A large crowd was at Laurel High School’s football stadium Sunday night, but fans weren’t there to cheer on the Spartans. They came to pray for Hayden Hamilton.
Hamilton is a sophomore linebacker at Laurel who sustained a serious spinal injury Friday in a game against Rochester. Hamilton went through a nine-hour surgery Saturday at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.
Laurel, a small WPIAL school in New Castle, held a vigil for Hamilton Sunday night at the stadium and the place was filled. Laurel coach Brian Cooper has been at the hospital much of the weekend. Sunday morning, he saw Hamilton and talked with his parents, Chad and Melissa. Cooper said Hamilton has movement in his hands, has some feeling in his arms and is alert and able to communicate.
Cooper said Hamilton’s parents wanted to pass along a message.
“They just want everyone to know they appreciate all the love and support and just continue to pray for them,” Cooper said. “Hopefully, we’ll see a miracle.”
Cooper went on to say, “We’re being optimistic. The next 72 hours are very critical.”
Hamilton is a 5-foot-9, 185-pound outside linebacker who also started a year ago as a freshman before a torn ACL in his knee ended his season. Hamilton had bounced back from the knee injury and also was seeing some playing time at running back on offense.
Hamilton was injured in the third quarter of the Rochester game. After a long delay, he was taken by ambulance to UPMC Jameson in New Castle. Cooper said Hamilton was taken by LifeFlight helicopter to Children’s.
“He was making a tackle on a running play and the leg of the running back just came up and got him in the helmet,” Cooper said. “He did nothing wrong. He didn’t have his head down. It was just the running back’s legs kept pumping and the one leg caught [Hamilton] the wrong way. He went down instantly.”
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The game eventually resumed, and Cooper said it finished close to 11 p.m. Rochester won, 26-14.
Chad Hamilton had a Facebook post about his son Saturday that said, “The doctors stabilized the vertebrae in his neck, and have done their best to decompress his spinal cord. They are treating him as aggressively as they can to regain as much as possible. I wish I had better news. Thank you, everyone.”
A GoFundMe page already was started Saturday for Hamilton and his family.
“This is an unfortunate accident and we’re just trying to be positive,” Cooper said. “Sometimes, we don’t fully understand things that happen the way they do. The best thing to do is just to try and keep moving forward. There has been a great outpouring of love and support from the community. It has been overwhelming in many ways the love the community has had for this kid. It’s a testament to him.
“We have to try and be patient. Everyone wants something to happen fast, but it’s going to be a long process.”
Mike White: mwhite@post-gazette.com and Twitter @mwhiteburgh.
First Published: September 2, 2018, 4:58 p.m.