While it’s a typical sports cliché to say that champions aren’t born overnight, Moravia's head football coach Fred Ott said he and his coaching staff knew how special the current team would be for many years.

“We’ve known this group of kids would be special for a long, long time,” Ott said. “Coach Palmer coached these kids back during youth football. So, he knew this group was special from the start.”

Fast forward to 2023, and that ragtag group of youth football players are now the Section IV Champions – the first Sectional Championship in program history.

Led by a group of athletic, dedicated seniors, Moravia’s season is still going strong. This Friday, they will head to Windsor to play a de-facto semi-final playoff game. The team is just two wins away from being the best eight-man program in the state of New York.

So, what does Ott attribute to this incredible success?

“We’re just athletes. We have strong athletes at every starting position,” Ott said. “They play multiple sports, and they’re dedicated to the weight room. And those things rub off on the other kids.”

Moravia’s offensive attack has been particularly spectacular during their undefeated run. The team averages more than 60 points a game. In the Section IV Championship, the offense had the ball for 11 drives. They scored 11 touchdowns.

For Ott, that success can be attributed to the ability the team has to spread the ball all over the field.

“We have so many players who can score at any moment. That takes a lot of pressure off the team. We’re not very predictable,” Ott said. “We move the ball around and have so many different directions we can go with the football.”

With the program winning its first-ever Section IV Championship, Ott admitted that it would be easy for the team to lose its focus moving forward. However, Ott said the job is not finished yet.

“There are only four teams remaining in eight-man football. And next week, there will only be two. So, this is huge. And that’s our motivation. Let’s try to get that undefeated season and finish on top of the state,” Ott said.

Seniors Aiden Kelly and Seth Parker confirmed that the team is not satisfied with just winning Section IV.

“It’s cool to win the sectional championship, but the job is not finished,” said Kelly.

“Being sectional champs doesn’t mean too much right now. Our goal is to win it all,” said Parker.

Win or lose moving forward, Ott said he is extremely proud of the team and simply hopes they have created memories that will last a lifetime.

“For whatever reason, football is that sport that you talk about when you’re 50 years old. So, for them to be able to look back and say they were Section champs and hopefully more, that's just really special," said Ott.