Taking one for the team: Brave souls take a dip in frigid Buffalo Creek to aid Freeport Youth Baseball

For Nate Scott, the anticipation was the worst part.

Scott gazed over Buffalo Creek in Freeport shortly before 11 a.m. Saturday, wondering just how cold it would feel when he and nearly 50 other Alle-Kiski Valley residents leaped into it to support a local fundraiser.

The whole thing was over in less than 30 seconds.

“That (expletive) is so cold, it’s unbelievable,” shivered Scott, 30 of Butler, whose feet and hands were numb as he wrapped himself in a beach towel after running out of the cold creek. “You got in and it just hit you right away.”

“It sucks,” he added, before pausing to chug a can of Guinness beer, “but you should try it.”

Doug Englert was counting on that unflappable enthusiasm. The Freeport Youth Baseball league’s fundraising coordinator said he tried to think outside the box when planning the first-ever “Freezport Polar Plunge.”

At 10:58 a.m., the temperature lingered around 30 degrees in Harrison, Freeport’s closest observation point, according to Matt Brudy, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Moon Township.

The weather service had no data Saturday on Buffalo Creek’s temperature. Crooked Creek, another Allegheny River tributary in Armstrong County, registered at 37 degrees about 12:45 p.m.

Several adults came out Saturday in full-blown regalia.

Craig Rinaman, the league’s president, hammed it up for the kids in a blue-and-red wrestler’s mask, red cape and matching tights. One man dressed as an oversized beer can. At least two other men, one sporting a neon-accented fanny pack, wore garish wigs punctuated with mullets.

Some ran down the concrete-floored boat launch into the water or leaped into the creek. Others walked in cautiously. Everyone, however, left the same way: quickly.

“That’s freezing!” one man blurted upon exit.

Englert said adults donated $25 to jump into the creek; kids, $10. The group hoped to raise $1,000 to $2,000 Saturday.

“I just wanted to get people involved and do something different,” laughed Englert, 38, of Buffalo Township, whose three children — ages 5 to 9 — play in the league. “(The plunge) doesn’t cost us anything to do — and it’s great to raise money.”

Funky Monkey Donuts helped fuel the event, selling the plungers and their families freshly baked cake doughnuts out of a pint-size, mustard-yellow food truck.

The doughnuts cost $2 each — or $10 for a half-dozen. Flavors ranged from vanilla sprinkle to Oreo to chocolate-covered strawberry.

A few snowflakes were falling near Buffalo Creek’s shoreline around 10:30 a.m., as people started to gather near the creek’s murky, greenish-brown waters. Children skipped stones nearby.

“I thought we were jumping off a dock,” quipped one man sporting white tights and red shorts. “So, what, we walk in? Is it a slow death?”

The league didn’t mess around with liability. Everyone who braved the frigid temperatures of the creek, which sits at the three-pronged intersection of Allegheny, Armstrong and Butler counties, had to sign a waiver Saturday.

An ambulance also was onsite, waiting — just in case.

As the polar bear plungers hurried back to the warmth of their SUVs and trucks, Freeport Fire/EMS squad paramedic Mike Barrett confirmed he didn’t treat a single case of hypothermia.

“When someone jumps in, sure, they can freeze up,” Barrett told TribLive. “That’s why we’re here.”