WEEK 1 : BACK TO THE START

I got in the car on a beautiful sunny Saturday afternoon and hit the road on my way to Pennsylvania for my first traveling coach trip of the year. My wife wished me well and packed me some healthy snacks, so I didn’t eat myself out of the league in week one. I must admit that it was strange heading to a game in which I had nothing at stake. I felt some nervous energy as I drove down the Jersey Turnpike towards Bucks County, Pennsylvania. This was more than just a trip to a high school football game. This was going back the place where my passion for football began. Until my thirteenth birthday, I called this area home. This is where I spent my early youth football days. I played for the Bux-Mont Saint CYO Football organization. The coaches who ran the Saints, Dave Armstrong (for 26 years) and Joe Meehan (for 38 years) are still running it to this day. They have been cornerstones in that community and have produced great players and people during their tenure.

My drive was a little over three hours long – crossing through Connecticut, New York, New Jersey. My side kick for most of the ride was John Sterling, giving me the play-by-play during the Yankee/A’s game on the radio. I got to Mike’s Bar & Grille which was at the end of a huge strip mall. The building has a big screen TV mounted on it that provides a list of the specials for the week. I went in and was greeted by the hostess. Entering the restaurant I found a corner seat at the bar. I just finished binge watching Cheers on Netflix, so I wanted to for a second pretend I was Norm Peterson walking into Cheers. The bartender (not Sam Malone) greeted me right away and ask me for my drink order. I ordered a Coors Light and the bartender asked me my name and referred to me by name the whole time. This aspect is huge for me — when you go to a new place you want to feel welcome and comfortable. It may be a little thing but it can turn a place that serves okay food into a place I would go to regularly. The place has two sections: one for diners that surrounded the bar and one for people sitting at the bar. It was four o’clock Saturday, the bar was sprinkled with what seemed to be regulars and reminded me of a welcoming family establishment. People were talking Phillies baseball, mostly and complaining about their relief pitching. There is a good distribution of TVs along the perimeter walls with “College Football Goaline” (North Carolina and South Carolina & Duke and Alabama) and the US Open Tennis. Penn State was playing Idaho but I am sure if they were playing Michigan there may have been a different atmosphere. Pennsylvania has always been a football first state. I can remember the many trips I took to Philadelphia when my wife was at Drexel University. I would drive in the car listening to WIP sport radio. It could be the middle of July with the Phillies in first place and the fans would be calling in about the Eagles left tackle situation. Needless to say football is always on the menu in Pennsylvania.

The menu selection was your typical bar food and wing sauce selection was limited to six sauces. I ordered the traditional buffalo sauce. I asked the bartender for a recommendation of another sauce and without hesitation she said, “Tangy Gold.” She seemed pretty sure of herself so I went with a half-dozen of each sauce. The wings came out on a white plate, which I think enhances the appearance, as opposed to the standard basket. The split order came with garnish, blue cheese and celery strategically placed in the middle to separate the two flavors. The wings were medium sized and coated nicely with the sauce. I started with the buffalo which had nice heat to it. Not so much to make you cry or have your nose run but it gave a nice mouth feel of heat. They could have been a touch crispier to give that first bite crunch but overall they were a solid wing. The tangy gold sauce was a mixture of honey mustard and hot sauce. It had a good balance of sweet and spicy. Again they could have been crispier but the sauce flavor was very good. If I were to compare these wings to a player it would be the guy on your team that is fundamentally sound and always reliable. Not one of the biggest guys on your team but a solid 3-star recruit. Mike’s Bar & Grill is definitely a place, if I lived local, I would frequent weekly. They make you feel comfortable right from the start. These days with all the micro brews being opened it’s nice to get a regular beer and a friendly family atmosphere where everybody knows your nam…..Never mind I won’t sing.

A fill up of the tank and trip to the bank and I was off to the game.

Archbishop Wood plays their home games at William Tennent HS. They will be playing an out of state high school, Maryland Freedom Academy, for the first time. Since the turn of the Millennium, Wood has become a football power in the Philadelphia Catholic League as well as in the state of Pennsylvania. They have won the league 11 out of the last 16 years and have been state champions 6 times since ‘08 including back to back in ‘13 and ‘14 and ‘16 and ‘17 and has countless players getting recruited to play college football. This is a far cry from when my family lived around here and they were a .500 program at best. They definitely made a commitment to improving all aspects of the program and the atmosphere that surrounds it. Coach Steve Delvin started that culture change. In 2017 Coach Devlin moved on to Ursinus College in Collegeville, PA to become their defensive coordinator. Coach Adkins who was the Defensive coordinator took over last year and went 9-4 losing to Penn Hills 20-13 in the state class 5A semifinals. By all accounts this year will be a new year for Wood with a ton of new starters on both sides of the ball. Maryland Freedom is a private academy made up of students from alternative education situations. The program is open to home schooled public or private school students. These factors can present its own challenges when trying to build chemistry and support for the program.

