Aaron Hill remembers the camaraderie of former rivals teaming up to play one last game in the Big 30 All-Star Charities Classic.

Hill played in 2003, when New York won a shootout over Pennsylvania 56-40. He’s also coached in the game twice before as an assistant. Now, it’s his first time calling signals in the annual senior game at Bradford High’s Parkway Field, serving as the defensive coordinator, as he does for Chad Bartoszek’s coaching staff at Salamanca.

Hill has noticed certain position groups — perhaps the defensive unit as a whole — growing closer over the two-week practice leadup to Saturday night.

“That’s the fun part,” Hill said. “You kind of spend your entire career playing against these guys as enemies and now you’re teammates playing on one side of the ball with a common enemy. They’ve done a really good job supporting each other. It’s been a really nice camaraderie. We’ve had dinner every night after practice and it’s kind of a mixed group where they’re not necessarily sitting with the kids they’re familiar with, they’re sitting with the ones that they’re playing with on that side of the ball. So it’s really cool to see.”

That’s exactly what Hill remembers from 2003.

“Meeting some of those guys you didn’t necessarily like in the middle of a football season, all of a sudden you’re best buddies coming out of the game,” he said. “So that’s a really cool aspect of this game.”

Rules set by the Big 30 Committee restrict the formations — or blitzes, for example — coaches can use. But the good thing for New York’s defense is Salamanca and Hill are used to a 4-3 base defense.

“We’re very familiar with the structure and the process,” Hill said. “So it’s really just relaying all that information to our kids and trying to make it as simple as possible and making it fun from a schematic standpoint so they can kind of fly around and enjoy what we’re doing on the structured side of things.”

Hill’s comments echo Bartoszek’s approach to the offense: the Salamanca coaches don’t want to bog down the players with unnecessarily complicated schemes or concepts.

“We try to keep it simple and fun, because if you overcomplicate it in this situation, the kids only have two weeks to prepare,” he said. “So we want them to react on the football field and not necessarily be thinking about what their responsibility is in those situations.”

On the edge, New York’s defensive ends include Brock Gagliardo (Portville/Cuba-Rushford), Jacksen Kahm (Olean) and Collin Mooney (Franklinville/Ellicottville).

Henry Chamberlain (Portville/Cuba-Rushford) and Ethan Allen (Franklinville/Ellicottville) are set to play defensive tackle.

At linebacker are Zane Gleason (Allegany-Limestone) and Zach Trietley (Salamanca) in the middle and Owen Hayes (Southwestern) and Manoah Miketish (Olean) on the outside.

New York’s defensive back numbers are a bit deeper with four cornerbacks and four safeties. Listed at corner are Trent Casselman (Southwestern), Dakota Colts (Salamanca), Logan Fleischman (Pioneer) and Carter Smith (Franklinville/Ellicottville). The safety group includes Cole Keesler (Portville/Cuba-Rushford), Kyle Lecceardone (Salamanca), Landen Schappacher (Portville/Cuba-Rushford) and DJ Szata (Cattaraugus-Little Valley).

Hill sees speed and athleticism as New York’s strength.

“We’re not an overall huge group up front, but the kids are mobile, they fly around, we seem to do a good job getting bodies to the ball,” he said. “So if we create some turnovers on the back end with bodies in support, I think we should have some success on the defensive side of the ball.”

Hill commended the defensive unit for a “group support” approach to leadership.

“There’s certain situations where depending on the position group or the kid, they’ve approached it as leaders of any football team, or as a captain of their own football team,” Hill said. “So they’ve done a good job as a group bringing each other along throughout the course of the last few weeks.”

The defense includes three members of a 2024 Salamanca team that made it all the way to the state championship game in Syracuse, including a two-time Big 30 All-Star, Trietley.

While there’s no official film exchange for an all-star game, Hill acknowledged he’s done some online research on the opposing coaching staff from Otto-Eldred.

“Obviously, we have some tools available to us that weren’t necessarily there 15, 20 years ago,” he said. “You can go to YouTube and find a little bit of film and you can find clips here and there of some of the things they do structurally that can give us some hints as we work with the gameplan for Saturday.”

Hill tries to attend the Charities Classic every summer when his schedule allows. It’s not always easy with kids playing sports now and a job for USA Football (he’s now the head Manager of Recruiting & Club Relationships) that often sees him traveling.

“Whenever I can get there, I’m there because I love the atmosphere, I love the environment. There’s always four or five thousand people there,” he said. “It’s great energy and it’s obviously a kickoff to the football season, so it kind of brings back those butterflies and the feelings of a regular Friday night.”

And “energy,” according to Hill, is exactly what New York will need if it’s going to win a second straight Big 30 game. As the reigning winners (New York won 39-18 last August), the Empire state will occupy the home sideline in front of the main bleacher stand.

“For us it’s going to be energy, effort and physicality,” Hill said. “We need to have better energy than them and we have to hit all night long. We’ve got to get 11 bodies to the football and as long as the kids embrace the atmosphere and the crowd support, I think we’ll be in a good position to bring that on Saturday.”