John Walters

Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman), the transcript-filling hero of the film “Rushmore,” once bragged, “I saved Latin.”

Anastasia Barr’s feat was more heroic. Barr, a junior at sparsely populated Avella High School in western Pennsylvania, saved football. Considering that Barr began the school year as the captain of the cheerleading squad, her efforts are even more remarkable.

Avella has only about 200 students. The football team opened August practice with 28 players on its roster. Then, due to a combination of injuries and a high rate of attrition, coach Frank Gray had only 10 players who were able to suit up for a game. Were that to happen, Avella would have had to forfeit the contest and perhaps the remainder of the season.

Worse, under state rules, Avella could have been penalized further, with its football program being suspended the following season.

While Gray was wondering what he would do, Barr attended the funeral of her great grandmother, Theda Sellers. There she found a new font of inspiration.

“I was impressed by how fearless she was,” says Barr. “For instance, she went back and finished high school in her 30s. I thought, 'I don’t want to have any regrets.'”

The next day, Barr approached Gray about joining the football team. He told her thanks, but no thanks. She thought about it some more. “There was no way,” says Barr, “I was going to miss having football my senior year.”

A few days later, Barr simply showed up for football practice. When Gray attempted to dissuade her, she told him, “I weigh more than half the kids on the team, anyway.”

And that is how the cheer captain became a safety … and helped saved football at Avella. Barr’s friend, Mitch Spencer, a wrestler who had never played football, also joined the squad so that at season’s end the Eagles had an even dozen players on their roster. Avella lost every game, but they won the respect of every team they faced.

The lesson of a hero is that one person can make a difference. How many 16-year-old girls would sacrifice their spot on the cheer squad — and potentially their physical welfare — to save football? Besides, Barr discovered, it’s a lot more fun to be part of the game than to be standing on the sidelines.

“I made one tackle, in the final game of the season,” says Barr, who also plays on the girls basketball team, runs track, and is on the dance team. “They put me in at outside linebacker, which isn’t even the position I had learned.

“ ‘What do I do?’ “ I asked. “ ‘They said, ‘If someone comes to your side with the ball, tackle him.’”

Someone did. And Barr found the nerve to tackle the ballcarrier. In fact, her coach told her that it was “the best form tackle I’ve seen all season.”

“I couldn’t believe it,” Barr recalls. “I started jumping up and down. I did the spirit fingers, because that’s what I’m used to doing after a tackle.”

Barr was so excited, in fact, that she turned to her friend Spencer and asked, ‘Can I hug you?’

“Ana, no,” Spencer replied. “It would look like two dudes are hugging.”

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