Highlands grad Romello Freeman goes from homeless to earning football scholarship

By: HSSN Staff
Saturday, July 28, 2018 | 10:45 PM

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It took just Romello Freeman’s presence at a recent Highlands football summer workout to get the atmosphere at Highlands Golden Rams Stadium buzzing.

Coach Dom Girardi teased Freeman as he went through a photo shoot, worrying aloud that his former player might break the camera. Girardi’s young son asked if Freeman would attend his birthday party next month, while some of Freeman’s former teammates invited him to join the workout.

Freeman dealt with the attention the way he handled the hardships of his first 19 years of life: good-naturedly, with an ever-present smile.

“Everyone’s family to me,” said Freeman, 19. “I love everyone.”

Officially classified as homeless, Freeman nonetheless found a home the past three years at Highlands: starring in two sports, getting voted Homecoming king and — most importantly — becoming the first member of his family to graduate high school and the next day signing a national letter of intent to play football at Mercyhurst.

After a past of bouncing around, Freeman’s present and future appear more stable. And despite difficult times, he’s embracing it all.

“A lot of people go through stuff at home and it’s hard, but don’t let nothing bring you down at all,” Freeman said. “Just keep grinding, do what you do, and just focus on the next day, the next opportunity, everything like that. Matter of fact, don’t focus on the next one: focus on the opportunity you have now. That’s what you need to do, and I have the opportunity to be the best.

“I have an opportunity to be something I always wanted to be. It could be my dream come true: be a successful person.”

‘This made me tough’

Born in Manhattan, Freeman moved to Lancaster at a young age and spent most of his childhood either there or in Philadelphia. While in Lancaster, he lived with his mother, Doris Ward; his older brothers, Walter and Eric; and his younger brother, Shawn. Walter and Shawn are half-brothers, but Freeman said he considers them “full brothers.” The family also spent time with his maternal grandparents, Walter and Bessie.

“I always stayed with my family my whole life,” Freeman said.

Freeman’s grandparents were frequent church-goers, and their influence — along with the rest of his family — helped shape him. Highlands basketball coach Tyler Stoczynski noted Freeman’s consistent “yes, sir” and “no, sir” answers in their first meeting after Freeman enrolled at the school midway through his sophomore year.

“He’d look you straight in the eye,” Stoczynski said. “He immediately made a first impression, a positive one, on me, like wow, he’s a big strong kid who’s obviously been taught some things in his life where he knows how to address coaches and teachers and elders.”

Although he had his mother, brother and grandparents surrounding him, Freeman said he never had a relationship with his father, nor did he seek one out.

“He was never in my life,” Freeman said. “I just never cared to ask. He called me a couple times, but I just never cared because he wasn’t there helping my mom or anything.”

Freeman moved to Uniontown with his mother and Shawn for the first one and a half years of high school. Then, they came to Tarentum.

“Sometimes, I still feel like I’m on my own,” he said. “(But) it feels good when you’re on your own. You see the world more, you learn about it. It’s on you. It’s making you a tougher person. This made me tough. My whole life I had a hard life, and it just made me who I am today. I’m blessed to live this life. I could have been through worse.

“The reason it made me tough is not living a stable life, not playing in one spot, it made me more of a man. There’s a lot of people out there that didn’t go through what I’ve been through, so they’re going to learn it later in life. I already learned. They don’t understand how hard it is to live life.”

‘I thank everybody for it’

Freeman, his mother and younger brother came to Tarentum in the fall of 2015, his sophomore year, moving into the Alle-Kiski Area Hope Center — a nonprofit that offers shelter for people in need.

He found at Highlands a community that embraced him and his family.

Grace Tanilli, mother of Freeman’s classmate and basketball teammate Christian Tanilli, said Freeman would frequently stay at their house: “He was welcome anytime he wanted,” she said.

Other times, community members would offer money, or food, a couch to sleep on, or academic assistance.

“He was always extremely appreciative,” Grace Tanilli said. “Like every time I see him now, he’ll come over and hug me and tell me, like 10 times, ‘I love you, Grace.’ He has never once asked for anything or acted entitled to having anything because of his rough childhood.”

Freeman starred on the football field, where he led Highlands in receiving as a senior — catching five touchdown passes in one game against Blackhawk — and on the basketball court, where he was the sixth man for the Golden Rams’ WPIAL semifinal and PIAA quarterfinal run in 2017-18.

