Eagles thankful for their first win on Turkey Day
BY SHAWN LAYTON
Staff Writer

RICH GRAESSLE Edison's Michale Campbell outleaps J.P. Stevens' J.R. Padilla to make a touchdown grab during Friday's Eagles win over the Hawks in Edison.

EDISON - For the first time in five years, the Edison High School football team walked off the grid iron Thanksgiving Thursday with a victory.

The Eagles defeated cross-town rival J.P. Stevens in a turkey-day thriller 29-28.

"It was an unbelievable game for a lot of factors," Edison head coach Matt Fulham said. "Not only was it our first win against Stevens in five years, it was our first win over a playoff team with a winning record, and our first road win of the season."

Fulham also mentioned that the Edison football had been flat-out dominated by the Hawks the entire last decade. Stevens had only lost one Thanksgiving game to Edison the past 12 seasons.

"The game was a great one to watch as the teams went back and forth the entire time," Fulham said. "Both teams played hard right up to the very end."

JEFFGRANIT staff BishopAhr's Moses Negron drags a Cardinal McCarrick defender during the Trojans' Nov. 22 win in Edison.

Stevens struck first when tailback Jahyere Bryant put the Hawks on top with a 46-yard scoring run. Bryant's run began a trend of exchanging touchdowns that would last until the final minute of the contest.

"It was pretty exciting," Fulham said. "Stevens went up 7-0, and then we tied it. They went up 14-7, and we tied it at 14. This continued as we tied it at 21 apiece before they went ahead 28-21. With about six minutes to play my coaching staff and I decided we would go for the win as opposed to a tie if it came down to it."

With 16 seconds on the clock, that is precisely what happened as Edison quarterback Erik Janz ran in a touchdown that brought the Eagles to within a point of heavily favored Stevens.

"We ran a play that we've been practicing all season," Fulham said. "We line up in a shotgun formation with four receivers to one side all running curls."

Janz found a favorite target in senior Mike Campbell and the Eagles completed the upset. Janz finished with 330 yards passing with three aerial touchdowns and one on the ground. Campbell was on the receiving end of all three touchdown throws from Janz. Campbell finished with six receptions for 220 yards.

"Mike is just a tremendous athlete," Fulham said. "He had a height advantage over some of the defensive backs and he took advantage of that."

For Edison, the win was the team's third in a row after dropping the first seven of the season. In the three-game stretch, the team beat Perth Amboy 28-10 and Columbia 44-7 in addition to last week's win at Stevens.

"With our JV team going 7-1 this year and the varsity squad picking up wins in the last three games, the program seems headed in the right direction," Fulham said. "This really sets the tone for our program."

While Campbell played his final game in an Edison uniform Thursday, Janz will be back for his junior year next fall. Also slated to be back next season is linemen Mohammed Elkattan and Chris Pierth along with kicker Frank Leone. Leone went 26-26 in PATs this season.

"We'll definitely miss Mike Campbell and our seniors on the offensive line," Fulham said. "Brian Pascal, Dan Tirado, and Mark Orillaza were fantastic on the line. They are a big reason we scored 70 more points from last season and tallied 700 more offensive yards."

Senior outside linebackers Victor Rivera and T.J. Alli were also instrumental to the team's success this season.

"Those guys played hard every game," Fulham said. "It's nice that they were able to end their high school careers with three in a row."

With the loss, Stevens finished the year at 5-5.

Bishop Ahr, Colonia also enjoy rivalry game wins

Bishop Ahr put an exclamation mark on its season on Nov. 23 with a 46-0 victory over Cardinal McCarrick in Edison.

The Trojans used a dominant ground game to score on each of its first five possessions to run away with this one. Moses Negron (119 yards) and Joseph McAuley (121 yards) paced the attach for head coach Ron Hilliard's squad, which also got a dominant effort from its defense, which limited the Eagles to just four first downs for the game.

Another team that enjoyed the turkey a bit more this Thanksgiving was the Colonia Patriots, who beat rival Woodbridge on Nov. 17, 20-18, in their annual match-up. Colonia was led by the legs of Eric LeGrand (102 rushing yards) and Whitley Harris (111 yards and two touchdowns), and some big defensive plays down the stretch to finish the year at 4-6, the same record as the Barrons.

Colonia, who fell behind early when Woodbridge's Anthony Viola hit Anthony Graham for a 16-yard touchdown in the third quarter, came back to tie it later in the quarter when Harris raced 43 yards for his first score. The lead grew to 13-6 when LeGrand capped a long drive with a two-yard plunge, before the Barrons got within 13-12 on a DeShawn Knight four-yard run, before Harris struck again, racing 62 yards for a score, and a 20-12 Colonia lead.

Woodbridge got within 20-18 on a Knight 45-yard run with just under three minutes to play in the game, but LeGrand made a big tackle on the two-point conversion attempt to protect the lead. The Barrons had one last chance to steal the game, driving all the way to the Colonia 26 in the final moments before the drive stalled.