Minnesota kids get a taste of Super Bowl excitement

The Super Bowl crew had pulled out all the stops Thursday to prep the turf field for its group of VIPs: Juice boxes were lined up on the snack table, covers of popular songs blared across loudspeakers and a wide field expanse sat empty, ready for play.

It was a party fit for the guests of honor, the kids from schools and community groups from around the state. They flooded into Edina's Braemar Field for the Super Kids-Super Sharing charity event — sorting donated school and sports supplies and playing hard like they'd made it to the Super Bowl themselves.

Every Super Bowl host city in the past 18 years has been home to this donation drive, which asks kids to collect items for other needy kids in their community. This year's nearly 46,000 items collected was a record high. It's also the first time so many schools have participated, said Jack Groh of the NFL environmental program.

The event brought the energy of a hometown Super Bowl to the kids, too young to get into bars open late for the festivities or to gamble at casinos that will soon be flooded for the event. Other family-friendly events will kick off next weekend in the lead-up to the game.

"It feels really special," said Autumn Thompson, an eighth-grader at Chaska Middle School West, who was sorting books in the morning. "A lot of the time, it's more like people think of the Super Bowl for adults and stuff, and to include all the kids is a really cool thing."

Schools and community groups like the YMCA pitched in for Thursday morning's event. The kids unpacked boxes and hauled bags of books to sort them into designated containers. The donations ranged from board games and school supplies to bulkier ones, like skis.

After a program that included performances from choirs at FAIR School Crystal and Northport Elementary in the Robbinsdale school district, Vikings youth football manager E. J. Henderson warmed up the kids by running drills on the turf. Then he sent them around to different football stations on the field.

It's important to get kids interested in the Super Bowl "so they can see what the highest level of football is like," he said.

The kids sorted the supplies for representatives from local schools and organizations, who browsed the stacks for the items they needed, Groh said.

"When the adults who help those kids in need come in to select items, it's like Christmas morning here," said Groh's wife, Susan Groh, also of the NFL environmental program.

The teachers who accompanied their students to the event felt the positive vibes, too — even Scott Sykes, a teacher at Birchview Elementary in Wayzata, who said he's a Packers fan.

Even though kids are back in school the day after the Super Bowl, those headed to schools in Minneapolis could be caught in traffic. The Minneapolis Public Schools released a warning that transportation could be stickier because of possible road closures and delays around the city.

"The worst day of traffic will likely be the Monday after the Super Bowl as everyone exits the city," the district wrote on its website.

Traffic hassles weren't on the minds of the kids who filled boxes and ran plays like their favorite football stars. When Viktor the Viking appeared, the students closed in on the mascot in a pack to take selfies. A group of students from Nativity of Mary School in Bloomington smiled for photos in the photo booth, holding up cardboard cut-outs of the Viking hat and one that said "#SKOL."

"It feels like I'm just out being a part of it," said eighth-grader and student council member Brady Waters of Bloomington's Oak Grove Middle School.

Beena Raghavendran • 612-673-4569