“I think that our Highlands community did a great job of embracing him from the very start,” Stoczynski said. “And because he has that infectious smile and that infectious personality that you want to be around him, I think our community grew on that. We have a lot of really, really good people in our community. … There’s obviously a ton to name, but they deserve a lot of credit.”

Freeman and his family moved out of the Hope Center during his junior year into an apartment, but they couldn’t consistently make rent payments. Eventually the family split up: Shawn moving to Lancaster to live with his father. Freeman moved in with Tim Oravitz, the father of some of his Highlands classmates.

That caused a split with his mother.

“I didn’t want to leave her,” Freeman said. “She wanted to move, so I was like, I like it out here – I’ll stay. I’d rather finish my senior year here. It’s a good life, I like it. I just want to be the man who I am. I’d rather graduate here then start another year somewhere else.”

Freeman said he hasn’t spoken with his mother in a few months — “Sometimes me and my mom didn’t see eye to eye, but I know she loves me from the bottom of her heart,” he said — and in her absence, the Highlands community became his family. On basketball senior night, his teammates escorted him onto the floor.

“He always keeps his chin up, and he always has a smile on his face,” Oravitz said. “There’s probably some things that are bothering him inside, but he keeps his head up high and he moves forward. He’s a joy to have around.”

Freeman said he wishes he had come to Highlands sooner, calling the help he received from the community “truly a blessing.”

“Sometimes, it feels like I’m homeless because I’m not with my family,” he said. “Like, I would love to be with my family every night. But it’s a good thing people open their door. I could be out here sleeping in the street every night and people wouldn’t know. But it’s a good thing they did, though. And I thank everybody for it, honestly.”

‘This is when it gets real’

In Mike Choma’s first extended conversation with Freeman, he mentioned his dream of going to college and playing sports.

“I’ve done it for other guys around here, and I always say, I’m going to give you an opportunity — take advantage,” said Choma, an announcer, statistician and do-everything type at Highlands.

Freeman did, earning that scholarship to Mercyhurst, but it came down to the wire. Although he had a total GPA of 3.0 midway through his senior year, Choma was surprised to find that his “core GPA” — grades in core classes like math, science, English and history — didn’t meet the NCAA standard of 2.2. Neither did his low SAT scores.

That led to a full-court press in Freeman’s last semester as he attempted to raise his grades and test scores. As he recovered from a broken arm suffered at the end of football season, Freeman studied at Choma’s house. Teachers were available to offer their own assistance.

“Nobody gave him anything — he earned everything — but they helped,” Choma said. “They knew what we were trying to shoot for, and they kept me in the loop.”

Freeman pinpointed biology teacher Matthew Taladay as another instrumental figure at school.

Mercyhurst football coach Marty Schaetzle kept a scholarship and financial aid available for Freeman, and eventually, Freeman’s grades rose. So did the SAT score.

“I never really thought it was an issue because I’m going to get good grades,” Freeman said. “If you work hard enough, if you try. That’s what I did. I just worked hard, did my thing, focused more and got to it.”

Freeman needed an 82 in one of his final tests to get the needed GPA. He earned an 83.

That made graduation night extra special for Freeman. His older brothers, whom he speaks to frequently, attended the ceremony. The day after graduation, Freeman signed his letter of intent to Mercyhurst.

“It was really big for me because of all the stuff I’ve been through,” Freeman said. “I’d be the first one in my family to graduate high school, so it was really big for me. I liked it. But I want to be the first to graduate college in my family, so I want to work hard for it.”

Oravitz said he was “overjoyed” to hear everything came through for Freeman. Tanilli said he “deserves it.” Choma credited Schaetzle for keeping a position open for Freeman, who could play defensive back or wide receiver at Mercyhurst.

“I want this to be a big win-win for everybody because Romello gets an education and he gets a good football player,” Choma said.

Freeman hopes his story can serve as an inspiration to others. He harbors NFL dreams; if that path doesn’t work out, the criminal justice major hopes to become a state police officer.

He knows it won’t be easy. Then again, given his life experience, that’s something he’s ready for.

“This is when it gets real, it gets tougher,” Freeman said. “I just need to focus more on what I need to do … and just do it, keep it going for myself, keep grinding, keep getting bigger. Because I know I want to be something with my life, because what I’ve been through in the past, it’d be good if I came out on top.”

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Doug at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.