SPB's High School Football

I wasn’t going to do this, but seeing as I will be going to Ken Strong Stadium today, might as well give everybody updates on the progress of Xavier in their game against West Haven. (We may have some Bethel-Stratford updates as well).

As you all may know, Xavier is right now third in the Class LL playoff race, which is suddenly down to five with Hamden’s loss yesterday.

If the top four teams, Glastonbury, Staples, Xavier and Cheshire win out, Central and Ridgefield are cooked.

If Staples, Xavier or Cheshire lose one of their final games, Central can get in with a win over Harding.

If two of those teams lose, then Ridgefield can join them by beating Danbury.

Two-loss teams like Greenwich and Hamden would need most, if not all, of the 1-loss schools to lose a second game to have any kind of shot… and that’s not happening.

So keep us on in the background while you’re watching the Jets today. We’ll keep you posted.

Yawn… Is it Saturday afternoon already?

Welcome back to the live scoring blog for Saturday, Week 9. It’s still rainy, rainy, rainy out there. We already have one postponement before kicking off this afternoon’s games. Xavier at West Haven, a crucial Class LL game which was supposed to go off at 7, is now Sunday at 2.

Check all the results on our live blog below (most of the games will start to trickle in toward the late afternoon, early evening). Then click here for the CIAC’s football playoff standings page to see how the results have impacted your team.

You can also check out other postponements and schedules on the CIAC’s scoreboard page here

By the way: The FCIAC has announced that its championship game will be played at Trumbull, and not Wilton, next Friday.

Central's #51 Ernest Wiggins, left, picks up a fumbled New Canaan snap, and gets it close to the endzone, during game action in Bridgeport, CT on Friday Nov. 20, 2009.

We’re taught in journalism school that the shorter, succinct lead typically is the best way to emphasize your story’s point.

Try this one on for size:

Central 42, New Canaan 7

Foof.

This was not your typical upset of a No. 1-ranked team.

This was a bludgeoning… a brutal, big city beat0down the likes of which haven’t been seen by an urban school this side of New Haven in a good while.

This just doesn’t happen in the FCIAC, doubly so against one of the big three (New Canaan, Greenwich, Staples). Yeah, Central’s done this before. In the 2004 state playoff season, the upstart Hilltoppers walloped New Canaan 24-0 at Dunning Stadium to signal their arrival into the league’s upper echelon.

I was at that game. This made that one look as pedestrian and insignificant as any one of Central’s victories before and since.

This time, the Hilltoppers met the top-ranked, defending FCIAC and three-time defending Class MM  state champion New Canaan and just basted, seasoned and stuffed the Rams and their once-vaunted 24-game win streak.

Jeez. And we’re still a good two weeks from Thanksgiving.

Week 6′s 14-13 victory over Greenwich was big. No doubt.

But this?

“This was bigger than Greenwich,” said quarterback Christon Gill, Central’s best player who did a lot of cheering from the backfield as his boys, Shabashe McIntosh, Dominick Luckey and Lucas DeSouza ran around, over and through New Canaan for what must have been close to 400 yards on the ground. Central converted two huge fourth downs on its first scoring drive.

We had ignition and liftoff.

Central offense tries to make a path for #27 Lucas Desouza, during game action against New Canaan in Bridgeport, CT on Friday Nov. 20, 2009.

And the defense, don’t get us started. All week, Central watched quarterback Turner Baty and the Rams fly unfettered up and down the field against the likes of St. Joseph and Greenwich. Yeah, we thought, Central might be able to score against New Canaan’s D — which showed some signs that it was susceptible to a ground game. But what about stopping Baty, Cody Newton, Kevin Macari and, sheesh, just about everyone else?

Earnest Wiggans, Christian Bish, Damien Francis, Axel Lee, David Rhodes, Gill, DeSouza…heck, everyone in a red-and-black uniform for that matter, just pinned their ears back and let ‘er rip with hit after brain-rattling hit.

