Nancy Haggerty

nhaggerty@lohud.com

PLEASANTVILLE – The fifth- and sixth-grade boys – most in basketball jerseys – entered the Pleasantville High gym last Wednesday and made a beeline for Jack Bramswig, hands raised.

Bramswig happily obliged with high-fives for each, although, since he’s 6-foot-5, from his end they were really low-fives.

He had played in this very gym, the 24-year-old said, and in the same Dad’s Club program that has been around now for nearly 60 years.

When Jon Lieb, a basketball commissioner, asked how many of the 45 or so kids had had Bramswig as a substitute teacher, about 15 hands shot up.

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The Dad’s Club wanted the kids to listen to what Bramswig and current Pleasantville athletes Quentin Lupo and Charlie McPhee had to say about playing sports – about doing things the right way.

Marisa Mercatante was there with her son, John, 10. Another son, Andrew, 15, stood to the side.

Andrew’s autistic and, as a teacher’s aide last year, Bramswig worked one-on-one with him.

“He was very good with him and a great role model,” Marisa said.

A phone call last winter ended his work with Andrew and the other kids.

Bramswig was All-State in football, basketball and baseball before graduating from Pleasantville in 2010 and going to Manhattanville for basketball.

There, he scored 1,163 points, his 1,000th coming on a dunk on the same basket where his dad, Jim, scored his 1,000th for Rockland County’s St. Thomas Aquinas College in 1978.

But Jack's “competitive fire” still burned after basketball.

“I picked up a javelin and started jumping over things,” he said, not mentioning he set a school record in the long jump and gained first-team All-MAAC honors throwing the javelin.

After graduation, many of his buddies went to Wall Street or to other Monday-through-Friday jobs. Bramswig, who majored in childhood education and history, still had the itch to pursue athletics.

NCAA rules allow a maximum of four years participation in one sport and five years overall. With one year of eligibility left for something else, football beckoned.

Bramswig sent a highlight tape showcasing his athletic ability to multiple schools.

That August, Boston College summoned him.

As a recruited walk-on with little eligibility, Bramswig got into only three games and only then on special teams.

But he proved to himself he belonged and participated in a March 2015 pro day.

Some NFL teams later contacted him. After nothing came of that, Bramswig reached out to Canadian Football League, Arena Football League and Indoor Football League teams.

One Friday last winter, while he was working at the high school, the IFL's Green Bay Blizzard called, expressing interest.

That Monday, they called back. That Saturday, he was a professional football player, lining up alongside teammates from football schools like Ole Miss and West Virginia.

And Bramswig made an impression. He had 14 receptions, three for touchdowns, in just three games before breaking his left wrist and tearing a ligament in practice.

Some guys would have gone home. Bramswig stayed and trained.

“I knew I wasn’t done playing,” he said. “I don’t want to be that guy who throws the towel in after one round.”

It’s no surprise there are naysayers – folks who tell Bramswig, who received a master's in administrative studies from BC and worked the first half of this school year one day a week as a substitute teacher and the other four days in digital marketing, he should forget football.

But Bramswig, whose IFL season runs February-June, believes he has the mix of height and speed (4.53 40) for the NFL.

“There are not a lot (of players) who are tall and fast. The ones who are, you see little kids wearing their jerseys,” he said.

Some teammates have been in the league five or more years. He can’t see himself doing that. But Bramswig also isn’t ready to put a time limit on his goal.

“It’s kind of a sense of blind faith,” he said. “If I show everyone I didn’t reach the tip of my potential (last year), NFL teams will come knocking.”

High-five to that.

Twitter:@HaggertyNancy