As high school football teams were just beginning their first week of preseason preparation last week, the National Football Foundation’s Lehigh Valley Chapter held its first ever Lehigh Valley Football Media Day.

Coaches from all 33 teams in the NFF-LV area were invited to come to Northampton High School’s Erdosy Stadium with their team captains to talk about the upcoming season.

“I would say it’s about time,” Northwestern Lehigh head coach Josh Snyder said. “The Schuylkill League does a league event. I would love a Colonial League Media Day. For an organization to step up and have a Lehigh Valley media day is great. The kids deserve it. The program’s deserve it. It’s fun and it’s exciting.”

Parkland fullback/linebacker Nick Suriel, whose team is a six-time defending District 11 champion, said it was nice to see the competition on friendly terms before meeting them again with the pads on. But the event was more about celebrating the sport they love.

“This is cool to see our competition,” he said. “We know most of these kids in the Lehigh Valley. At the end of the day it’s all about everyone in the Lehigh Valley coming together for a sport they love.

The Trojans will be a favorite to continue their success, but several teams shouldn’t be too far behind, including last year’s Class 4A district champ Bethlehem Catholic, District 11 Class 6A finalist Freedom and an Emmaus team that returns most of its skill players and added transfer quarterback Ethan Parvel, who was one of the top QBs in the league last year at Whitehall.

“I’m excited because I have a bunch of great kids,” said Hornet head coach Harold Fairclough. “It’s one thing to have talented kids, but when they work hard and do what you ask them to do and seem to enjoy doing it with each other it seems to make a difference.”

Bethlehem Catholic is coming off a run to the state semifinals, where it lost to Imhotep Charter. Parkland got to the state quarterfinals in Class 6A, while Freedom entered districts as a six seed and reached its second consecutive district title game last season.

Emmaus, which has lost to Freedom in each of the past two district tournaments, returns three-year starting running backs in Sone Ntoh and Lubens Myers. It also has some pas catchers that got significant playing time last year. But the Hornets graduated five linemen who were all two-year starters. Owen Minnix is the only returning starter up front.

“It’s going to come down to how well our line gels,” said Fairclough. “If they come together up front its going to be fun to watch. We graduated all five guys. All five were two-year starters. We have two guys back, Owen Minnix and Lance Hoch, who also played a bunch last year due to injuries.”

Emmaus won a share of the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference title in 2016 and went 6-4 last year to earn the No. 3 seed in districts. The Hornets are looking to become a team that is consistently competing for league and district titles. In his third season at the helm, Fairclough has the program headed in that direction.

“That’s the goal,” he said. “When we got here as a staff that’s what we wanted to do. We wanted to set the expectations higher. This program for a long time has been right in the middle of the road. These guys have the talent and the work ethic to take it to another level.”