When it comes to the town of Hopkinton, there’s no better ambassador than Scott Mackin.
The 59-year-old has been an assistant coach with the Hopkinton football team since the 1970s. He also coaches unified basketball (and officiates the games), boys basketball and baseball. Even though he has significant intellectual disabilities that hamper his speech, his players understand him well, and his actions speak volumes to his tireless dedication in service to the community.
He extends his services to the Hopkinton fire department, police, Boston Marathon, and youth Parks and Recreation basketball camps.
Mackin has been coaching alongside Hopkinton’s unified and freshman boys basketball and baseball coach Jay Golden for 23 years, and Golden believes Mackin exemplifies commitment and teamwork at every game and practice. He is the first person to show up for practices and the last to leave and ensures nothing is left behind, especially the medical kit or the water bottles.
“Scott (offers) great support,” said Golden. “Not just athletically but emotionally to the kids, too. After a really tough practice or maybe a tough loss in a game, (the players) look over and see Scott, and Scott has a smile on his face, and it cheers the kids up and really boosts team morale. He really brings a lot to the team from the team-building perspective and kind of brings everybody together.”
“It makes me happy,” Mackin said. “I say, ‘You’d better win for me!’ (and) ‘Do you have good news for me?’ ”
During basketball games, he greets players coming off the bench and creates his own charts to show the team at halftime. For varsity games, he sits in the first row of the bleachers across from the bench and gives hand signals to the head coach, Tom Keane. In the spring, he chats with freshman baseball players to keep them engaged in the dugout.
Mackin’s connection with Hopkinton High ripples beyond the athletes. Stop by Hopkinton home football games, and you’ll see him walk over from the sideline to fire up the student section with his signature “roller coaster” wave.
“No exaggeration, there’s hundreds of kids in the student section,” said Golden, a PA announcer for several years. “So, they’re all dressed up and their faces are painted, and he’s got them eating out of the palm of his hands. He’s pointing this way and they go this way … and they’re chanting his name. He brings so much positive energy, not only to the game but to the whole atmosphere of what’s going on, too. And there’s not one kid in the entire school that does not know his name.”
Because Mackin cares, countless others care for him. In 2003, after a foul ball grazed Mackin’s head, umpire Jeff Merzel and his sons Dan (a player at the time but now an MLB umpire) and Adam made him a helmet, which he still puts to use.
Mackin is well-known among parents, Hopkinton alumni and opposing coaches as well.
“Anywhere we go,” his mother, June, said. “Not just in town. Other towns. There is always somebody that comes up and talks to us.”
Perhaps nothing represents Mackin’s lasting impact on the Hopkinton community better than when Golden chose him as a group leader on a senior class trip to a Red Sox game at Fenway Park in 2022. The Sox invited the group leaders onto the field to stand behind home plate and appear on the Jumbotron.
Imagine their surprise when they heard someone behind them calling out Mackin’s name.
“I had a player on my freshman basketball team in 2009 named Ryan Bohlin,” Golden said. “Ryan was one of those players that not only became very close to Scott but has kept that connection over the years. We turn around, and Ryan and his girlfriend are in the front row waving to Scott. Ryan had been out of high school for 10 years. They made all this effort just to see Scott, and so I think that is the best testament to the effect that Scott has on our student-athletes in Hopkinton.”
Mackin is a thriving example of how athletes and coaches living full lives with disabilities aren’t defined by their disabilities. They offer profound value and talent to the sports industry and their community at large. Embracing inclusion helps reveal everyone’s gifts to the game.
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