep working and the rest will take care of itself. That really stuck with me in college as well.”

LINKS TO INDUCTION INTERVIEWS

The Induction video can be see on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PooAwlqWRg and also on Nashua ETV channel 99 or livestream https://www.nashuanh.gov/824/Nashua-ETV-Live-Stream today at noon.

In addition to the induction video, a playlist of the full-length interviews with the 11 ninductees will be available at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLI2ZwD8K9qY6AzYEHRV0aAlwBkb3X-vJN

(Editor’s Note: Telegraph staff writer Tom King is a member of the Nashua Hall of Fame selection/organizing Committee.)