Photos by Steve Ellmore: West Orange (blue uniforms) vs. Irvington, Sept. 15, at home. Irvington won, 28-7. WEST ORANGE, NJ – In the game of football, West Orange High School head coach Jim Matsakis has experienced a host of positive results. But last Friday night, Oct. 27, at WOHS,, it was a much different […]
The 2017-18 high school hockey season is still a ways off, but some special things are in the works for the 60th year of league competition in the Garden State. For starters, a number of teams around the state hope to recognize the 100th anniversary of the NHL, which is December 19. On Dec. 19, […]
MAPLEWOOD, NJ – As a student at Columbia High School in the latter part of the 1970s, Dave Erdos, the new head girls’ and boys’ tennis coach at the Maplewood school, admits he wasn’t all that interested in the sport. For Erdos, his interest at that time was in sports like track and field and […]
WEST ORANGE, NJ (corrected Wednesday Sept. 6, 10:35 a.m.) – Since moving from South Orange to West Orange in 1985, Seton Hall Prep has experienced some special moments on the gridiron. The first came in the late fall of 1985 when Tony Verducci’s squad blanked St. Peter’s Prep to capture the North Jersey, Parochial […]
WEST ORANGE, NJ – Jim Matsakis, the personable head football coach at West Orange, feels his team has the potential to have a successful season in 2017. But Matsakis, who had great success coaching at Butler High School and Jefferson, admits he’s concerned about the squad’s lack of experience. On the line, that’s particularly true. […]
WEST ORANGE, NJ – At Seton Hall Prep, the two sports programs that Pirate fans expect to do well every year, are basketball and baseball. Both squads have won countless conference, county and state titles. Another sport that is close to those two is soccer. Marty Berman, who competed for the late Gene Chyzowych […]
IRVINGTON, NJ – When people talk about the best high school football players to ever come out of Essex County, names like quarterback Frank Tripucka of Bloomfield and running back Aubrey Lewis of Montclair are always in the spotlight. Tripucka starred for the Bengals in the World War II era, while Lewis competed for […]
BLOOMFIELD, NJ – There’s an old expression in sports that says “The road to success is always under construction.” That could very well be the philosophy for the new head wrestling coach at Bloomfield High School, Ryan Smircich. During most of Sam Fusaro’s time at the school, the Bengals had one of the most competitive […]
BLOOMFIELD, NJ – When a coach has a true passion for the sport he or she directs, it figures that the players will, too. And in most cases, that will lead to good results in the athletic arena. Since the early 1990s, Bloomfield High School has had one of the most successful wrestling programs […]
GLEN RIDGE, NJ – When he was a student at Glen Ridge High School, one of the greatest joys for Rob Rollo was competing in American Legion baseball during the hot summer months. That experience helped him to improve his overall performance on the diamond. And in addition, it helped to get him in […]