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Ding! Ding!

The 2008 High School football playoff fields are set in Sean’s Perfect High School Football Neighborhood of Make Believe. And we have some nice playoff brackets this year, especially in Class M and S, where we could see a couple of big rematches in the championship games, like Darien-New Canaan or Ansonia-Seymour.

But we also see plenty of amazing potential semifinal matchups: Hamden-Glastonbury; Masuk-Cheshire… Brookfield-New Canaan, Darien-Hillhouse. …Ansonia-New London (in a rematch of last year’s final). …Upset specials in the first round? Northwest Catholic (which had more Class S/SS playoff points and gets in over Montville in our universe) over New London.

Yeah, it’s not as great as last year’s playoffs. Overall, it’s been sort of a down year in Connecticut. But at least we’ll — once again — get some true champions to come out of worthy fields of like-sized schools. … not the watered down abomination that we have today.

So, let’s get on the trolley and take a trip down the imaginary playoff lane and see what we’re missing:

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New Canaan wins, Central wins, Foran wins, Ludlowe wins, Greenwich wins, Shelton wins… as we all lay exhausted, full of stuffing from Thanksgiving Day dinner here’s a quick recap on all everything that went down yesterday.

The CIAC, by the way, has spoken. The state playoff pairings have been confirmed. Brookfield will host Avon at Danbury’s Crotty Stadium. Masuk will host Weaver Windsor at Trumbull. Update: Forgot to add this change: the Darien-Hillhouse game will be played at West Haven High School’s Ken Strong Stadium.

Here’s the playoff story: Bunnell’s playoff hopes dashed

Saturday Update: Here is the CIAC 2008 playoff page.

And could a title game between Darien and New Canaan go back to Boyle Stadium. Though reconstruction is supposed to begin soon, it might happen if the two teams reach the Class MM championship game. Read more here.

Incidentally, I always understood that teams could not play a state championship game at a field on which it had already played during the regular season. Either way, I doubt this will happen.

Below are all the game stories:

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Here’s the press release from the home office in Cheshire, and once again it’s much ado about nothing as the 50-point policy continues to prove its irrelevance. Enfield coach Jay Gaucher’s suspension for Thanksgiving’s game with Fermi has been overturned. Big shock.

Take it away CIAC:

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Nobody does Thanksgiving like “The Coach” George DeMaio.

I’ve been covering high school football Thanksgiving games since 1999 and I can’t think of a year without Coach and Crew — including Steve Kirck, Nick Aprea, The Day’s Ned Griffen and late Shore Line Sports Editor and former points keeper Hal Levy all on a conference call reporting scores and then working their calculators to see who’s in and who’s out of the state playoffs.

They’re also extremely entertaining, especially if you get an upset or two.

Anyhoo, coach is on WAVZ AM-1300 this year (ESPN Radio 1300). So you can either tune into 1300 or go to espnradio1300.com. to listen in.

Coach will be broadcasting the Elm City Bowl between Wilbur Cross (6-4) and Hillhouse (10-0) on Thanksgiving Morning.

On WEDNESDAY, however, he will be in the studio taking phone calls from his network of correspondents from all the consequential Friday night games, including Masuk-Newtown and Cheshire-Southington. So if you can’t get out to a game, tune in to get all the information.

SPB

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Hello everybody! In lieu of poll questions, I’ll ask every one here to pick the winners for all of these Thanksgiving Week games:

Just copy-’n'-paste onto your comment section and then replace the game with the winner.

Save any comments until the end of your post. Remember: be civil.

…..annnnd GO!

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I know you’ve all been waiting with baited breath….

Here’s the latest HSFB Media Poll. And New Canaan is No. 1 again. Not much change from the coaches poll. I’m glad to see Cheshire get back in here finally.

And I know this is already stirring up debate, but lots of voters are liking Masuk better than Brookfield, despite identical records, Brookfield’s head to head advantage and the SWC championship.. (Personally, I don’t get it but that’s why polls are polls.)

New London, like Ansonia before it, getting lots of respect in spite of a loss to Ledyard. I know Jordan Reed is hurt, but I’m not so sure about this one, either. It wasn’t like that Ledyard game was a barn burner. 27-6 is a butt whuppin’. The Whalers are clearly one dimensional and that dimension is sitting on the bench.

Anyway, without further delay, your media poll.

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Indeed that was the 28-year New Canaan coach’s reaction to the news that the FCIAC was overruling his decision to keep the Turkey Bowl game at Dunning Stadium and move it to Boyle Stadium in this story by Tom Renner sports editor of The Advocate of Stamford: Darien, New Canaan game changes venues.

Marinelli, the dean of FCIAC football head coaches, has a right to be upset for a number of reasons… especially since it looks like the FCIAC and NC athletic director Jay Egan went behind his back to move the game.

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The pre-Thanksgiving Day polls have been released.

First, the tally from The Day of New London‘s coaches poll:

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UPDATE: And a fast-developing story today just gets weirder and weirder.

FCIAC executive secretary John Kuczo just confirmed that the league has voted to move the Turkey Bowl Thanksgiving Day game between Darien and New Canaan to Boyle Stadium in Stamford. “We just made the decision,” he said when I called at 3:30 before our mobile connection was cut off.

A follow-up call was not returned. But at 3:32, the CIAC website confirmed the move, which must be approved by both schools to take effect.

The decision, first reported by the website of the Darien Times this afternoon, apparently has been made amid vehement protests by the New Canaan football program.

Here’s the briefing on Ramfootball.com which was posted as of 2:45 p.m. Monday. It’s a brief that is soaked with hardcore resistance from the New Canaan program and expresses outrage that coach Lou Marinelli was being pressured to change the game — New Canaan’s last home game of the year — to Boyle Stadium.

Anyway, here’s the note that appeared on the New Canaan football site as this story developed.

Game Location Update

(as of 11/24/08 at 2:45pm)
Nov. 24, 2008 – All 4,000 of the “advanced sale” tickets made available have been sold, and Dunning can probably hold another 500 people, especially if additional bleachers are brought in. Coach Marinelli was told that the decision to move the game was entirely his, but that agreement seems to be changing. Darien has petitioned the FCIAC to move the game to Boyle Stadium, and there is very heavy pressure being put on the Rams’ coach to give up his home field so that more tickets can be sold.
It should be noted that New Canaan has only had 4 home games this season – Darien has had 6. New Canaan was sent on the road for 6 straight weeks of away games – Darien was never away from home for more than 1 week.

Update (6:52 p.m.): Then this addendum appeared below the preceding paragraph at 5 p.m.

That said… The Rams are very comfortable on the road… and making us drive to Stamford won’t change the final outcome for Darien.

And here’s the press release from Dave Stewart, who also writes for New Canaan Advertiser and Maxpreps.com:

Due to the overwhelming interest in this week¹s FCIAC championship football
game between New Canaan and Darien, the contest will be moved from New
Canaan to Stamford High School¹s Boyle Stadium. The move was made to
accommodate a greater number of fans from both towns.

Game time is 10:30 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day.

Stay tuned please, this could get ugly.

SPB

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This is kind of like saying, “Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.”

But because of rampant rumors that just didn’t seem to want to go away, the New Canaan football website, Ramfootball.com felt it necessary to post this notice that the game will STILL be at Dunning Stadium at 10:30 on Thanksgiving Morning.

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