Super Bowl winning safety Justin Reid shared a long embrace with his high school coach Benny Saia Saturday after riding in a parade honoring the Dutchtown High alum.
The parade featured a line of Ascension Parish fire trucks carrying Reid, his father, Eric Reid Jr. and Dutchtown High football players. La. 73 was lined with fans braving the rain and 47 degree temperature to see their hometown hero.
Amanda Higgins and her daughter, Khloe, 7, parked in front of Dutchtown Middle School hoping to get a look at Reid, who went to high school with Higgins.
“I’ve followed him his whole career and couldn’t miss this chance to see him,” Higgins said.
She wasn’t the only fan attending the homecoming parade and ceremony, which was held in Griffin football stadium.
Angel Aycock and her son Martin, who is known as the football team’s No. 1 fan, waited in line to get a photograph with Reid.
Kansas City native Deondra Johnson and her son, Regionald, live in the same neighborhood as Reid’s family. Johnson said her son wanted an autograph and he received one.
Several of Reid’s family members came from around the state, Texas and Maryland to show support. In the crowd were his mother, Sharon, and brothers Eric Reid Jr. and Ryan Reid.
Former Dutchtown High School coach Benny Saia said Reid had to be convinced to sign up for football over soccer.
“I almost didn’t get him,” Saia said, adding that Reid was leaning toward playing high school soccer.
Reid is the school’s first player to win a Super Bowl.
Several of Reid’s former teachers and administrators waited in line to say hello.
“I had to come to say hello,” said retired educator and assistant principal Marsha Moses.
Eric Reid Sr. said he was happy to see so many from the area come out to support his son.
“This is what Ascension Parish and Dutchtown is about … supporting their own,” Eric Reid Sr. said.
Reid thanked the fans for showing up the cold rain to honor him. He said Dutchtown has grown in the years since he played football, adding that the football team now plays on artificial turf.
Leave a Reply