In Tempe, Arizona, Richard Appel and Dry Star Restoration, LLC have put an Arizona business inside the story of Tempe High Football. Through Arizona Boosters Foundation, that support shows up when the Buffaloes take the field and again when the season ends: a Buffalo tunnel, team banquets, and player awards for the student-athletes in Coach Sean Freeman’s program.
The Challenge Around Buffalo Football in Tempe
Tempe High fields varsity, junior varsity, and freshman football in one of Arizona’s most competitive high school landscapes. The program’s first official varsity season was 1924. The tradition now stretches back more than a century. The weekly work is still the work of a school program: equipment, uniforms, meals, travel, tournament fees, and the moments that tell a player the city noticed.
Since 2025, Arizona Boosters Foundation has partnered with Coach Sean Freeman to rebuild and stabilize the Buffaloes. ABF’s role is the infrastructure around the staff, corporate sponsorships, fundraising, team meals, events, operational support, and community engagement, so coaches can coach and athletes can compete. The foundation identified Tempe High as a program with real need and real potential.
On that same partnership, one campaign season raised more than $9,000 for uniforms, travel, and tournament fees, more than the program had raised in the two seasons before it. That total is its own case study. This page is the donor track beside it: one Arizona business choosing specific things the program can point to in Tempe.
See how Tempe High football raised $9,000+ in one campaign season.
Some Businesses Sponsor a Team. Others Become Part of Its Story.
For the Arizona Boosters Foundation, Richard Appel and Dry Star Restoration have become one of those partners. As one of our most significant donors and supporters, Richard has continually poured into the Tempe community and the student-athletes of Tempe High Football. His support has helped fund team banquets, player awards, and special experiences that recognize the young people putting in the work every day. His impact can be seen every time the Buffaloes take the field.
Helping Create a New Buffalo Tradition
The new Tempe High Football Buffalo tunnel is hard to miss.
But to us, it’s about much more than an inflatable tunnel.
Imagine being a student-athlete standing behind that Buffalo on a Friday night. Your teammates are beside you. Your coaches are preparing you. Families and community members are waiting in the stands. Then the team runs onto the field together.
For the athletes, that’s a moment. For the program, it becomes a tradition. And for the businesses that helped make it possible, it’s a tangible reminder of what investing in young people can create.
Tempe High’s football tradition stretches back more than a century. The tunnel gives today’s generation of Buffaloes another tradition of their own, and Richard Appel helped make it happen.
What Dry Star Restoration and ABF Did
Community impact in Tempe starts with people who decide to get involved. Richard Appel, owner of Dry Star Restoration, LLC, is one of those people, and one of Arizona Boosters Foundation’s most significant donors. He has shown up. A photograph of him at State Farm Stadium, home of the Arizona Cardinals, sits with this story.
Arizona Boosters Foundation, Inc. is the 501(c)(3) that holds the partnership, EIN 39-3080525. Gifts that run through the foundation give an Arizona business a defined way to support a Tempe high school program. Donations to ABF may be tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.
Richard and Dry Star Restoration have:
- Helped fund the new Tempe High Football Buffalo tunnel the team runs through when it takes the field.
- Funded banquets where players, coaches, and families come together at the end of a season.
- Provided awards that recognize achievement, commitment, and hard work.
- Invested in special experiences that make being part of Tempe High Football something the athletes can point to.
Why Banquets and Awards Matter in a Tempe Season
A banquet or an award is a line in a season budget. For Tempe High, it is also the night a player hears their name, a coach marks a year of work, and a family in the city gets a seat at the table.
We see a young athlete hearing their name called. We see a coach recognizing months of hard work. We see parents getting the opportunity to celebrate what their child accomplished. We see teammates sitting together one more time and remembering the season they shared.
An award may eventually end up on a shelf, but what it represents can stay with an athlete much longer: your work mattered, your accomplishments were noticed, your community was behind you.
That’s exactly the kind of environment we want to help create.
What the Partnership Has Produced
The results on record are the ones Tempe can already see. The Buffalo tunnel is in use when the team takes the field. Banquets bring players, coaches, and families together at the end of a season. Awards mark achievement, commitment, and hard work. Special experiences are part of what Dry Star has funded around Tempe High Football. A separate ABF campaign on the same program raised more than $9,000 for uniforms, travel, and tournament fees. That dollar figure belongs to the campaign, and it is published on its own page.
Why This Matters for Arizona Youth Sports
The Arizona Boosters Foundation’s work with Tempe High Football fills the gaps around the program so coaches can focus on coaching and athletes can focus on competing. That work includes corporate sponsorships, fundraising, team meals, events, operational support, and community engagement. People like Richard Appel make the visible pieces possible.
This partnership is what it looks like when someone in Arizona decides: These are our kids. This is our community. And I want to help. The help landed in Tempe, on a game day and at a banquet, through Arizona Boosters Foundation’s 501(c)(3).
Arizona Boosters Foundation wants more partnerships like this across the state. One company can provide a team meal. Another can help purchase equipment. Another can help athletes travel to a college campus. Another can sponsor awards. Another can help a team create an experience its athletes will remember. Put those businesses together and the community becomes part of the team.
That is what Richard Appel and Dry Star Restoration have done for Tempe High. A business can start with one need. A coach who needs a campaign for the rest of the season can start one with ABF or contact the foundation.
Thank You, Richard Appel
To Richard Appel and everyone at Dry Star Restoration:
Thank you, Richard, for believing in what we’re building. Thank you for investing in Tempe High Football, not just with a check, but with your time, your presence, and your commitment. Thank you for helping us celebrate these student-athletes. Thank you for the banquets, the awards, and the experiences they’ll carry long after their final game. And most importantly, thank you for continuing to pour back into the Tempe community.
Every time the Buffaloes run through that tunnel, we’ll think of the people who helped make it happen. We’ll think of Richard Appel.
Bring this kind of support to an Arizona program.
Arizona businesses can back student-athletes through sponsorships, equipment, meals, travel, awards, and other program needs. Coaches can open a campaign for a specific season gap. Either way, start with Arizona Boosters Foundation.
