The temperature may have been hard pressed to reach 40 degrees in Huguenot on Saturday, and the calendar showed us to be months removed from the final pitch of the 2023 high school baseball season, yet there were the Tottenville Pirates receiving their PSAL city championship rings prior to a gridiron semifinal.

While the situation seemed a bit odd, the emotions were quite honest and true, as manager Mike Grippo presided over the impromptu ceremony near the Tottenville football team’s bench just minutes prior to the school’s 43-15 victory over Lincoln and a berth in the Dec. 3 pigskin final at Midwood HS in Brooklyn.

Should the Pirates win that, the school would pull off a rare baseball-football dual championship in the same calendar year (though not the same school year). In fact, several players who graduated from the baseball title team and who are now collegians scattered throughout the country, made it back to receive their rings.

“We kept asking the PSAL when the rings would be ready. Then, on Monday or Tuesday of this week, the league said they were in,” said Grippo, whose second-seeded squad defeated No. 1 Gregorio Luperon by a 7-4 score at Yankee Stadium on June 12 to capture the crown. “It was still too early to give them out during the [boys’ season-opening] basketball game on Wednesday night, so we planned it for today. The administration did a great job setting up breakfast at the school for everyone.

“It was important that we get it done now, since we had so many kids back in town for Thanksgiving. We had about seven guys from college come back, some from as far away as Florida.”