With both teams with won-loss records hovering near the .500 mark and out of the playoffs, the game won’t be the battle between two titans that both team’s expected at the beginning of the season. But as the last game of the year between two arch-rivals with young coaches looking to build their programs into CVC contenders, this year’s North-South game is big.##M:[more]##
North and South have played twice, both in mid-season matchups. South beat North, 23-9, in 2002. North then turned around and beat South last season, 13-9. This year the game has been moved to the final game of the season for both teams. Kickoff will be at 7 p.m. on Friday, November 19, under temporary lights at High School South.
High School North head coach Art Stubbs, whose team enters the game with a 5-4 record, likens it to the annual Army-Navy game in which the records aren’t as important and each team plays for bragging rights. “This game will make or break our season,” says Stubbs. “It is that big. We are going out there to make a statement.”
“Our kids get really pumped for the game,” says South head coach Lou Solomon, whose team has a 3-6 record this season. “They do know all the players on the other team and I think that is what makes it a rivalry. The game is really more for bragging rights.”
For both football programs it has been a season of building, although early season success raised expectations. But the injury bug bit hard and both teams wound up outside looking in for the NJSIAA playoffs.
The Knights started the season with three wins in a row, then ping-ponged the rest of the way with wins followed by losses followed by wins. For much of the season the Knights looked like they would make the state playoffs, but the final blow came on November 6 against Steinert. Needing a victory to qualify for the state playoffs, North was crushed, 35-12.
For South, a shot at the states was over several weeks before. After winning three of its first four games, the Pirates have had trouble getting in the winner’s column. On Saturday, November 6 against a revitalized Hightstown (a team that lost its first two games), South tried to attack the Rams’ defense with its running game, led by senior Grant MacQueen, and juniors Earl Burgess and Brandon Manley. But while Hightstown’s defense would bend — South had a respectable nine first downs and 104 yards in total rushing — it would not break and the Pirates lost, 24-0.
For both teams, the NJSIAA consolation games — an extra game added to the schedule for teams that failed to make the playoffs — were no consolation. On Friday, November 12, the Knights battled Montgomery in the midst of a cold damp rain and came away with its most uninspired showing of the season. Montgomery jumped out to a 13-0 first quarter lead and it was all downhill from there. The Knights were able to earn only five yards in total offense and were unable to gain even a single first down the entire game. The Knights defense gave up over 300 total yards and 15 first downs. The final score was 26-0.
On Saturday, November 13, South did a little better against its opponent, Trenton, but still came away with a 25-12 loss. But there were some promising performances, including the emergence of a solid passing game. Junior quarterback Brian Morris completed 7 of his 14 passes for 173 yards. This included two long touchdowns to MacQueen — for 65 yards and another for 38 yards — in the third quarter. MacQueen caught five passes for 146 yards.
Senior Moments
For seniors on both teams, the North-South game will be their last time on a high school football field. “It is a different kind of game and it is exciting,” says South’s Ian Petri, who missed the first two months of the season due to an arm injury. “It is the most important game of the season as far as I’m concerned. Even if we had made it to the playoffs, this game is the game that I’d want to have played the best in.”
He adds that he wants to even the score against North after last season’s loss. “We have a lot of pride going on too,” he says. “We lost last year so I feel like I can’t be 0-2 against these rivals.”
The fact that players on both teams are so familiar with one another also adds to the drama of the game and the stakes of winning. “We know these guys very well,” says North senior quarterback Jeff Torralba. “We played with them in the Pop Warner league. We hang out with them now. This game is definitely important to us.”
North linebacker Andrew Shogun agrees. “We are friends with those guys,” he says. “We went to school with them (in elementary and middle school). If we win that means we can talk crap to them for the rest of the year.”
But MacQueen, South’s senior slot back, takes a different perspective to the North-South finale. “It will be by far our biggest turnout of the year and in that respect we care about it a bit more,” he says. “But really it is not more important than any other game throughout the year. But since it is our last game, especially for the seniors, it will be a big one.”
MacQueen, a resident of West Windsor, hopes to play football at Yale next year. He is the third member of the MacQueen football legacy in WW-P. His brothers Ed and Ian were stars for West Windsor-Plainsboro High School and he also has a younger brother in seventh grade at Grover Middle School. “My older brothers had good careers,” he says. “It was nice actually when we got new coaches (after longtime Pirates coach Tom Stuart retired after the 2002 season) so people couldn’t attribute me getting a lot of playing time simply to having older brothers come through.”
