To say Jake Elliott’s family is proud of his Super Bowl success would be an understatement.
Elliott, a rookie kicker for the Eagles and Western Springs native, scored the first and last points of the big game on Sunday, sealing his team's fate.
"I found Jake, I picked him out on the sideline and just watched him running around the field," Elliott's dad, Bruce, told NBC 5. "It was awesome. It was so incredible.”
While Elliott’s sister, Karen, and her fiancé celebrated in the stands in Minnesota, some of his former teachers at Lyons Township High School were jumping for joy in the Chicago suburbs.
"One of the teachers there was Jake’s physics teachers, so we kept on joking about projectile motion, projectile motion," Jeremy Vrtis, a Lyons Township math teacher, said.
It has been a wild ride from being a Lyons Township tennis star just six years ago to NFL World Champion.
"Guess I made the right decision back in junior year in high school," Elliott said on the field. "That's all I got to say. Unbelievable, unbelievable atmosphere.”
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Another victory was sales from T-shirts boasting Elliott's roots that Lyons Township staff created for charity. The money raised went to the foundation started in honor of Kelli O’Laughlin, Elliott's former classmate who was murdered in 2011.
Sales from the T-shirts raised nearly $15,000 for the Kelli Joy O’Laughlin Foundation.
“We've raised a lot of money for scholarships for kids in the area, and it's an unexpected benefit from such a great story,” Vrtis said.
Elliott plans to continue the Super Bowl celebration in Chicago when he comes home in a few weeks.