Whenever Baty (who was just off all night after throwing for over 300 yards in each of his last three starts) delivered a ball in the vicinity of his receivers, a Central back was there to deliver a bone-crushing hit. Baty didn’t crack 100 yards passing. He threw a pick and lost one big fumble. They laid into Tim Robustelli on New Canaan’s first series. He never returned. Perhaps the others started hearing footsteps, too.

For the first time in forever, it seems, New Canaan looked bad. In fact, there was talk among media present that if, somehow, if the Rams managed to edge Central for the second FCIAC championship game berth — and, for a good hour after afterward, it looked very likely until Stamford rallied to beat Trinity Catholic and Greenwich held off St. Joseph — New Canaan coach Lou Marinelli should forfeit his team’s spot to the Hilltoppers, anyway.

“They were the most athletic team we’ve faced all year,” New Canaan coach Lou Marinelli said.

This wasn’t New Canaan. Was it the weather? Maybe. Was it the inevitable emotional letdown after such a huge win against New Canaan the week before? Perhaps. Or was it that the program on the other side of the field has finally arrived?

“We expect you do do this,” Central coach Dave Cadelina told his troops three weeks ago after their thrilling 14-13 victory over Greenwich, a win that touched off a wild celebration and drew tears from boys and men alike.

Aside of giving their coach a victory ride to the center of Kennedy Stadium for the post-game handshakes, this time there were no crazy celebrations with students and fans all across the turf. There certainly weren’t any tears flowing, either.

They expect it now.

Said one FCIAC coach just the day before, “That Greenwich win gave them confidence. You give a city school confidence, they believe they can do anything.”

I’d say.

Beating Greenwich.

Crushing New Canaan.

What’s next?

Staples?

 According to Connecticut P0st calculations, Staples and Central have clinched berths in the FCIAC championship game.

Staples clinched with a victory. With Stamford and Greenwich winning, and a guaranteed 10 more points from Westhill-Ludlowe, Central’s minimum league point total will be 1090, for an average of 121.11.

New Canaan’s minimum point toal will be 960, for an average of 120.00.

Since Central shares the final 20 available bonus points with New Canaan, there’s no way the Rams can outpoint the Hillhoppers.

This will be Central’s second FCIAC championship appearance in school history. The last was in 2004, a 42-27 loss to Greenwich. Staples last reached the FCIAC championship game in 2007. It’s last FCIAC championship victory was in 2003.

Here’s the final total.

FCIAC PLAYOFF STANDINGS
(Through Friday)

*Clinched berth in FCIAC championship game, Friday, Nov. 20 at Wilton Trumbull.

As predicted, the remnants of Hurricane Ida has mucked with our schedule, with all kinds of games getting postponed to Saturday, Sunday, heck even Monday.

Yeah. I know. It’s football. What’s the big deal?

That’s the way it is nowadays, especially for those teams who don’t have turf fields (don’t ask me what’s up with Shelton or West Haven or most of the NVL. Masuk’s Benedict Field is so bad, coach John Murphy said yesterday his team will be playing at a neutral site if they reach the state playoffs.

It’s so bad, Masuk’s now giving a home game to arch-rival Bunnell. (Nobody can accuse Masuk of backing down, btw. They truly will play anybody, anywhere.)

But, as far as we know the biggies are still on in the FCIAC: St. Joseph at Greenwich, Staples at Trumbull and New Canaan at Central.

We’ll be out and about, trying to get you updates from these and all of the other regional games we’re covering. Of course, as you all should know by now: We can’t be everywhere. We need your help.

So, here’s the drill. If you are at a high school football game (preferably one we aren’t covering) and want to send updates it’s pretty simple if you have a mobile phone.

1. Get a Twitter account (go to Twitter.com).
2. “Tweet” scoring updates (not play-by-play) from your game.
3. Add the following at the end of your tweet: #ctfb.
4. Send your tweet and it will show up on the live blog.

If you have internet capabilities from your phone, great. But you can also tweet using text message. Just go to “settings” and then hit the “mobile” tab on the Twitter webpage and give them your phone number. Then text your update to 40404 and it will show up.