Ed, now a senior at Johns Hopkins University, is preparing himself for life after college. Ian is a junior at Princeton where he plays on a club rugby team there.
Grant will play basketball in the winter season and then try his hand at lacrosse in the spring. “I ran track last year but I think I will play lacrosse this year,” he says “My good friend Jon Lupo plays a lot and he’s talked me into it. It’s a change of pace for me so I don’t know how well I’ll pick it up.”
Petri — who plays both offensive and defensive line for the Pirates — injured his arm in a preseason scrimmage last summer and was not expected to play for the rest of the season. “I came back early because the rehab went really well for me,” he says. “It was dislocated and they tell me that it usually takes the whole season to heal.”
Coming back from the injury was a learning experience for him. “The first couple of games were just trying to get back to the sport after not doing anything for eight weeks,” he says. “It’s been a growing year. I learned a lot about myself by coming back from the injury.”
The last of the team captains named by Coach Solomon, Petri was selected last spring to share duties with MacQueen, Morris, and senior Chad Prima (who were named captains at the end of the 2003 season). A resident of West Windsor, Petri’s father is a software developer at Bristol Myers Squibb and his mother is a nurse’s aide at Princeton Medical Group. While many athletes play sports all year long, football is the only sport that Petri plays. “I used to wrestle but don’t do that anymore,” he says. “Music studies are so time consuming.” A music major, Petri devotes much of his timeto playing drums in the orchestra and band, as well as singing in the choir. He also studies music theory.
He has been able to apply some of his football experience toward making music. “Football has taught me that even though I am not the best at something, I can work real hard and become the best that I can be,” he says.
He hopes to study music in college and he is looking at some Division III schools where he may also play football. But his studies will be the main focus in his college selection. “I really want to put my focus on music in college,” he says.
For Shogun, a Plainsboro resident who has been one of the stalwarts of North’s defense for the past two seasons, the end of the football season will be bittersweet. “I’ve been playing football for 12 years and I don’t want to stop now,” he says. Although he is pursuing the opportunity to play at the Division II level in college, he hopes to one day become a coach. “I want to be near the game,” he says. “If you can’t be playing then it is good to be near it in some way.”
Shogun’s father works for a furniture distributorship in New York and his mother is a decorator. He says that he sees the North-South game one day becoming one of the best rivalries in the state. “You have two teams from the same district battling one another,” he says. “Someday it’s going to be like Steinert against Hamilton. That kind of intensity.” He adds that once permanent lighting is installed at High School North some luster will be added to the game. “It’s a little difficult to play under the temporary lights. They’re so small,” he says.
For North’s Torralba, who combines a strong passing arm with quickness similar to that of Michael Vick of the Atlanta Falcons, the North-South game will grow more intense in the future. “In the future, with both teams less on friendly terms, the rivalry will get meaner and better,” he says. “I also hope they finally get around to playing the North-South game on Thanksgiving Day. It’s been talked about for a while and it’s about time it happened.”
Torralba, who will be playing varsity basketball in a couple weeks, hopes to play football at the college level. Although short in stature, he is quick. He is as dangerous as a runner as he is a passer, leading the team with 542 yards rushing and nine touchdowns to go with his five touchdown passes this season.
With the last game looming, both coaches say that they have seen improvements in their teams over the season. Last year, North finished with a 5-4 record, for its first winning season in history. “This year we started out on that winning streak and we were shooting for the moon and the stars,” says Stubbs. “But we did not have any luck with the injuries this year. First the starters got hurt, then the replacements got hurt. It’s been that kind of season.”
South, having finished 2-8 last season, has more wins and may have had even more if not for some bad luck. “I feel as a team we have gotten a lot better from last year,” says Solomon. “I think the football program is going in the right direction overall. It’s tough sometimes because the wins are not there, but we do see the improvement as a coaching staff.”
Common Foes
Here’s how High Schools North and South fared against common opponents this year.
Against Princeton: North won on October 30, 42-28; South lost in overtime on September 18, 20-14.
Allentown: North won on September 23, 32-14; South won on October 1, 25-21.
Trenton: North won on September 11, 25-21; South lost 25-12 on November 13.
Hightstown: North lost on October 22, 36-15; South lost on November 6, 24-0.
Ewing: North won on September 18, 40-22; South won on September 23, 21-19.
Steinert: North lost on November 6, 35-12, South lost on October 23, 20-14.
