By Patrick McGavin-Just All Sports
Quinn Durkin is one of the best youth football prospects of his generation.
Now a freshman running back at Sandburg, Durkin was the best player in the River Valley Youth League.
After taking a hard hit and suffering a collarbone injury as a 7th grader, Durkin was anguished and doubled over.
One of the first adults on the scene was Jenny Czerwonka. At that moment she was in the middle of her four-year tenure running the Orland Park Pioneers.
She had a special connection with the players.
“The Pioneer kids were her family,” former coach and president John Stefanos said.
According to Stefanos, Quinn Durkin requested Czerwonka accompany him to the hospital.
“Jenny drove to Silver Cross, and sat by Quinn and his father for more than four hours as they diagnosed his injury,” Stefanos said
“The kids know who they trust.”
The Pioneers had profound success during her four-year tenure, with six championships.
Her personal odyssey from a mother and wife to a skilled fundraiser and organizational operator who ran one of the most successful youth league football programs is filled with her personal touch.
“It was very satisfying to always win, and that was the biggest success,” she said.
“The most gratifying thing is to see the kids grow, and to see the kids really fall in love with the game and then go to the next level.”
The time is now opportune for Czerwonka to reflect on her reign after the Pioneers recently restructured their coaching and management teams.
Now in their 47th year of operation, the Pioneers have been a gold standard in southwest suburban football culture.
John Stefanos and his brother, Chris Stefanos, seized new opportunities, developed the grass roots program, intensified recruiting and built a powerhouse.
When the moment came for John Stefanos to relinquish his control of the program and move into high school coaching at Marist, coming up with the right successor was crucial to the foundation of the program.
John Stefanos knew Czerwonka was the right person for the job.
“When I supported Jenny as the President to follow me it wasn’t a decision I took lightly,” he said.
“First and foremost, Jenny has a passion for youth football that is unmatched. There is not a single person in the Pioneer organization that has put their heart and soul into the success of the Pioneers as Jenny has.”
“She is the only member who has never missed a game, a Board meeting or a league meeting. She is the only member of the Pioneers that would attend every level of Pioneer games. Not just her son’s games. She was so well respected at the league level that she was selected as secretary and was acting and voting member for the Pioneers.
The curious thing is football was about the farthest thing from her mind when Jenny was growing up on the southwest side near Midway.
She was more into movement and lyric actions, like doing dance and gymnastics. She went to school at Queen of Peace, an all girls’ Catholic school in Burbank across from St. Laurence.
She was captivated by other ideas, other interests.
Life is funny, rarely linear or predictable, and strange things happen with memory and time.
With her marriage to her husband Don and the birth of her son Christian, Jenny Czerwonka remade herself with her settling into life, family and work in Orland Park.
“The son of one of my best friends played for Homer, and I would go and watch his games,” Czerwonka said.
“With some of his friends, as they went to high school, I just continued to follow him. At that point, I just fell in love with the game.”
Her son Christian was born in June 2010. When he was about five years old, Jenny signed him up for the flag program.
“A friend of mine was getting it off the ground, and I started working with him,” she said.
She helped with jerseys and uniforms, and doing whatever job was needed. As her son made the transition to the higher level programs, she was asked to join the board.
In 2019, Czerwonka took over running the program.
In the era of analytics, numbers and how to make organizations more efficient, Czerwonka had a superpower.
She was an incredibly skilled fundraiser.
“Jenny built the largest cash reserve in history, and that placed the organization in a very strong position,” John Stefanos said.
“The entire universe of high school coaches of the top programs in Illinois consult Jenny on a regular basis.”
For Chris Stefanos, Jenny was the ideal fit for the program.
“Jenny’s greatest quality as President was that she truly wanted every young athlete to feel like a blue chip recruit. It did not matter to her if they were the superstar or the first year player who was learning the game as a backup. She was determined to guarantee that the years spent in a Pioneer uniform would be an experience every athlete could look back on and smile.”
“Jenny always made sure every athlete, coach and family had everything they needed. She would never miss a game at any level and would cheer everyone as if it were the state finals. She promoted the kids, past and present, on social media because not only did she admire their accomplishments, she wanted everyone else too as well. She always made sure the Pioneers’ families were taken care of.”
“Some may forget, but during Jenny’s tenure, the Pioneers faced some harrowing challenges. The Pioneers had to split between two locations for awhile to find the space they needed. This was very difficult as Jenny would travel back and forth between locations every day making sure every Coach and player had what they needed.”
“The Spring season was an unprecedented event for the League, and Jenny was integral for making this happen, not only for the Pioneer athletes, but for the entire River Valley league, as she was also an officer on the League Board. The Pioneers’ home field was not available, and Jenny assisted me with contacting stadiums as far as Indiana to find a location for the kids to play, as well as having a bit of normalcy during a trying time. Ultimately, the Pioneers and League had a very successful Spring season much because of her efforts.”
She came into the job without fear or favor, and went in with her eyes on the prize.
“Looking back, it was definitely a challenge, and I wondered whether I could really do it,” she said.
“I knew with John’s knowledge and back and with my passion for high school football and my organizational experience with fundraising that I could do it.”
The early going was a crash course in every avenue of the organization, registration, the certification of the coaches to the organization of the end of the season awards banquet.
Not for nothing was the first day of registration on January 1. A new day, a new year, and everything was ramped up.
Time is the essence.
“There is such a push to get everybody registered as early as possible so you have enough time to order jerseys,” she said.
John Stefanos was the magnet for many young players because of his background and level of accomplishment.
With his departure, the most significant structural challenge was convincing players and their families the program would remain an elite platform for visibility and getting seen by high schools.
“I really wanted to build the brand as much as possible,” Czerwonka said. ‘I wanted there to be a greater social media presence, and to grow them as much as possible.”
Outside events soon took over, like the team losing their football field to the village. That began a near endless negotiation for practice space that was as much a political battle as an athletic question.
Then the world changed with the pandemic that forced the postponement of the fall season into the spring of 2021.
That meant a double-season in the spring and fall.
Czerwonka had to adjust on the fly, and adapt to the moment. It occasioned her own epiphany that became one of her proudest moments.
“It was the spring season two years ago, and the varsity was playing the Falcons, and we were losing at halftime,” she said.
“At halftime, everybody was cool, and we made the adjustments and came out and won the game. It was one of my proudest moments.”
Her son is in eighth grade and a member of the varsity. As he contemplates his next step, Czerwonka is proud of what she achieved, and how she helped the Pioneers maintain their lofty status.
With Quinn Durkin leading the way, the Pioneers completed a remarkable 13-0 season with a dominant victory in the Super Bowl.
Her impact and value continues to be felt.
“For me the legacy is just the impact I’ve had on the kids,” she said. “They sent me messages, and they tell me how thankful they are.”
She remains an executive secretary in the league. She is also helping out national power Mount Carmel.
“Last week I watched five of our graduates play in their high school scrimmage,” she said. “They all came up to me. Seeing how excited they are and knowing that we still support them is so great.
“I’ve had almost every other team in the league tell me they are trying to mirror what I did, and they tell me I changed the game. It’s the relationships with the kids and the families that means the most to me.”
New Pioneer leader Al Krokos will have his opportunity to fill big shoes same as Jenny Czerwonka did when John Stefanos stepped down. Certainly Krokos will meet and experience the same challenges that come with leadership. With Jenny Czerownka’s departure, Al Krokos is capable and in good position to succeed and continue the upward trend.
“She did a lot of great things for the program, we will continue to move in the right direction.
