West Orange High honors football alum, coach Keith Little

West Orange High alumnus Ray Forsythe joked that he and his best friend, Keith Little, were supposed to be standing on the sidelines at every football game this season, critiquing Forsythe’s son, Hawke. 

It was something the two were looking forward to as Hawke entered his junior season as a guard and tackle. What they didn’t know at the beginning of the year, though, was that they wouldn’t get that chance.

Little, also a West Orange alum, former college football player and coach, died May 6 from a hemorrhagic stroke. He was 40 years old, and left behind his daughter, parents and other relatives.

FALLEN WARRIOR

Forsythe himself suffered a hemorrhagic stroke in February 2015, when he was 42. He spent four months in the hospital recovering, where he had to re-learn how to walk and move his arm again. It took a toll on his six kids and his wife, but Little made a difficult time easier for him.

“Keith was one of the individuals that came to the hospital to visit me and made sure I was focused,” Forsythe said. “(Then) I came home, and Keith would come over and sit with me, talk with me and so forth.”

That’s why Forsythe was shocked at the beginning of this year when he received the phone call that Little had suffered the same stroke.

“It was almost a shocker to get that phone call from a mutual friend of ours who said, ‘Hey, Keith had a stroke,’” he said. “I was in disbelief, I couldn’t believe it. Roughly two-and-a-half months later they moved him to hospice, and he passed away in May.”

The Orlando Pitt Club posted a tribute to Little on Facebook after his passing, adding that he was a loyal Panthers fan, always rooting for his college team.

“Keith was a very upbeat person and always looked to the next year as Pitt’s year,” the post read. “Unfortunately, Pitt never had that big year (1992-94, the years he played); but, he was a very positive person and fun to be around.”

After his experience with recovering from a stroke and with losing his best friend to one, Forsythe knew he had to do something to help others going through the same thing. Currently, he and his wife are in the process of creating the Ray Forsythe Stroke Foundation. The foundation would help families, especially those of young adults, who are going through similar devastating situations. Although Forsythe had help from the Brooks Rehabilitation hospital, which specializes in strokes, he wanted to become a person that a young family can lean on for support.

“It’s mentally not an easy process, it’s life-changing, it’s family changing, and that’s what I want to do with the rest of my life — to spread awareness for young athletes,” Forsythe said. 

THE BEST OF FRIENDS

Forsythe and Little played football together, first at Lakeview Junior High and then at West Orange. Little’s father was the basketball coach, so they also played basketball together and even tried their hand at wrestling.

When the two graduated in 1990, Little went off on a full-ride scholarship to play as an outside linebacker defenseman for the University of Pittsburgh, while Forsythe played as offensive tackle at Kent State University. The former teammates even became rivals when they played against each other at Pittsburgh in 1992. It’s one of Forsythe’s favorite memories.

“One of the best memories I would say was when KSU played Pitt, where we actually met as college athletes as rivals for the first time in our career, and I got the better half of it,” Forsythe said. “Pitt beat us that year, because they had Alex Van Pelt. It was a great game between Keith and I. We talked trash to each other all the way into it.”

After graduating from Pitt with a bachelor’s degree in legal studies, economics and Spanish, Little came back to Orlando, becoming a member of the Orlando Pitt Club — part of the Pitt Alumni Association — and also became the assistant linebackers coach at Bethune-Cookman University.

But one thing that never changed was this: Little loved his West Orange Warriors. 

Forsythe always remembers Keith in his football uniform for West Orange on the sidelines, the number 80 emblazoned on the back of his jersey. Little loved West Orange so much that he went back to the school to teach. He started coaching at the school, which Forsythe said was a dream for him. The two always had talked about the coaching on junior and high-school levels, always wanting to get involved with teaching them their positions the right way.

“We would show up every Friday night, and Keith and I would stay on the sidelines and root on our Warriors,” Forsythe said. “He was always doing some sort of community involvement in regards to making sure the youth knew how to tackle. He was always teaching proper footwork, eating habits and dieting, proper weight training, and later in his life became a sports trainer as well.”

HONORING A ROLE MODEL

Since Little’s passing, Forsythe knew he wanted to do something to honor his friend. He mentioned in passing to West Orange High Athletic Director Adam Miller that not only was Little an athlete and coach at the school, but also everybody in the community loved him. From there, Forsythe said, Miller took matters into his own hands.

“Adam is the man behind the plan and said, ‘OK, let’s do it behind the biggest game of the year, and we’ll do a recognition, bring his family down on the field and present them an award, we’ll have a moment of silence and we’ll start the game at 7,’” he said. “From there we put together a Facebook page for the classes of ’88 to ’90 and let everybody know about the recognition. So far we have about 57 confirmed that will be in attendance.”

The community recognition will take place Friday, Sept. 30, at the school, when the Warriors take on Apopka’s Blue Darters. Little’s family and some of his closest friends will walk onto the field together around 6:40 p.m., and an award will be presented to his family on the 50-yard line.

“(He was) just an all-around great guy — great classmate, great teammate, great buddy in life, and I could always come to him and vice versa,” Forsythe said. “We’ll present the award, have a moment of silence and get ready to play football for Keith.”

And while the Warriors take on the Blue Darters, Forsythe will stand on the sidelines as they said they would this season. He’ll sport a special West Orange football shirt, too — with his best friend’s last name and high-school number, 80, printed on the back.

Contact Danielle Hendrix at [email protected].