Anthony Mangan is a key member of the offensive line for the Kean University football team, but the neat thing about the junior center is that he prides himself on having an extra dimension that goes beyond the gridiron.
The Lawrence High graduate is toting a 3.81 grade point average as a criminal justice major, with hopes of being a state trooper. As a freshman, he became the first player in program history to earn a 4.0 in a semester. He is also an ambitious contributor to the Cougars community services that they perform for the Union area.
“Our coach (Dan Garrett) always beats it into us that you have to be an animal on the field and the best person you can be off the field, and we all took that to heart,” Mangan said. “I want to be more than a football player around campus. I don’t want to say I’m just going out to the field. We go to class, we do community service on the team.”
Garrett asks his players to prove themselves on and off the field, and Mangan does all that and more. He and his teammates volunteer at a soup kitchen and do winter trash cleanups at the Jersey Shore. Mangan’s favorite activity is going to an elementary school at nearby Hillside and doing book readings for the students.
“That’s a really cool experience,” he said. “They think we’re NFL players because we go in there with our jerseys on. We’re like superstars for the day.”
The squad has also adopted two youngsters with muscular dystrophy as team mascots.
“I’ve gotten pretty close to them,” Mangan said. “I talk to them a lot before and after the game. They think we’re superstars from the NFL, too.”
In between those services, Mangan has managed to hone his game on the field for the Cougars, who finished the season 2-8 but lost some tough, close New Jersey Athletic Conference games in which a few breaks could have reversed things.
Mangan is in his 15th year of playing football, and most of it has been on either the offensive or defensive line. Much to his chagrin, he had no choice but to play the line as a fourth-grader for the Pop Warner Lawrence Thunder (now the Mighty Cardinals).
“I remember going in and playing running back, that was the ideal position,” Mangan said. “But they had a weight limit and I was five pounds over the weight limit. I remember sitting with my parents and they said ‘You gotta play lineman.’ I was like ‘Oh no.’”
Mangan sucked it up and dug into the trenches playing both defensive and offensive line.
“I was always a big fan of the defensive line,” he said. “But I came to love offense as well.”
After four years, he went to the Lawrence Lightning in the Mercer County PBA League and played fullback and linebacker.
“I loved playing those two positions,” he said.
The Lightning won the championship and the versatile Mangan moved to guard for that game.
Once he arrived at Lawrence, his days of fullback were pretty much over, although there would be one more stint.
“My freshman year, they needed linemen,” Mangan said. “I would do anything to get on the field. My sophomore year I played tackle (on JV), my junior year I made varsity and played center and started every game. My senior year I got to play tackle and defensive end.”
His claim to fame that season was taking a lateral and throwing a 55-yard touchdown pass on the first play of the game against Hamilton West.
“If you Google my name, that play is the first thing that comes up,” he said proudly. “It’s on YouTube, the papers were there. It was great.”
Mangan was lured to Kean by former LHS teammates who were up there. His guidance counselor also felt it was a good fit, so it was a no-brainer.
As a freshman, Mangan played two games of center for the JV team. As a sophomore, he played two games at center and six at fullback for the varsity.
“That was great playing fullback again,” he said. “Our fullback went down with an injury so they replaced him with me. I played there until the end of the season. They had a special package that they put in for me. It was awesome. It was a lineman’s dream.”
Because he still had a lineman’s number, however, that dream didn’t include carrying the ball.
“I still played center if they needed me to, but I couldn’t touch the ball because of my number,” he said. “But I would come in for eight plays a game at fullback and it was pretty cool.”
While it may seem strange that Mangan would enjoy it so much while still not carrying the ball, there was a difference in blocking. Rather than coming right off the ball, he got to build some momentum before meeting his target.
“You get a running start and get to pop somebody who’s not paying attention,” he said gleefully. “They don’t see you coming out of the backfield. It’s a great experience. I loved it.”
This season, one of his goals was to win the starting center berth, which he was being groomed for all along, since Kean recruited him at that position.
There was just one little problem. Coach Rob Radice never ran a shotgun offense at Lawrence, and that’s pretty much all they run at Kean.
“That was a little disturbing when I got here,” Mangan admitted. “I had no idea how to do the shotgun snap. You have to learn to keep your butt level, you have to have a straight wrist, instead of snapping it as hard as you can in the quarterback’s hands. Then you have to focus at getting the ball back and step in at the same time. You have a big nose guard, 300 pounds, standing in front of you. It’s a little harder than in high school.”
Mangan estimates that if the Cougars take 90 snaps a game, about two of them are the conventional style.
“Maybe down on the goal line, but sometimes even there we go shotgun,” he said.
It took a year before he finally grasped it, as Mangan learned how to do so while playing on the scout team as a freshman against the varsity defense.
“By my sophomore year, when we came in I was pretty comfortable with it,” he said. “I didn’t have many problems at all.”
Kean offensive line coach John Liberato agreed with that statement.
“Anthony is doing a great job at center for us,” Liberato said. “He is a very smart player who calls all of our blocking schemes. Anthony continues to improve each game, getting better and better.”
As one of the guys who gets no recognition in the trenches, he also has the perfect mindset for a lineman—team first.
“I’m a big team guy,” Mangan said. “Individual performance doesn’t matter to me. I’d rather win. It’s a great feeling to have a running back hit 200-something yards and him come up to the linemen after game and say, ‘Great job.’ As long as we know we’re doing the job and getting yards, it’s a great feeling.”
Because he has played all over the offensive line, Mangan is the perfect guy to call out the schemes, as he knows just what everyone should be doing; his father always taught him to be versatile, whether it’s being able to play any position on the line or keeping up with every position.
“That really is a big thing to know everybody’s position and not just yours,” he said. “Kean had me work everywhere and I really had a good handle on everything. I’ll even tell the quarterback sometimes, ‘This is the defensive front, this is what we need to run.’ The quarterback obviously has more responsibility than me, but I try to help him out. It gives me the quarterback role for a little bit.”
Mangan uses more than just his mind and experience up front. He has to utilize his powerful 5-foot-11, 270 pound frame, or he would never survive.
“He is a very physical player who can handle all stunts and blitzing linebackers,” Liberato, who calls Mangan “a joy to coach,” said. “Anthony’s tenacity and aggression make him a great college offensive lineman.
Not to mention, a great desire to be as well rounded as possible. He loves football, but he is doing a great job of being defined by more than just the sport itself.
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