I know. Lots to digest, but give it a try and you’ll find it’s pretty easy.

Now, let’s get down to brass tax for Week 9:

Here’s your CIAC scoreboard, you can check for postponements and finals here

Here are all the radio/internet broadcasts for Friday night (if the updates aren’t showing up below, be our guest and Tweet what you hear on the internet).

Amity at Notre Dame-WH, 7 p.m. — gogreenknights.com
St. Joseph at Greenwich, 7 p.m. — WGCH 1490-AM or wgch.com
Trinity Catholic at Stamford, 6 p.m. — WSTC 1400-AM, WNLK 1350-AM or wstcwnk.com
Staples at Trumbull, 7 p.m. – WWPT 90.3-FM or at Wreckers Radio on the web
Naugatuck at Holy Cross, 7 p.m. — WATR 1320-AM or watr.com

So if you’re sitting this one out follow along and post those scores, if they’re not showing up below. If they are, no bother. We’ve got it.

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

MONDAY

Ding! Ding!

The Trolley is here, so hop-aboard and let’s see how the 2009 state playoff races are looking in Sean’s (ok, and Steve Filippone‘s … but I thought of it first) Connecticut Playoff Neighborhood of Make Believe.

All aboard! Let’s go!
(insert trolley music here)

2009 MAKE BELIEVE CIAC FOOTBALL PLAYOFF POINTS
(as imagined by the Connecticut Post, based on a proposal by Steve Filippone, Daniel Hand High School, Madison.

Remember, the new proposal calls for:

• The regular season to end Thanksgiving, keeping that incredible sports day intact.
• Top eight qualify from each division.
• Quarterfinals on Tuesday (like normal with the current semis).
• Semifinals on Saturday (like normal with championships).
• Then a week of hype for the four Championship games at… Rentschler Field.

Ooooh, baby. Can’t wait.

CLASS LL

* Class L school in 2009 format

Synopsis: Assuming Glastonbury and Staples will have clinched in this format, all of the one-loss teams are in position to clinch playoff spots. Not one team is left out, folks. Of course, they still have to finish the season because there are a bunch of 6-2 teams waiting to take their spot.

Greenwich is out of the playoff race in real life. Here, they’re very much alive, battling Manchester,  Windsor, South Windsor and Newtown for the right to sneak into the playoffs.

If the playoffs started today, you’d get:
No. 8 Ridgefield at No. 1 Glastonbury
No. 7 Bridgeport Central at No. 2 Staples
No. 6 Hamden at No. 3 Xavier
No. 5 Cheshire at No. 4 Simsbury

CLASS L

**Class MM schools in 2009 format ***Class M schools in 2009

Synopsis: Again, not one 1-loss team out of the mix and, woah, there’s even 2-loss St. Paul Co-Op hanging onto the No. 8 spot. New Canaan, Masuk and Pomperaug have all probably clinched spots while Conard, Vinal Tech are mere bonus points away. Notre Dame and East Lyme are all probably just one win away from clinching (a second loss probably won’t knock the Green Knights out, either). All that’s really left is figuring out who will take the last playoff spot or two, and positioning.

By the way, Darien is very much in the same position it is in now, probably needing to win out to squeak in.

So, if the season ended today, here would be your 2009 Class L playoffs:

No. 8 St. Paul at No. 1 New Canaan or Masuk
No. 7 East Lyme at No. 2 Masuk or New Canaan
No. 6 Notre Dame-WH at No. 3 Pomperaug (could happen in real life)
No. 5 Vinal Tech-Coginchaug at No. 4 Conard

This fixes the problem of all the “New Canaan Invitational” jokes going on in Class MM right now. This s a strong fieldYeah, I’m sure some of you aren’t keen that Vinal and Conard will meet while NDWH and Pomperaug butt heads. But there’s still two more weeks to sort this out. A Green Bowl win for ND would fix that.

