Seven football players and one coach who graduated from the Port Arthur Independent School District participated in the Super Bowl since its inception at the end of the 1966 season.

Now, the NFL is honoring each with a golden football from Wilson in commemoration of the big game’s 50^th edition.

The league has announced the Super Bowl High School Honor Roll initiative, which recognizes schools and communities that contributed to Super Bowl history and positively impacted the game, it said in a news release. High schools across the United States and globally will receive a commemorative Wilson golden ball for each alumnus who participated, amounting to nearly 3,000 players and head coaches and more than 2,000 high schools honored.

Port Arthur Memorial will receive the most golden footballs with eight, honoring Aaron Brown, Bobby Leopold, Joe Washington, Tim McKyer, Eric Alexander, Duriel Harris, Jordan Babineaux and Jimmy Johnson. They attended schools that were consolidated into the current Memorial before the start of the 2002-03 school year.

Texas schools will receive 326 golden balls all together, second only to California’s 432. Five schools will receive six balls each, 14 will be awarded five and 16 will be presented four. New Hampshire and Vermont are the only states that have not produced a Super Bowl participant.

“CBS This Morning,” the network’s morning news program, on Thursday launched a weekly feature that highlights the Super Bowl High School Honor Roll visits. The first segment featured the making of the footballs in Wilson’s Ada, Ohio, factory and the delivery of the first football to the Hall of Fame’s SBHSHR exhibit in Canton, Ohio, where McKinley High School is located. The visits also will be featured during coverage of “Thursday Night Football” and on “The NFL Today” each Sunday, as well as on other assets across the CBS Corp. CBS, which broadcast the first Super Bowl in January 1967 along with NBC, is televising Super Bowl 50 on Feb. 7.

The “NFL Kickoff” program on NBC Thursday featured 50 footballs delivered to San Francisco Bay Area schools.

It is not immediately known, however, when Memorial will receive the footballs or when it will be featured.

The NFL Foundation, it was announced, will provide the schools with a new character education curriculum and the opportunity to apply for grants up to $5,000 to help support and grow their football programs.