I got to the game for warm ups about 45 minutes before kickoff. The strange feeling I felt earlier driving to Pennsylvania continued as I walked into the stadium and had to buy a ticket. I stood near the fence on the home side of the field. I love watching how the coaches interact with their position group during warmups. Whether it’s giving the players that last pep talk to fire them up, reminding them of the game plan, or keeping them calm when they’re too hyped up, all those can be used depending on the type of player you have. There is special bond between position and player that you don’t necessarily get as a head coach or coordinator. As a position coach you spend so much time with that small group of players that they become like family. It was tempting when I saw an open gate to step on the field like I had in the past but now I was on the outside looking in. I positioned myself on the visitor side that was almost empty and stood in the top corner of the bleachers to catch a good view. Archbishop Wood in black and gold jerseys and Maryland Freedom, who definitely won the uniform battle in all white uniforms with both the numbers, the shoulders and side panel of the pants in the red white and blue (Stars and Stripes). Both teams being unfamiliar with each other created a real quiet nervousness before kickoff. Even though you get to watch film on each other you really don’t know until that first hit what kind of team you’re going to be playing. As the PA announcers started to welcome everybody to the game, his voice sounded very familiar. It was Joe Meehan the youth coach I mention prior. I have a really good memory. A coach who is a staple in the CYO youth football community and has probably coached more than 1000 kids taking his time to announce a game on a Saturday night. Coach Joe Meehan is a fine example of selflessness to a program and a community.

The theme of the game early on was clearly overcoming those early jitters. Three plays were a perfect game example of this. The opening kickoff was fumbled by Wood however they did recover. Then Wood proceed to go down the field in five play scoring drive highlighted by Quarterback Max Keller to Cardel Pigford on the opening play for 36 yards and touchdown strike of 25 yards to give Wood an early 7-0 lead. After a Freedom three-and-out series Wood got the ball back. On the first play Ryan De Vergilis took a handoff 16 yards then fumbled the ball back to Craesean Washington of Freedom. However, De Vergilis did not hang his head , he proceeded to make the next two tackles for no gains and Freedom was forced to punt again. The fumble almost seemed to galvanize Wood as they went in for their second score with another Keller to Pigford 28 yard pitch and catch on a mesh play (two receivers crossing each other over the middle). The Junior Keller did a great job in the first half of avoiding the rush and delivering the football on the run. He finished with 4 total Touchdowns (3 Passing and 1 rushing). The final example of overcoming some adversity was on the following series. Defensive back Ryan Woertz just missed intercepting a pass that went off his hand. Like De Vergilis, Woertz did not dwell on the miss opportunity but instead intercepted the next pass on the following play which led to a score on the next drive. The final score ended up being 46-6 Archbishop Wood victory. In a blow out like this you would think it’s hard to find a story. However the real story is this. As a coach these are your favorite teams to coach. The team that follows the teams with all the success. Those players tend to have a chip on their shoulder for all the non-believers. Coaching self-motivated players is a lot of fun. When you’re a dominant team your coaching style can be different. With the dominant team the challenge sometimes keeping them focused on not looking past opponents is how you spend most of your weeks. However with this type of team who is getting there real first chance to lead motivation week to week is never a problem because every week is a proving ground to show people that there will be no drop off, and we are not rebuilding. It’s probably the most fun you’ll have as a coach because of the inexperience you really get to coach and empathize the fundamentals. I was on a staff like that in 2003. The team that followed “the team”. It’s like having kids, you love them all but you know you have your favorites just don’t tell them that.


As the third quarter began I made my way over to the home side of the field. I saw a familiar face sitting up in the stands. It was Coach Armstrong who with Coach Meehan built the Youth program in which I and countless others learned football. I went up to him and said, “I don’t know if you remember me, but my name is Chris Mascolo.” He reached his hand out and gave me a hug. In true old school coach fashion he busted my chops by saying “I barely recognized you; you used to be much better looking.” This made me laugh because he hasn’t changed much since I was 12. Those guys coached us hard and held us accountable for mistakes, lack of focus, or being selfish. I didn’t understand any of those lessons until I became a coach. He asked me about my family and kids, I told him how I had to go all the way to Rhode Island to meet a girl from Pennsylvania, and how coaching has made us fat. His son Dave, who I played with on the Saints and was a star at Central Bucks West and a Michigan recruit now the D-line coach for Archbishop Wood, He is now coaching his son also a “Dave.” I thought it was pretty cool talking to Coach Armstrong, watching his son Dave Armstrong, Coach his son Dave Armstrong. Three generations tied together by football. I said good bye and walked through the parking lot thinking about how family, food, and football really do unite and bring people together.

Back on the road next week:
9/6/2019
Fiddlers Green Pub
John Jay (NY) @ Carmel (NY) 7pm