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November 24, 2010

Raiders & Greyhounds will make more memories Thursday morning

By TOM WILLIAMS
Sports Columnist


There won’t be much at stake Thursday morning when Mark Impagliazzo takes his Ocean City High School football team to Pleasantville to take on the Greyhounds, coached by B.J. Burch. But that won’t matter.

Both Impagliazzo and Burch, who played at the schools they now coach, know all about the importance of this rivalry. They know that people will come out Thanksgiving morning to see this game who haven’t seen a game all year.

Back in the early 1990s, the series seemed to be over. Pleasantville had reduced its program to the junior varsity level and Ocean City moved on to play Middle Township on Thanksgiving. When Wayne Colman’s team defeated the Greyhounds in 1990, giving the Raiders a 35-34 lead in the series, it seemed like OCHS had won the series. They even gave the players tee shirts that said, “The End of an Era”.

But Pleasantville brought its program back and eventually resumed the series, coming up with a couple of nice wins in the past 10 years.

Since the series resumed, Pleasantville won an overtime decision in 2005, the first overtime game in the history of this series and only the second overtime game in Cape-Atlantic League Thanksgiving history. The Greyhounds also upset the Raiders in 1998, a year when Ocean City won the South Jersey title. And, in 1996, Kevin Sinclair set the South Jersey career rushing record in the Pleasantville game and Scott Lipford set CAL receiving records.

In the 1990 game that looked like it might be the end of the rivalry, Doug Colman scored three times for Ocean City and George Karayiannis scored twice, also setting receiving records for tight ends that stood until Matt Chila came along.

Last year, Chris Curran set 11 school records in a 28-6 win over the Greyhounds, completing 20 of 33 passes for 264 yards and kicking three field goals. The year before, Matt Lombardi threw a pair of TD passes and ran for a third score in another 28-6 win for the Raiders. And, in 2007, Vinnie Djukanovic ran for 147 yards and one TD and Matt Graham scored twice as Ocean City won, 21-0.

But this series is filled with those kinds of performances.

In 1976, Mickey Gerald scored twice for the Greyhounds in a 22-0 win that gave Pleasantville the CAL championship. In 1975, with Impagliazzo in the lineup, Al Burch, who went on to become a head coach at Penns Grove, kicked the winning point in a Raiders’ 7-6 win that gave OCHS the CAL title. In 1974, despite Mike Linahan’s 181 yards, the Raiders lost, 19-13, and had to share the league championship with Buena. And, in 1973, Dino Hall, a future record-setter with the Cleveland Browns, threw the game-winner in Pleasantville’s 14-7 win that earned it a share of the CAL championship.

In 1971, Mike Baldini scored twice and OC registered eight sacks in a 25-0 win. Dave Bruce scored four times in a 27-8 win in 1970. On a muddy field in 1962, Pleasantville won a 19-6 decision with Dan Money’s 74-yard kickoff return accounting for Ocean City’s only points.

Bill Shallcross threw one TD and scored another in 1958. Walt Buckholtz scored three times in 1949. Four years earlier, an OCHS defensive line, led by Bob Sannino, registered a safety on the second play of the game and it held up for a 2-0 Raider win.

Joe Elbertson went 20 yards for the only score in Ocean City’s 7-0 win in 1936. John LePore scored three times and John Carey returned an interception 65 yards for a TD in a 31-0 win in 1929.

These are some of the memorable moments that have happened when these two teams have been on the field in what was generally the final game of the season. It is Thanksgiving football. It is special in Ocean City and Pleasantville, just like it is in Vineland and Millville or Atlantic City and Holy Spirit.

It doesn’t matter if the Raiders are 2-7 and the Greyhounds are 0-9. Somebody is probably going to make a play Thursday morning that will be talked about 20 or 30 years from now, just like we’ve remembered those that came before right here.

In this high-paced, constantly-changing society of the 21st century, the tradition of Thanksgiving football is still something special.


Read more of Tom Williams' columns