Belleville HS football team strives to keep cooking this season

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BELLEVILLE, NJ — With head coach Brian Antab in his first year at the helm, the Belleville High School football team last season had a fairly young squad. Despite the struggles and injuries, the Buccaneers persevered. Their reward for that perseverance was a 40-22 road victory over North Bergen in the season finale for their only win of the season.

The victory gave the Bucs some good vibes. Going into this season, the Bucs want to build off that momentum.

“We’re really excited about this season,” Antab said. “We had a very young group last year. We finished off the season, we won that North Bergen game. We played the whole season with a ton of sophomores. By the end of the year, with some injuries, we were even younger. For that North Bergen game, we played with about five freshmen starting, so it was great to get those young guys experience, and winning that last game was a great momentum-builder going into the offseason. It really motivated the kids. They worked all offseason in the weight room and in our new indoor training facility that we have, so those were great things in the offseason.”

At quarterback, the Bucs return junior Anthony Torres and sophomore Jordan Armstrong, who were in a battle for the starting job. “They both got experience last year and bring different things to the table,” Antab said.

Junior running back Jeremiah Cook also is a key returning player. Cook is a rugged runner who demonstrates strong diligence, breaking out last season with 1,149 rushing yards and nine rushing touchdowns to earn first-team honors on the all-Super Football Conference-Patriot White Division.

“He’s a tough kid and a hard runner,” Antab said of Cook. “He brings a hard-working attitude that really rubs off on the younger guys.”

Cook feels the Bucs are poised to have a strong season. “I think we’re going to do very good this season,” Cook said. “We showed some promise last year at the end of the year when we played North Bergen and got the win. I think we’re going to build off of that.”

The top receiver is expected to be junior Elijah Pickering, who is looking to bounce back from a thumb injury last year. Leading the offensive line are junior center-guard A.J. Clenaghan and junior left tackle Ahmad Manley.

On defense, Clenaghan will see time on the line, as well as a pair of sophomore defensive ends in Caleb Love and Devon Westfield.

The linebackers are senior Adrian Rodriguez and sophomore Josiah Morton on the inside, and senior Khalil Bey and junior Dimitri Moya on the outside.

With continued hard work and focus, the Bucs hope to achieve a successful season. “We’re really excited about this year, having another year of experience for all those players,” Antab said. “We’re going to miss the seniors that we had last year, but we’re really excited about the guys we have returning. We expect to be competitive in every game we play. We want to have a much more successful season than last year. We want to go out there and compete every day. We want to take it week by week. It’s a very similar schedule from last year, so we’re looking to avenge those losses. We just have to work together. Everybody has to worry about doing their job and coming together as a unit.”

The other teams in the Patriot-White Division are Millburn, Nutley, Passaic Valley, Wayne Valley and West Essex.

Belleville l0st to Passaic, 47-30, in the season opener on Friday, Aug. 25.

One of the Bucs’ greatest wins in their history was a low-scoring 3-2 win over a Passaic team that was ranked No. 1 in the state. The game occurred on Oct. 2, 1982, in Belleville. It was the second game of the season for both teams, which had won their season openers.

For longtime Bucs fans, it has been referred to as “The Game,” which featured three future NFL players in running back Craig “Ironhead” Heyward and linebacker Tyronne Stowe of Passaic, and defensive lineman David Grant of Belleville. Belleville also beat Passaic in 1980, which interestingly was the last time Passaic had lost a regular-season game. Passaic in 1982 went on to win its second of three straight state sectional titles, beating North Bergen, 21-0, in North 1, Group 4 final, while Belleville finished 8-2 after losing a tough 12-7 decision to Union in the first round of the North 2, Group 4 state playoffs.

Belleville lost to Passaic, 58-12, in last year’s season opener in Belleville.

Schedule