The results from last week’s local high school football games said it all. There was no need for discussion, banter, debate or evaluation.
One after another, the final scores ring out like haymaking punches coming from the heavyweight champion of the world, like a Mike Tyson overhand right in his heyday.
* Boom _ St. Peter’s Prep 42, Snyder 0.
* Boom _ Hudson Catholic 61, Dickinson 12.
* Boom _ North Bergen 55, Ferris 7.
* And boom _ Bayonne 40, Lincoln 8.
Those aren’t just lopsided scores. They are mismatched debacles. They are disgraceful attempts of even trying to be competitive. It’s not even funny.
The state of football at the four Jersey City public schools has never been worse. Never. Especially after looking at the aforementioned results. There aren’t words to describe it. How can you? How do you even explain four teams getting outscored by a combined score of 198-27? How do you even try?
I’m not taking anything away from Ferris coach Wilbur Valdez and Snyder coach Keith Price, because I know they’re trying their best to get a competitive team on the field. But what gives? How can it be that Jersey City’s public schools can produce such trash on the gridiron? Are the athletes simply not there?
Please, that’s not the case. We all know that the best athletes in Jersey City reside in the halls of Lincoln High School. Now, getting those better athletes to come out and play football is another thing.
And there are athletes in the other schools as well. It all depends on whether they are football-playing athletes.
But why have some coaches succeeded in at least being competitive at the Jersey City schools and others have failed?
Harry Lerner was able to make the state playoffs every year when he was at Ferris. The minute he leaves, that program goes right into the toilet. The Bulldogs haven’t sniffed the state playoffs since Lerner’s departure more than a decade ago.
When Jeff Wiener was at Lincoln, the Lions were one of the most dominating forces around. But once Wiener was forced out in a power struggle with the district’s physical education director Michael Venutolo, that program has also gone the way of the sewerage authority. Sure, some hard workers like Tommy Ferriero tried, but it was a losing battle. Lincoln has also not come close to the state playoffs since Wiener’s fine season of 1987.
Quick math: That’s 17 years ago. None of the current players on the Lincoln squad were even alive the last time the Lions tasted post-season glory. How amazing is that?
But the current coach, Adonis Blue, thinks he has seven players of “All-County caliber.” That’s right, in the pre-season, Blue said that he felt his players were being shortchanged in All-County selections because they didn’t win enough last year and that there were seven players (I guess among the 19 that went to practices) _ that were standout performers.
Correction, Coach Blue, your team didn’t win at all. In fact, this is Blue’s third season as head coach and he’s still looking for his first win. That’s right, the Lions haven’t won a single game, losing 25 in a row. That’s right, twenty and five.
The Lions are on the verge of becoming the universal symbol for futility. If the Lions truly have seven players of “All-County caliber,” then why are the Lions getting housed week after week? The Lions are 0-5 and have been outscored by a combined total of 183-26.
Snyder hasn’t had a winning season since 1990. That’s 14 years of futility. There have been a handful of coaches, the program has been dropped twice. They’re trying again with Price, the former Ferris and Rutgers standout. And he’s pulling his hair out trying to get the kids to do the right thing.
But the Tigers seriously haven’t been a threat since the days of Jim Gillick and Ollie Jackson, of Walker Lee Ashley, Lou King and Zane Corbin, in the late 1970s-early 80s. Now, we’re talking decades there.
In 1978, two of the best teams in the state were North Bergen and Snyder. Well, some 26 years later, North Bergen still wins every year and Snyder is a laughingstock.
Dickinson also had some glimmers of hope when Joe Marsella was the head coach, leading the Rams to their only two appearances in the NJSIAA state playoffs. In that respect then, Dickinson was the last Jersey City school to experience some success, because the Rams made appearances in the state playoffs in the 1990s.
But the well has run totally dry ever since Marsella was not retained and a parade of others have tried to bring the Rams to respectability _ with no success at all.
This year, Eric Piccolo was brought back to coach at Dickinson, hoping what he said in pre-season was to restore a sense of pride to the program. Well, the Rams are 0-5, having lost their five games by a combined score of 218-40.
Put it down now. The Jersey City schools will not win a game other than beating themselves this season. They will not win a game outside of themselves.
And that makes the showdown between Dickinson and Lincoln on October 29 the game of the century, because one of those weak sisters will come away with a win, unless the showdown ends in a meaningless draw.
Now, what can be done, other than blowing the whole thing up and starting again, which the Jersey City Board of Education simply isn’t willing to do?
But here are some suggestions _ and it will take funding. There might be the big stickler, because the Board of Education doesn’t want to spend a dime on pre-game meals, transportation, pre-season summer camp and what have you. So what makes anyone think that they will spend money to have football done the right way?
First, the Board of Education should instill a football program in the grade schools. Let’s not rely on PAL and the Jersey City Recreation Department as the lone feeder system for the schools. Have kids in fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth grade learn the proper way to play the game of football in gym classes. Organize traveling teams that will take on other schools and programs in the area.
Have qualified, respected coaches getting the kids interested in playing the game at an early age, because waiting until they get into high school is way too late.
Next, make sure that there are proper weight-training facilities at each school. The only way that the Jersey City schools can compete is if the kids are as big and as strong as the opposition. Right now, they are not. There are too many out-of-shape, unconditioned kids on the fields right now, masquerading as football players.
Cutting corners to save a dime here and there isn’t going to work. It hasn’t up until this point and it won’t work in the future. If there isn’t a full commitment, especially financially, to do things the right way, then they might as well just bag the whole thing. Just cut the losses and eliminate football altogether.
Because right now, it’s “man in the mirror” time for everyone, from the administrators on down to the coaches. It cannot get any worse than this.
To the kids of those four schools who are out there busting their tails every single day, pouring their hard-earned sweat and tears on to their respective fields, who are trying to make their schools gain just a hint of respectability, you deserve applause and credit.
This isn’t directed at the kids. This is directed at the high-paid adults who have not given the kids of Jersey City a fair chance to compete _ and now those kids are being left to handle the disgrace of getting blown out week after week.
Major changes have to be made and in a hurry. Unless apathy continues to reign supreme, like it has for more than a decade, perhaps even longer, over a dollar here and there.
However, if the powers-that-be decide that these results of the last weekend were not a warning sign and will allow the devastation to continue, then they all get what they deserve. They’ll get a rapidly dwindling number of participants and they’ll continue to pile up embarrassing results like last weekend.
The ball is in the court of the Jersey City Board of Education. Let’s see how this gets handled.