The coveted WPIAL trophy, the section banner, or the chance to win a gold medal are some of the defining moments in high school sports—but what happens to that trophy once you graduate?

Up until last month, nothing.

All section plaques, certain championship trophies, and the section champions banners were packed away in boxes in the athletic office.

The lack of “hardware” left the hallway near the gym and musical wing fairly bare even though that hallway is the most heavily trafficked by guests and parents.

Mr. Kevin Krzeczowski, our athletic director, realized this flaw in the athletic department when he noticed all of the boxes sitting in his office that were overflowing with past glories.

“We should be proud of our wins, and the people who won want to see their name in their school, so I tried to find a way to display all of our plaques,” Mr. Krzeczowski explained.

Mr. Krzeczowski spearheads this massive undertaking and started problem-solving about what to do with all of the past Bobcat trophies, banners, and plaques.

He decided that the section plaques would be the most important part of this project.

None of the section plaques were being displayed before Mr. Krezowski’s project, and now all 144 are hung in the hallway by the gyms.

The section plaques display the sport, coaches’ names, and players' names, as well as a graphic that represents the respective sport.

“The plaques weren’t being used but had all of these people’s names on them, and now they can try and find themselves,” said Mr. Krzeczowski.

However, finding your name on a specific plaque out of the 144 would be time-consuming and potentially impossible, so Mr. Krzeczowski decided to organize the plaques in chronological and alphabetical order (by sport).

The oldest plaque dates back to 1961, and every year the plaques will begin with baseball and end with track and field.

Mr. Krzeczowski also hopes to revamp the school’s tradition of hanging the section champions' banners in the gym.

These banners were replaced by only the WPIAL and PIAA champions’ banners but many teams have won multiple section titles but have not been able to clinch the WPIAL title.

Beaver Area is also a member of one of the more notoriously difficult sections in multiple sports like girls' soccer, football, and boys' basketball, so winning section champs is a huge accomplishment on its own.

Adding section champions banners would mean that the WPIAL and state banners would be embroidered to include section champions so the athletic department would not have to buy completely new banners in those cases.

So what if you can’t find your trophy, plaque, or banner at Beaver Area High School but still want to admire the championship regalia?

This project doesn’t just end with hanging plaques and banners; the athletic office is photographing all plaques, trophies, and memorabilia that the office has collected over the years for a database of sorts.

The massive trophies that the cross country team earns every year inspired the photo database since the trophies are too big to be displayed in the building trophy cases.

Mr. Krzeczowski said, “Cross country, for instance, has these huge trophies that don’t mean anything to some people, but the people who earned them like to reminisce about their time on the team. We won’t get rid of them; we just don’t have room for them.”

All of the photos will eventually be displayed on interactive TVs installed near the gym where people will be able to search the photos and get information about the accolades in a short paragraph accompanying the photos.

Miss Beth Spence’s yearbook staff has been taking the photos for the database.

Mr. Krzeczowski and his wife hung all of the plaques over a weekend, and despite this project seemingly being a massive undertaking he expects it will be finished in another week.

And thanks to donated labor and repurposing TV’s already in the district’s possession, the athletic office did not need to spend any money on this amazing project.