CLASS M

**Class MM 2009 school

Synopsis: This division enhances my previous arguments for just three divisions. It’s somewhat watered down compared to the other divisions. But certainly not as bad as how some of the real divisions turn out in the current format. Still, it’s a decent field, one in which the seeding actually looks right.

New London, Avon, Wolcott, Berlin are your top seed. Bethel’s hanging in there as the No. 5. The rest is a free-for-all for the final three spots. Probably won’t be a great quarterfinal, but when this bracket is finished, the winning team can call itself a legit champ.

So if the playoffs started today:

No. 8 Coventry/Windham Tech at No. 1 New London
No. 7 Ellington/Somers at No. 2 Avon
No. 6 Gilbert/Northwestern at No. 3 Wolcott
No. 5 Bethel at No. 4 Berlin

CLASS S

***2009 Class SS

Synopsis: Foof, now this is a playoff race. Yeah, lots of 1-loss teams are sitting below the Filippone Line (our version of baseball’s Mendoza It is, however, a tad misleading because many of these teams are still waiting to play their seventh game. Hyde and Cromwell play each other. St. Joseph still has to play Greenwich. Besides, two of the 1-loss teams are Bullard-Havens and Prince Tech… they’re both below the Filippone Line with very low point totals.

This is another division that’s going to sort itself out in another two weeks, believe me.

So, if the playoffs started today here’s the Class S field

No. 8 Hyde at No. 1 Holy Cross
No. 7 Ansonia at No. 2 Bloomfield
No. 6 NW Catholic at No. 3 Montville
No. 5 East Catholic at No. 4 St. Joseph

That is an amazing playoff field. Hoist that trophy high if you win the title here.

***

Ding! Ding!

Looks like our time is up here in the wonderful, idyllic … *perfect* state tournament land of make believe.

Until next time… OR until the CIAC realizes one more week of football won’t rip apart the fabric of spacetime.

I’ll even say we keep the starting date as-is if you adopt this format. See I’m all about compromise. I understand we don’t want our kids playing forever. One more week for eight teams won’t kill anybody, except maybe the third line on a hockey team or the 6th man on a basketball team.

C’mon CIAC. You can do it.

Make it happen.

Luv,

Sean Patrick

Here are all the major polls for Week 8, brought to you by our friends at other newspapers who want to waste their time doing this stuff. Considering the day I’ve had, I’m so glad I don’t have to chase down delinquent voters (like myself this week — whoops) and put together a poll.

Anyway, not a ton of movement except for the expected drop of Greenwich. Not a surprise, but I don’t think they deserved more than a slight adjustment.

I might have dropped Greenwich one spot in my tally, others wanted to vote all the undefeated teams ahead, which is their prerogative.

To that end, Holy Cross gets into the top 10. Personally,  I think Greenwich beats Holy Cross by about 30 touchdowns. But whatever.

All that matters is No. 1, anyway.

TOP 10 MEDIA POLL
Compiled by New Haven Register

Dropped out: Greenwich (10)
Others receiving votes:
11. Conard (8-0), 167
12. Greenwich (6-2), 163
T13. Cheshire (6-1)
T13. Montville (7-1), 160
14. Bloomfield (8-0), 157
15. Bridgeport Central (7-1), 135
16. St. Joseph (7-1), 74
17. Simsbury (7-1), 63
18. Avon (8-0), 56
19. Ridgefield (7-1), 40
20. East Lyme (7-1), 18
21. Wolcott (7-1), 12
22. Berlin (7-1), 11
23. New Britain (4-4), 10
24. Shelton (5-3), 9
25. Ansonia (6-2), 8
26. Cromwell (6-1), 7.

