Overtime: High school athletics in Connecticut

The King football team has garnered a lot of attention in Stamford this fall, and not just because of a change in the school name from the more cumbersome King & Low-Heywood Thomas. The Vikings, behind Division I prospects Silas Redd, Kevin Pierre-Louis and Eric Joyner, are off to a 2-0 start heading into this weekend’s Fairchester Athletic Association showdown with Brunswick, and have one of the strongest teams in the programs’s history (check out colleague Emery Filmer’s upcoming stories this week on Pierre-Louis and the team).

But the football team’s success has served as an eclipse, overshadowing the fact that the entire King sports program has been flourishing this season. The volleyball team, behind Briana Brown and Alex Smyth, is 6-0 and ranked No. 6 in NEPSAC, the New England private school association. The boys soccer team is 2-1-2, with Kyle Luneberg, Gordon Bray and Nicholas Hall-Risko leading the way. The girls soccer team is 3-2 behind Lauren Karp and Summer Segalas. The girls cross country team is solid.

“This is clearly the best teams we’ve had since I’ve been here,” said Tom Decker, who has been at King for 10 years, the last five as athletic director. “Everyone is talking about how the football team is doing well, but it is really all of our teams.”

There have been several reasons for King’s success, outside of a strong stable of athletes and a good coaching staff. Decker credited former athletic director and current Westhill football coach Dick Cerone for instituting a 5th and 6th grade sports program that has served as a good feeder system.

“A lot of this is the culmination of that seven years ago,” said Decker, who was the assistant AD at the time. “There are 270 kids here at the upper school and many of them are multi-sport athletes.”

Decker has also done an outstanding job overseeing the entire sports program, providing support and taking an interest in all the teams and their athletes. He has proved a top-notch administrator.

And the support of Tom Main, the head of school, cannot be discounted. Main recognizes that a strong sports program — indeed the importance of all extracurriculars — is an important part of the educational process. He is a regular presence at all games.

It is worth noting that King’s achievements have come without compromising its academic mandate. It is not unusual for private schools to recruit top athletes and turn a blind eye to their efforts in the classroom. King has never followed this path.

“We’re looking for good kids first and foremost, and then the opportunity to look for good students and then good athletes,” Decker said.

It is a formula that has worked pretty well, as has been evident on King’s fields and in its gymnasium this fall.

There may be no better place to watch a high school football game than New Canaan High School. From the scenic setting, to the people involved, to the talent of the teams over the years, Friday nights and Saturday afternoons at Dunning Field are a joy.

No high school sports team I can think of operates more like a small college program than the Rams. And a large reason for that is Lou Marinelli, who is in his 28th year as coach.

Marinelli has boyish charm, is a great strategist and is terrific with the media. If there is a better coaching staff in Connecticut I haven’t come across it. The team is 10-4 in the state tournament under Marinelli, and a large reason for that is because his staff will give New Canaan a big advantage when it comes to preparing for an unfamiliar opponent in a short period of time.

In doing interviews for a profile I wrote on Marinelli that will appear in Friday’s paper, the thing that I found most interesting is Marinelli is the school’s JV hockey coach. Bo Hickey, his close friend, who has been Marinelli’s running backs coach from the beginning, is the school’s hockey coach. Two years ago he needed a JV coach.

Though Marinelli had never coached hockey before, Hickey asked him to take the job for one simple reason.

“Louie can coach,” Hickey said.

It is a typical Marinelli story. How many other people in his position would do the same thing? Then again, how many people would even be asked?

The Rams were written off by the media before the season started because of all the starters lost from last year’s state championship team. Apparently my colleagues are not familiar with Marinelli’s track record. In two games again supposed contenders, the Rams defeated Trumbull by 28 points and Ridgefield by 27.

There are still a lot of games to be played and this is looking like a league without one dominant team. New Canaan will learn more about itself when it hosts 2-0 Danbury on Saturday.

In a season in which the race for the two spots in the FCIAC championship game could be closely contested, the Rams will be in an advantageous position because of having Marinelli on their sideline.

A correction to the last post: Friday night’s activity is a social gathering at Bobby Q’s restaurant in Westport. For more information on all of the weekend’s activities, contact Dan Woog at dwoog@optonline.net or write to www.StaplesSoccer.com.

It will be a special morning on The Hill Saturday, when the Staples High School boys soccer team hosts Stamford, one of the highlights of a two-day celebration commemorating the 50th anniversary of the program.

When it comes to tradition, the Wreckers are in select company. Heading into Wednesday night’s game with Fairfield Ludlowe, the program has produced 687 wins, 145 losses, 85 ties, 11 state and 24 league titles. Alumni have made their way into professional soccer and to the highest levels of their professions.

As a matter of full disclosure, I am a Staples graduate and played on the sophomore team, where I am pretty certain I still hold the record for the most blown scoring opportunities in a year. It got so bad that in the final game, as he tried to get everyone in the game, Chris Keneally, the coach, in a move of unparalleled compassion, kept me in the contest almost the entire second half in the hope I would finally find the back of the net. As was the case all season, I did come close.

For the next two years I spent many autumn days on The Hill rooting on my much more talented friends. And for the last 26 years I have had the honor to continue to cover the team at one of the most scenic settings in Connecticut high school athletics.

I did get to spend a year in Albie Loeffler’s locker room. Loeffler, the program’s patriarch, was the personification of class, someone who could get a point across with a few soft words and a look. To everyone associated with Staples soccer, he will always be Mr. Loeffler.

No one knows more about the importance of Staples soccer than Dan Woog, Class of ‘71, who played on the team, wrote about the team for The Westport News and now coaches the team. He will be the first to tell you it is a dream job.

Like everyone, he is looking forward to this weekend, which will include a cocktail party Friday night and a wine tasting Saturday evening, as well as an alumni game.

“It’s very, very cool,” Woog said. “And the excitement is coming from the alums. I’m getting several emails each day.”

What the returning players will see Saturday morning is a skilled Staples team that is 5-0 and a legitimate threat for league and state titles.

Asked if his current players were aware of what this weekend is all about, Woog said, “They don’t know how big it is going to be. They don’t know what I think will be a real electric atmosphere.

“They don’t know the history, but they know they are a part of something.”

A very special something.

With the recent dominance of Staples and Greenwich, FCIAC football seasons have been largely anti-climactic, with a handful of big games. One of the two schools has appeared in the league title game the last nine years, and last season the two teams met on Thanksgiving morning for the title, denying fans of other schools playing that day the chance to watching the championship game.

Could this be the second year in a row this happens? And could we end up with a New Canaan-Darien final, one of the FCIAC’s biggest rivalries.

There is a long way to go, but fans in both towns have to at least be dreaming a little following the Blue Wave’s 31-25 upset of Greenwich today, which ended the Cardinals’ 15-game winning streak. With New Canaan routing Ridgefield on Friday night, 40-13, after two weeks the two schools are thus far the class of the league.

The fallout from Greenwich’s loss will be felt all week. But don’t book your calendars just yet. The FCIAC season is a marathon, not a sprint. Both Darien and New Canaan still have to play both Staples and Wilton, two schools that could also have a say in the playoff race. And don’t write off Greenwich just yet. New Canaan, in one of the many quirks in this year’s schedule, plays 2-0 Danbury at home next week, its third straight game at Dunning Field, then is on the road for six straight weeks (Stamford plays its first four games on the road — who made these schedules?).

It takes at least three weeks to get a real feel for the league, and right now this could be the most wide-open playoff race in recent memory.

But as we close the book on Chapter 2, a Darien-New Canaan FCIAC final that would be heavily trumpeted and draw a huge crowd at this point looks like a real possibility.

What do you think? Post your thoughts.

Former Greenwich High School football star Jonathan Meyers is profiled on a front page story of the sports section in today’s New York Times. Meyers, a freshman, talks about his decision — which surprised many — to attend Princeton instead of Florida.

While heading to the Ivy League was viewed by many as the road less traveled in a football sense, Meyers does a good job of explaining his choice.

Meyers’ alma mater is involved in the most interesting game in today’s slate. Greenwich, a team everyone thought would slide back to the pack this year, faces Darien, which was considered a possible sleeper in the Fairfield County Interscholastic Athletic Conference. Given the way the season has played out so far, it would be wise not to pay too much attention to the pundits.

There was a Mike Sangster siting tonight at halftime of the New Canaan-Ridgefield football game in New Canaan. The legendary former Darien High School coach, who retired and now lives in Arizona, was in to see old friends, including one of his former assistants, Steve Lauten, who is now on the Rams’ staff.

Sangster does not seem to have aged a year, though the coach who never settled for anything less than perfection said things have definitely changed a lot around here.

“What is this talk about Darien having a good chance to keep it close with Greenwich tomorrow?” Sangster said as he prepared to close out his trip by watching his former team in action. “If I remember correctly we used to have some success against them.”

Sangster said he is enjoying the good life out west, spending time with his family, enjoying outdoor activities and going to see the University of Arizona’s teams play.

On a chilly night, Sangster proved again that he still retains the same feistiness. He said he reached into Lauten’s closet tonight to grab a jacket and the first one he pulled out was red and black and had the New Canaan logo.

“I’d rather freeze than where that,” he said with a laugh.

Felipe Rodriguez walked into athletic director Mike King’s office this morning with a huge smile on his face.

“Am I back?” Rodriguez, the star forward on Westhill High School’s boys soccer team, asked.

“You are all set,” King replied.

And with that, the player many consider the best in the state started looking ahead to his return this afternoon for the Vikings’ home game with Danbury.

Rodriguez, who scored what is believed to be an FCIAC record 44 goals a year ago, was ineligible for the team’s first three games for unspecified reasons. Westhill went 1-2 without him.

With midfielder Danny Ruiz suffering a separated shoulder Tuesday against Trumbull and the team still adjusting to a new coach and a turnover in personnel, Rodriguez’s return could not be timed any better.

All King said about the matter was “Felipe has met all of his requirements.”

Rodriguez said, “I’m just happy to be back.