EDWARDSBURG — On a foggy and moist Saturday morning, members of the Edwardsburg High School football team gathered at the Edwardsburg Sports Complex to participate in the arduous task of digging holes.

At 9 a.m. about 40 football players dug and filled in 80 suitcase-size holes in order to assist the sports complex in installing a sprinkler system at two of its new baseball fields, which are expected to be ready this upcoming spring.

“I’m not sure if these guys will ever use the fields themselves, but their brothers or sisters may,” said Kevin Bartz, head coach of the Edwardsburg High School football team. “It’s a great thing they are putting together out here to once again improve our overall athletic facilities here in Edwardsburg. It’s a chance for them to give back to the community and help out. I don’t think it will take us that long.”

Installing the sprinkler system with the football team’s help only took about two hours total. If they had not helped, Edward Patzer, the president of the sports complex, said that this project would have taken the complex at least two days to complete.

“It’s just tremendous that we get the support of the community like this,” Patzer said.

Each field will have four or five different base-path options, which will allow different age level and softball teams to utilize the fields.

In the coming year, the Edwardsburg Sports Complex plans to add two more baseball fields.

“Edwardsburg Sports Complex has kind of been a work in progress for several years,” Bartz said. “They’ve got some soccer fields. They got some football fields. Now they’re getting baseball fields. About every year or so they get a couple fields.”

This is not the first time the Edwardsburg High School football team has assisted the sports complex.

“I’m on the school board, and I’m a strong supporter of the football team,” Patzer said. “I’ve known Kevin Bartz for years. This is probably the fourth or fifth time the football team has come out and helped us.  …. They certainly responded today.”

While many of the football players do not love waking up early on a Saturday morning, many of them were happy to have the chance to give back to the community.

A few players also said that compared to football practice, digging holes was light work.

“Even though this isn’t football, it’s still a chance to help people play sports,” said Adam Covert, a senior on the team. “I was talking to someone yesterday, and this is going to be his daughter’s home field. So I want to be to be a part of that. I want to be a part of giving future generations an opportunity to play the sports they love.”

Bartz said that working at the sports complex on Saturday also provided him with an opportunity to make sure he is developing his athletes into more than just good football players.

“If high school football is just about football then we’re not really getting much accomplished,” Bartz said. “We talk about the process of becoming a good football team and a good football program. … A lot of them tend to focus just on the end result, which is playing in a football game, but I feel that an athletic facility is a great place for these young men to come together, get out of the house and do some work.”