Now, to be fair, two of those touchdowns came in the fourth quarter when the subs were in.
And also to be fair, well, the Bergen Catholic offense hummed like a machine, the defense showed some gaps.
This was my first look at the Crusaders in person and the first thing I locked in on was the offensive line…
65 – Gabriel Mendez
67 – JR Woods
50 – Sean Twomey
72 – Marquis Morris
68 – Zaakir Faith Jr.
Bergen Catholic wants to win a state championship. They have the quarterback. They have the skill players (Dylan Classi was awesome today).
If they are going to win it, it will come down to the guys on the offensive line – and the defense, yeah, we have to talk about the defense too.
As the pre-season winds down for the Big 5 this fall, the storylines are starting to crystalize. Last year, to me, the biggest thing was Dan Sabella taking over at Paramus Catholic. All he did was become the first coach at a Big 5 school to win a state title since Bill Roca did it in 1986 at Bergen.
This year….well, you have Mike Teel taking over at Don Bosco. That’s kind of big. You have Toal and Stengel at Bergen, working with Nunzio (you could hear Toal a lot today – and I was on the opposite sidelines). St. Joe’s is relishing the anonymity just waiting for someone to push around. Paramus Catholic has a lot of new faces. DePaul might be the biggest wild card of the bunch. They are easily the toughest team for us to rank. Are they the third best team in North Jersey right now? The second, possibly? Isn’t the DePaul/Bergen Catholic game a sneaky really, really good game, and maybe even a trap game for Bergen?
Bergen Catholic: Behind the scenes with rivals turned colleagues Toal and Stengel
Sullivan: Greg Toal talks about his move from Bosco to Bergen Catholic
Cooper: Toal brings pressure, panache to Bergen Catholic
So that’s why I watched those five offensive linemen. And guess what? My first impression was good. They gave Langan time. They cleared some holes for Rahmir Johnson and Josh McKenzie. And even though Red Bank Catholic was good….they aren’t Don Bosco, Paramus Catholic or St. Peter’s….there were a lot of positive signs.
On the other side of the ball, it was clear at times that Bergen is still mixing and matching on defense. I saw lots of different players sub in and out. I saw McKenzie at linebacker some, moved all around. Senior Javontae Jean-Baptiste (LSU had a running back named Garland Jean-Baptiste back in the day…I wonder) had an easy punt block and was an issue for the Caseys, classic edge rusher. But on the negative side….Red Bank Catholic had some success running the ball. I believe the running back’s name was Zack Blair, and when the Bergen coaches look at the film, they won’t be happy with some of the Crusaders tackling today. Blair ran hard and made guys miss. The Caseys also burned Bergen twice on screen passes. Throw out the special teams touchdown for Bergen, and it would have been 28-13 after three quarters. That’s not close, but not exactly a rout either.
The two teams went at it for three quarters with the starters. I didn’t see any injuries. Michael Feaster didn’t play, but I texted Nunzio a little while ago and he said Feaster should be back for DePaul.
Bergen quarterback Johnny Langan threw four touchdown passes. I only remember him running with the ball once. I wonder if that’s a conscious effort to keep him fully healthy. I don’t ever remember seeing him be more accurate with the ball. He threw like a back-shoulder fade to Classi (I think in the third quarter) that was just Money. No one else was getting that ball but Classi and it was put in the perfect spot. He also connected with Rahmir Johnson up an out and up and that was like stealing. We all know what a good and tough athlete Langan is, but wow, did he look polished today.
The Red Bank Catholic coaches were upset at a couple of pass interference calls – one that was not called and one that was. It was interesting because, both kind of appeared to be face guarding, which is now legal in HS football. But what if the defender is face guarding, but there is contact before the ball gets there? I kind of agreed with the RBC coaches on the first one, it maybe should have been called. The second one, I’m not sure…it kind of looked like straight face guarding, and was called.
I spent most of the second half chatting with Bergen Catholic President Brother Walsh, he always has some interesting insights, told me about some exciting plans up in Oradell (nothing for publication just yet). He wants to win a state title, I can tell you that.
So looking ahead, DePaul comes to Oradell next Saturday (the Spartans have their last scrimmage tomorrow at 11) for the season opener. It’s a dangerous game. Last year, Bergen won by two touchdowns, in 2015, they won by two points. DePaul beat the Crusaders 42-11 in 2013 (t... Click here to read full article
ARTICLE SOURCE:
