Hamilton West High School inducts championship basketball team and other athletes into hall of fame
John Costantino is about as Hamilton West as a person can get.
He is a West graduate who returned to teach and coach there and, aside from the previous two years as Steinert’s athletic director, has spent his entire professional career working in the same halls he walked in high school.
He can tell you as much about Hornet athletics as Rich Giallella can about Steinert or long-time photographer West Kirkpatrick can about Nottingham.
So when it comes to this year’s Hamilton West Athletic Hall of Fame inductees, you can believe Costantino when he says “This class is absolutely impressive. I look at some of those names, just incredible.”
And Costantino has first-hand information, as he played with some, coached others and watched others from a nearby distance.
“I wasn’t involved with the selection process this year because I was still at Steinert when they chose them,” Costantino said. “But I wouldn’t argue with any one of them.”
This year’s class, scheduled to be inducted on Oct. 4, features Mark Mirabelli (coach), Steven Hornyak (Class of 1953), Reynold Funari (1964), Bill Schappell (1979), Rocky Lambert (1982), Frank DeMarcello (1989), Chris Raba (1992), Susan Antosiewicz-Iorio (1995), Jaime McCormack-Land (2001), Meredith Malloy (2006) and the 2000 Central Jersey Group III baseball team.
Costantino was an assistant coach for Jim Maher on that state title team, along with Tom Carr, Mike Giambelluca, Matt Hamilton and Chuck Zalescik.
The players were James Hoey, Nick Massari, Frank Bizanzio, Scott Brettell, Jim Brettell, Steve Lattin, John Leonardo, Kevin Loretucci, Tom Metzler, Nestor Reyes, Matt Giannacio, current Hornets head coach Mark Pienciak, Scott Senese, Pat Shipe, Pat Zegarski, Steve Rinz, Mike Papp and Jeff Iorio.
It was an unprecedented day that June as Hamilton won the championship at East Brunswick Vo-Tech, and Hoey’s father was on the phone to Toms River keeping tabs on Steinert, as both township teams won state titles that day.
“That was an outstanding group obviously headlined by Jim Hoey,” Costantino said. “But the rest of the cast, Nestor Reyes was not too far behind Hoey. He was a great relief pitcher who finished off many of the games Hoey started.
“That’s why we were able to use Hoey so much in that playoff run. Jimmy would go to Hoey and say ‘Shut them down for five innings,’ and Nestor would come in for two innings so Hoey would be able to start the next game. If we don’t have Reyes we might not win it.”
Giannacio was the team’s leading hitter with Mercer County-record 47 RBI.
Aside from the title, the second most memorable part of that season was Scott Brettell locking Maher in the Port-A-John as a joke after the team won a regular-season home game. But when they went to let Maher out, the lock broke, and it took Carr and Costantino 15 minutes to release the angry skipper.
“It was unbelievable,” Carr said. “John and I had tears coming down our face from laughing so hard. When Jimmy finally got out, he was going crazy. The players were so scared they ran behind the bleachers. When we finally got them back on the bench, Jimmy looked at them and said ‘OK, I guess that was pretty funny.’”
But the Hornets weren’t funny to other teams as they recorded a 21-2 record en route to the title.
Raba, who coached the boys’ basketball team to the 2006 Group III championship, is actually getting in as an athlete. Although more known now for his basketball prowess, Raba was a three-year varsity starter in soccer and made first-team All-State and All-County as a senior. He was named to the Hibernians Senior 11 team that year a well.
In basketball, he started for three years and was a two-year captain. The Baron, as he is affectionately known, was the second-leading scorer in Mercer as a senior with a 21-point average, scoring over 40 points a school-record three times that year. He was the team MVP and finished with over 900 points.
“He’s an outstanding selection,” said Costantino, who was a few years ahead of Raba at West but knew all about him. “I know he’s going in as a player but he could just as well get in as a coach. His knowledge of the game is what elevated him athletically on the field.
“I remember playing against him in rec soccer, and he was just always a fierce competitor. He probably would have been a 1,000-point scorer if he hadn’t broken his hand one year.”
Funari, whose son Anthony is the current Hornets girls’ tennis coach, was a three-letterman in soccer, basketball and baseball. In soccer he was a two-year varsity starter, member of the 1962 Group IV state championship team and elected first-team All-City and All-Area his senior year.
He was also a two-year varsity letter winner in both basketball and baseball, and was voted Hamilton’s “Best Athlete” by the Class of ’64.
Former Notre Dame and Rider University standout John Wagner, who knows a little something about Hall of Fame criteria since he is a member of four different athletic halls of fame, nominated Funari.
“I’ve known him my whole life,” Wagner said. “Even though he went to Hamilton and I went to Notre Dame, we competed against each other. He was always a hard competitor and had a lot of talent.
“I knew he was good athlete. I thought he was a shoo-in. I talked to (former Hornet coach and player) Jack Bell a couple years ago and told him I was gonna nominate him and he said ‘If you don’t I will.’”
Antosiewicz-Iorio was also a three-letter winner in soccer, basketball and softball, with hoops being her best sport. She was a four-year varsity starter and the Hornets MVP as a sophomore, when she made All-CVC, All-Area, and the All-CVC Coaches’ team.
A four-year starter in soccer, Susan was named the Hornets most improved player in both her sophomore and senior seasons, and was All-CVC as a senior. She was also a four-year starter in softball and was All-CVC as a junior. No slouch in the classroom, Antosiewicz-Iorio was an NJSIAA Scholar-Athlete honoree.
Mirabelli compiled a dual meet record of 144-36 while coaching the West winter and spring track and field teams from 1991 to 2008. He was named Coach of the Year six times, coached Gary Johnson and Will Hendrix to Penn Relay medals, coached All-America Tim Upshur to fourth in the nation in the high jump and coached two-time all-America Terrence Glover in the discus.
Mirabelli was given the NJSIAA’s “Outstanding Coaching Award for Dedication in NJ Track & Field” in 2006, coached hundreds of student-athletes in the shot, discus and javelin to full or partial scholarships, and was one of just 10 people selected by the USA Olympic Committee to participate in javelin research at the Olympic High Performance Center in San Diego in 2009.
“Mark was a technician,” Costantino said. “He was a guy who taught things the right way. He’s just so well renowned in the track and field area and took our track program to another level. He put Hamilton West track on the map and coached guys outside of our school who went on to the national level.”
Schappell was a three-year varsity letter winner in football and named defensive captain as a senior. He was also named first-team All-County that year, was named to the Hamilton Elks Senior 11 team and won the Senior 11 Scholarship, and was Hamilton’s nominee for the Delaware Valley Scholar-Athlete Award.
Hornyak goes back the furthest of this year’s inductees and played three years of varsity soccer, while also playing midfield on an undefeated freshman team. Hornyak helped lead the Hornets to the Group III championship in 1952, and runner-up status the next year when Hamilton lost the final on penalty kicks.
In baseball, Hornyak won three games as a starter for the 1950 freshman team, and pitched on varsity the next three years.
“My senior year was my best year in pitching,” he recalled. “I remember beating BMI (Bordentown Military Institute), Trenton Catholic and Princeton.”
BMI and Trenton Catholic are now defunct but were athletic powerhouses in their day.
Lambert was a three-year varsity letter-winner in baseball and football, and served as captain for both teams his senior year. He earned All-County and All-Area honors as a baseball catcher, and was an All-County guard in football as both a junior and senior.
DeMarcello was the second coming of Lambert as he is also being inducted for his prowess in football and as a baseball catcher.
In football he was a two-year starter, making All-County at linebacker his junior and senior year and also playing at fullback.
In baseball He earned first-team All-County and second-team All-State in leading Hamilton to the Central Jersey Group III title. He was also on the Mercer County Carpenter Cup team and earned All-County honors as a sophomore and junior as well.
Costantino played on the CJ III champs with DeMarcello.
“He was my catcher my junior year through legion, and he was one of the most intense catchers I’ve ever been involved with,” the AD said. “His knowledge of the game was incredible. He was such an imposing batter and imposing force on the field, you respected everything out of his mouth and everything he did. As a young player he was a guy I could look up to and emulate.”
McCormack was a three-year letter winner in basketball, where she was 1,000-point scorer and a first-team All-CVC selection. She also was a member of the 1999 Group III champion softball team.
“McCormack transferred over from McCorristin, stepped right in and fit right in at Hamilton West,” Costantino said. “On the court she was as intense as anybody.
“She would challenge guys in gym class to games. One of the best games I saw was her against Jimmy Maher. I’ll reserve the right to not say who won that game, but let’s just say it was a great game. She didn’t back down from a challenge.”
Malloy was a three-year letter winner/distance runner in spring track, winter track and cross country.
In cross country, she finished fifth in the county as a junior and senior, and fifth and third in the Central Jersey Group III meets those same years. She was a wild card qualifier for the Meet of Champions as a senior.
In spring track, she was second in the counties and CJ III in the 3,200 meters, running a school record 11:20 in the counties. She also set the school record in the 1600 in 5:36.
“Malloy was like the Energizer Bunny,” Costantino said. “Everywhere I went I saw her running. Whether it was on Hempstead Road, Arena Drive, the other side of Steinert, you could see Meredith running.
“She was very similar to the girl at Nottingham now (Grace Dwyer), when you compare the work ethic. They had the same kind of build. You would think if Meredith didn’t have red hair, they would be sisters. She was quiet, didn’t say a whole lot.”
She didn’t have to.
Like the rest of her fellow inductees, their actions spoke for themselves in a very positive way.
