Thought for the day: Well, it’s back to school for student-athletes (and back to writing about school for me). Hopefully, students are as excited about heading back to campus as I am about returning to pen this column.
As George Bernard Shaw said, “What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, and not knowledge in pursuit of the child.”
Back to the MAC
The Middle Atlantic Conference, which actually has two “sub-conferences” — the Commonwealth and the Freedom — is where many local student-athletes go to get quality educations and play collegiate sports.
There are 17 schools in the MAC, 10 of which play football. Locals consistently seem to gravitate to a handful of the 10 to make their collegiate homes and play football.
Year in, year out the most popular landing spot seems to be Lebanon Valley College. The Dutchmen had a large local contingent last year with 14 student-athletes on the roster.
But they’ve outdone themselves this year. Despite losing a large senior class of locals on last season’s roster, 25 of the 117 members of the 2015 preseason roster (that’s 21.3 percent, for those into mathematics) are from the Republican-Herald coverage area.
We’ll run down the list in a moment, but we were curious as to how and why LVC was so successful in bringing Coal Region players to campus.
There are some obvious answers, of course. LVC has a great academic reputation, it’s close to home, it’s had substantial athletic success over the years, and there is now a tradition of locals going there, many of whom have had outstanding collegiate careers. But LVC’s football staff puts some hard work into recruiting area student-athletes as well.
In a lengthy conversation with head football coach Jim Monos, we found out that LVC has — and has had for at least 22 years — a very successful high school football camp each July where numerous high school programs bring their entire rosters with coaches and learn everything from fundamentals to installing complete offensive and defensive systems.
Schuylkill Haven is one of them. Southern Columbia is another. Monos estimates that an average of 20-25 players on LVC’s roster each season come from those camps.
During high school football season, Monos said he and 4-5 members of his staff are on the road, visiting schools every day and attending Friday night games. They are also getting academic prospectuses from coaches, because LVC has strict academic standards and a strong belief in the student-athlete concept, not the other way around.
He estimated that he and his staff will have visited 200-250 high schools by the time Christmas rolls around. They do so year after year.
Prospective student-athletes and their families are invited to home games, and players can watch games from a special area on the field. Monos said he thinks it’s important for the prospects to see the sideline interaction between coaches and players, getting a feel for “how is he (the coach) in the heat of battle.”
LVC also hosts prospects in its classrooms on school days, without coaches. Visiting students meet with admissions staff and go to class with players, giving the prospects a chance to see how they might fit in, and to talk with, as Monos puts it, “those who live it every day, who can tell you how it is.”
The Coal Region helps sell itself, as well, Monos said.
“The Coal Region has become very good to us,” he added. “We’ve found that Coal Region kids love the game of football, have toughness and physicality and come from programs where they have bought in to loyalty and commitment. They generally don’t say much, but just do what they have to do. They are very competitive and want to win.”
Monos noted that their families are also very supportive and place a high priority on a quality education for their children.
At the Division III level, there are no redshirts (other than medical). A six-game, Sunday afternoon JV schedule gives freshmen and some sophomores (but no juniors or seniors) a chance to play. A few freshmen and sophomores may end up being on the varsity depth chart as well.
LVC’s goal was 35 new players this year, but the team ended up with 48, in what Monos described as “one of the better classes we’ve recruited.”
That freshman class includes the following locals: tailback Ryan Fink of Schuylkill Haven (LVC grad Evan Fink’s younger brother); free safety Jason Richmond and center-offensive guard Jeremey Markiewicz of Mahanoy Area; fullback Derrec Robinson and inside linebacker Zach Martin of Blue Mountain; ILBs and twin brothers Tyler and Trevor Skripko of Tamaqua; offensive tackles Mike Kaminsky and Lee Amarose, both of Mount Carmel, and Jordan Dziczek of North Schuylkill; OG Scott Werner, ILB Alec Soltys (brother of LVC grad Adam Soltys) and nose tackle Brett Mars (brother of LVC grad Trent Mars), all of Pine Grove; and TB Blake Panko and wide receiver Treyvon White of Mount Carmel.
Sophomores include FS Cale Bruso of Tri-Valley; cornerback Mike Gilger of Lourdes; outside linebacker Anthony Agosti of Marian; TB Ryan Heim and defensive end Guy Zimmerman of Pine Grove; WR Michael Gaval of Mahanoy Area (a transfer from Lenoir-Rhyne); kicker and OLB Nick Newton of Lehighton; and ILB Tom Gallagher of North Schuylkill.
There is one local junior: C Robert Van Horn of Mahanoy Area.
One of the linchpins defensively is returning, fifth-year senior NT Clayton Williard of Tri-Valley, who was voted LVC’s “Unsung Hero” last year. Williard started all 10 games, made 29 tackles, including four for loss, and had half a sack and four quarterback hurries. Williard, who goes 5-foot-11, 309 pounds, also saw action at OG in goal-line and short-yardage situations.
In my next column, a look at local football players in the rest of the MAC and in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference.
(MacLaughlin’s college notebook appears biweekly during the collegiate calendar. Send items to him in care of Sports Editor Leroy Boyer at Lboyer@republicanherald.com.)