“Rocco, want to buy a camera off me?” 

David Fidler said to me in Video Media class on November 17th, 2023. I remember this date so specifically because it was the date a new chapter opened in my life. I should’ve said, “David, why would I ever waste my money on that?” But for some reason, which I still don’t understand to this day, I did it. Little did I know that was going to be the best decision of my life. 

Something that has stuck with me since my freshman year at Mount Carmel is Mr. Mark Antonetti telling us about swords. Not actual swords but figurative swords, something that differentiates you from other people. He told our class that for most of us, our swords would change before we left MC.

My sword definitely changed. 

When I first arrived at MC, I played hockey and lacrosse, and I thought that hockey was going to be my path in life. Spoiler alert, it wasn’t. 

Sophomore year, I sprained my UCL and couldn’t play hockey for two months; that’s when I bought the camera from Fidler. At the time, it seemed that getting injured was one of the worst moments of my life, but it would turn out to be one of the best. 

Without getting hurt, I would’ve never discovered photography, which would have never led me to broadcasting sports for MC. On May 16, 2024, Ryan Clark ’25 texted me and asked if I could fill in for him on the varsity lacrosse broadcast that night. I said yes, and from there, I loved it. 

Then in the fall of 2024, Matt Malloy ’25 asked me if I wanted to start broadcasting basketball. He saw something in me and decided to help me out. By the winter of 2024, I was the play-by-play announcer for JV basketball. 

Then it happened. Matt told me that he would be stepping down from the media group early to finish out his senior year of volleyball. Once he told me that, I got to work right away. I made a schedule, and we stuck to it. We streamed 13 games that spring, my favorite being the baseball team defeating Brother Rice, who at the time was the #25 team in the country. 

Once the fall of 2025 came around, I took a step back and started focusing on photography more and gave the main microphone to Brendan Daigler, who will take over as the next voice of the Caravan Media Group. 

Once basketball season came around, I put the headset back on and reminded myself how much I loved it. We streamed eight games, and not all of them were MC. Our school hosted the Chicago Sectional for Class 4A, and I knew that we had to stream it, so we broadcast all three games, and one of those moments put the Caravan Media Group on the map. With five seconds left in the game, St. Ignatius was trailing by one when Chris Bolte got a full-court heave and slammed it in for the win for the Wolfpack. To this day, it still is the craziest thing I’ve ever seen happen in a basketball game. Within 30 minutes of the game ending, it ended up on SLOCHE, MaxPreps, and the next morning ended up on a Barstool Sports podcast, which really put the Media program at MC on the map. 

Now I’m taking my talents to Indiana University to study Sports Media, and one day hope to be a professional sports broadcaster. 

Before I picked up the headset and started broadcasting, and even while I was broadcasting, I was managing teams at MC. Sophomore year, I started managing the basketball team. That taught me the true meaning of hard work. My first ever game as the manager was in St. Louis, a five-hour drive away. I got on that bus knowing one person, and got off that bus knowing everyone. 

That same year, the team went down to the state, and while they placed second, the whole journey was unforgettable. The next season, along with Ryan Clark and Declan Deering, I became one of the student athletic trainers for the football team, truly one of the most unique things that MC offers. I learned to tape athletes and manage injuries. 

In 2024, the football team won the state, and I found out that the other trainers and I each got a ring. When I first found out that the team was playing in Ohio during the first week of the 2025 season, I immediately asked Coach Lynch if I was going to go; his response was a “yes” immediately. 

(Speaking of Coach Lynch, I interviewed him a record six times for these articles, and he loved every second of all of them.) 

After football won state again this year, I moved to the baseball manager and got to travel to Las Vegas with them, an experience that I will truly never forget. I cannot express how much I appreciate Coach Brian Hurry, Coach Lynch, and Coach Phil Segroves for giving me the privilege to join their teams along for the ride. And I also can’t thank athletic trainer Joe Qualter and Ms. Meghan Lockerby enough, as they taught me everything I know about athletic training.

The bonds that I have formed at MC are unbreakable. I remember coming to MC knowing a few people and now feeling like I know everyone at the school. One of those people is TJ Kolke, and he and I have been close friends since 8th grade, when we did MC hockey spring skates for incoming freshmen together. We both also ran for Student Council president and vice president and won. 

But the story of how I met my other close friends is kind of crazy. Freshman year in Mr. Dan Haggerty’s English class, I got a text from my friend, Christian Bertucci, and he asked me if I knew a kid named Gio Giacone. I had no idea who this kid was, but it turned out he was sitting in front of me in English class. Christian told me to say something to him that I can’t say in this reflection, but Gio thought that it was hilarious and invited me to sit at his lunch table, and that’s where I met all my closest friends. Guys like Joey Casica, Jon Akin, Joey Rod, and Gio are some people who I truly consider family. 

Eventually, those four introduced me to their friends from Bridgeport, and I joined their friend group, and we have all truly been very close since then.I would meet more people from around the city and would grow close with them, including some Beverly guys like David Fidler, Quinn McCarihan, Quinn Flannery, and Will Walsh, with whom I just spent a weekend after prom, and it was some of the most fun that I’ve ever had. 

And that truly is the beauty of MC. There are kids from everywhere that you would never know if it wasn’t for Carmel. 

And then there’s this class, 21st Century Media, where the school newspaper is created. There are just four of us in this class this year–my fellow seniors Carlos Cerda and Anthony Chavez, and poor, lonely junior Derek Ozuna–and we have truly formed a bond that none of us will ever forget. 

There are so many more people that I am very close with at MC, too many to name. It is insane that these four years have come to a close, and now we have to “close the yearbook,” but do we really? Sure, we seniors are all going in different directions next year, but everyone will stay in contact, which is part of the brotherhood that is formed at MC. 

These four years have truly been the best four years of my life, and I can’t thank everyone enough who was part of them. To anyone who has tuned into my broadcasts, liked my photos, or supported me in any way, thank you. 

To Mr. Tim Baffoe and Ms. Eleanore Menke, thank you both for helping me find my love for sports journalism in a way that I could’ve never imagined. 

It truly has been a crazy four years. Thank you and goodbye, everyone.