Big players step up at big moments and for an all American-born, New York Gaelic football team trying to claim the Junior Football All Ireland Championship at Dublin’s iconic Croke Park, the third minute of added time with scores level is about as big as it gets.

Fortunately for the Big Apple squad, the football was in the hands of 19-year-old Brian Coughlan, whose goal just days earlier had helped propel New York past England’s Warwickshire into this final.

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“My whole life,” Coughlan answered when asked how long he has been playing the sport that his Offaly-born father introduced him to.

About to enter his junior year at SUNY Plattsburgh, Coughlan has led his college soccer team in goals in his two seasons to date, including nailing three game winners as a sophomore.

Soccer, Gaelic football, whatever the sport, the attitude for the 19-year-old seems to be to attack. “Yeah,” he said, “I really try to focus on just kind of going at players, making them defend you, rather than them slowing you down. Just go at them.”

Given Coughlan’s scoring exploits, the Irish Echo noted that the pressure didn’t seem to worry him unduly.

“Thankfully not,” Coughlan said. “You just kind of get used to it. You don't really feel it when you're out there.”

Coughlan followed the same path as virtually all of his teammates to get to this point. From club, in his case Rockland, to the Féile teams that travel regularly over to Ireland, through the U10s, etc. with many playing with the NYGAA college team, then onto Junior and Senior clubs in the New York Championship, and now the Junior County side.

It is a path that was laid out by the New York Board some years ago and a handful of American-born players took it to the top, lining out for the Senior team that beat Leitrim in New York’s first ever win in the Connacht Senior Championship.

New York celebrate winning the All-Ireland Junior Championship following the July 16 final against Kilkenny at Croke Park, Dublin. [Inpho/Evan Treacy]

Junior manager Kevin Moriarity noted of his group, “All those kids, they've all come through that system, 100 percent of the junior team have come through that system. They're all born here, played football here, learned to play football here, every one of them.”

There have always been American born players on the New York teams, going back at least as far as the star-studded, two-time National League winning teams of the 1960’s that featured Tom Feighry and Brendan O’Donnell, followed by the likes of Pat Carroll, John Brady, Terry Connaughton, and Kevin Lilly, to name a few.

But with plenty of Irish born players available for selection throughout most of those years, the rise of the occasional homegrown star seemed more accidental than anything.

That differs from the path that has led to the current success enjoyed by the New York Junior team and to the American born players like Shane and Mike Brosnan, Jamie Boyle, Shane Carthy, and Tiernan Mathers, all of whom contributed to that famous victory over Leitrim.

For Moriarity, “There was a kind of a fall off after féile, because there wasn't a kind of another step forward.” The Junior manager credits the creation of developmental teams, “started by Johnny [McGeeney] and Mikey Brosnan, and I was lucky enough to be brought onboard back then.”

Speaking of this recent upturn for the New York teams, Moriarity said, “It’s been coming.

”Those kids are coming through that system for a number of years, probably 10,13 years.”

Moriarity calls them “a good crop of kids,” and added that there hasn’t been a lot of turnover, traditionally a problem when building a team in New York.

It was a thought echoed by Coughlan, “You're playing with a great bunch of kids that are from here, it's the best group of kids you grew up playing with and against, and then you'll be able to go over there and try to prove yourself a little bit to Ireland. I mean, we were all pretty excited to do it.”

So, can we expect to see more of the Junior side graduating to the senior ranks? Their manager certainly thinks so.

“Brian Coughlan definitely will go into the senior team,” Moriarity told the Irish Echo with confidence. “Mikey Boyle will definitely go into the senior team, Shay McElligot will definitely go into the senior team. There's a lot of them, I’m just picking names off the top of my head.”

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Coughlan is attack-minded