The following voted: Marc Allard, Norwich Bulletin; Bob Barton, New Haven Register; Bill Bloxsom, Hersam-Acorn; Sean Patrick Bowley, Connecticut Post; Don Boyle, SportingNewsCT.com; Bryant Carpenter, Meriden-Record Journal; Henry Chisholm, Connecticut Post; Garrett Dale, Register Citizen; George DeMaio, WELI; Mike DiMauro, The Day of New London; Matt Doran, Norwalk Hour; Noah Finz, WTNH-8; Ned Griffen, The Day of New London; John Holt, WFSB-3; Mark Jaffee, Waterbury Republican-American; Ken Lipshez, The Herald of New Britain; Mike Madera, Elm City Newspapers; Joe Morelli, New Haven Register; Paul Nichols, Middletown Press; Mike Pucci, New Haven Register; Dave Ruden, Stamford Advocate; Tom Yantz, Hartford Courant; Jimmy Zanor, Shore Line Newspapers.

TOP 10 COACHES POLL
Compiled by The Day of New London

Also receiving votes:
11. Conard (8-0), 129 points
t12. Bridgeport Central (7-1), 98
T12. Greenwich (6-2), 98
14. Bloomfield (8-0), 86
15. Cheshire (6-1), 85
16. Montville (7-1), 55
17. Simsbury (7-1), 53
18. Avon (8-0), 50
19. St. Joseph (7-1), 43
20. East Lyme (7-1), 26
21. Ridgefield (7-1), 24
22. Berlin (7-1), 8
23. Ansonia (6-2), 7
24. Northwest Catholic (7-1), 7

The following coaches voted: Scott Benoit, Hamden; Tom Brockett, Ansonia; Jim Buonocore, Ledyard; Dave Cadelina, Bridgeport Central; Chuck Drury, Pomperaug-Southbury; Steve Filippone, Hand-Madison; Tanner Grove, Montville; Jude Kelly, St. Paul-Bristol; Tim King, Valley Regional-Deep River; Bill Mella, Southington; John Murphy, Masuk-Monroe; Marce Petroccio, Staples-Westport; Bob Zito, Maloney-Meriden.

CONNECTICUT SPORTSWRITERS ALLIANCE

Also Receiving Votes:
11. Cheshire 6-1 104
12. Bloomfield 8-0 94
13. Conard 8-0 93
14. Greenwich 6-2 93
15. Bridgeport Central 7-1 91
16. Montville 7-1 61
17. Avon 8-0 37
18. St. Joseph 7-1 34
T19. Berlin 7-1 19
T19. Simsbury 7-1 19
21. East Lyme 7-1 16
22. Wolcott 7-1 15
23. Ridgefield 7-1 13
24. Ansonia 6-2 7
25. Hillhouse 3
26. Cromwell 6-1 2
T27. Darien 6-2 1
T27. Northwest Catholic 7-1 1
T27. Vinal Tech/Coginchaug 8-0 1

Voters: Marc Allard (Norwich Bulletin), Bob Barton (CT H.S. Football Record Book), Don Boyle (Sporting News CT), Jim Bransfield (Middletown Press), Johnny Burnham (Bristol Press), Bryant Carpenter (Meriden Record-Journal), Henry Chisholm (Connecticut Post), Ray Curren (Elm City Newspapers), Garrett Dale (Torrington Register Citizen), Anthony Della Calce (Central CT weeklies), George DeMaio (WELI Radio), Gerry deSimas (Collinsville Publishing Co.), Bill Donovan (WXLM 104.7 FM), John Goralski (Southington Observer), Dave Greenleaf (CCC website), Mike Guerrera (Southington Citizen), John Holt (WFSB Channel 3), Mark Jaffee (Waterbury Republican), Larry Kelley (Times Community Newspapers), Greg Lederer (Cheshire Herald), Ken Lipshez (New Britain Herald), Andrew Lovell (New Britain Herald), Sean Patrick Bowley (Connecticut Post), Pat Pickens (Fairfield Citizen-News), Ryan Pipke (New Britain Herald), Mike Pucci (New Haven Register), Jesse Quinlan (Greenwich Time), Paul Rosano (Meriden Record-Journal), Dave Ruden (Stamford Advocate), Mike Suppe (Hersam Acorn Newspapers), Peter Vander Veer (Elm City Newspapers), Tom Yantz (Hartford Courant), Rich Zalusky (Willimantic Chronicle), Jimmy Zanor (Shore Line Newspapers)