Zane Britton doesn’t let wheelchair slow him down

Zane Britton, just like many 10-year-old boys in Princeton, wanted to play football.

He’s watched his friends do it and told his mom, Stephanie Shofner, he wanted to join them.

There was one catch. He’s confined to a wheelchair, paralyzed from the knees down, born with spina bifida.

“When football first started, he begged me. He said, ‘Mom, can I please do JFL.’ I said, ‘Well, buddy, I don’t know what you can do in JFL, and all that stuff. You’re kind of limited,” Shofner said. “So I reached out to Terry Smallwood (JFL President), and he was like, ‘Absolutely let him do it. We will find something for him to do.’”

Zane joined the fifth-grade Princeton team as manager, but was becoming frustrated because he wasn’t on the field with the rest of the team playing, telling his mom, “They won’t let me do anything.”

“I tried to explain to him, ‘One day maybe you’ll get out there and play,’ and he said, ‘I hope so,’’' Shofner said.

That day came soon enough.

With the help of Smallwood, Princeton coach T-Jay Alvarado and the Dixon coaches and players, Zane got his day to shine in last week’s game at Little Siberia Field.

“I was so glad he went out because I’d always see him in the end zones during the high school games trying to catch field goals,” Alvarado said. “We kind of had it in our mind, he’s going to be our team manager and we’d do a fun play some time in the season for him.”

That time came Saturday.

“Bodie (Terry Smallwood) asked me, ‘Hey what do you think of Zane scoring a touchdown against Dixon this week? (I said) absolutely. We set it up with the coaches from Dixon and they were all about it,” Alvarado said.

“Once the second half started I told Zane the game plan and he was all ready for it. I patted him on the helmet and said, ‘Make sure you get our mouth guard in.’

Alvarado said Zane was more than ready to go.

“All season long he’s jokingly been asking me if he can get in there and get some reps,” he said. “As soon as we got into formation, I wanted to make sure he felt the whole thing and felt like it wasn’t half tinkered. I pulled up the play, reminded him he wants to come to the left, juke to the right, and follow the blockers.

“I gave him a really quick warning, ‘You better not fumble.’ He looks up and give me his little signature smile. You could just tell he was just riveting with energy.”

The play was designed especially for Zane to score a touchdown, and he pushed into the end zone by his good buddy, Kip Cook. And he got to add the conversion run, too.

Alvarado praised the Dixon team for helping to make Zane’s moment special.

“It was so cool. The Dixon kids were into it. They’d go to cut him off, diving in the air, laying on the ground,” he said. “Had one of their kids almost in tears (saying ‘This is so cool. This is awesome.’ That just made my heart swell.”

And it makes a mom happy and bursting with joy for her son.

“It was great. It warmed my heart. I’m not going to lie, it brought tears just because how great his teammates are to him and how close they are coming together for that,” Shofner said. “When they told me they were going to to that, I was like, ‘Oh my God, that would make that kid’s whole year.’ And we kept it hush, hush.”

Shofner is so glad he got to join the football team this year.

“I understand he wants to be with his friends and do all the things his good friends do. And I don’t want to hold him back from that,” she said. “It’s been a really good experience.”

Alvarado, a former Princeton High School lineman (class of 2002), is doing more than building a youth football team. Along with showing his players compassion for a teammate, Alvarado is teaching his young men, including his son, Vincent, how to be good citizens. He organized a recent work day for his team to put out mulch at City-County Park for Matt Wright of the Princeton Park District, a former PHS teammate of Alvarado.

“I know the last few years they’ve been having trouble with vandalism and stuff like that from the younger kids,” he said. “I figure let’s put a stop to that and I’ll put these guys in there and get some accountability going and see if that doesn’t have an effect over the next few years. I’ll try to build something in them and get something on the other end, too, to see if they can set some examples.”

Alvarado is enjoying his first year in youth football after having many of the kids in flag football.

“It’s been awesome. When I was a player back in the day, I never saw myself in coaching,” he said. “I think now that I’m in it, (I’ve found) these kids are really fun. They learn fast. They’re super enthusiastic. That fires me up.”

Kevin Hieronymus is the BCR Sports Editor. Contact him at khieronymus@bcrnews.com