By Dan Cleary

5/16/2008 - Great to be back at Festival

As I was driving over to Wallkill Valley the other day to cover the Sussex County Interscholastic League Track and Field Festival, I started to go through my mental rolodex (which I am wont to do) trying to figure out when was the last time I attended the event.

I couldn’t come up with an exact year, but it had definitely been a long time, to say the least. But once I got to Wallkill and headed to the football field, it all came back to me. As I walked in, I was greeted, as always, by Wallkill AD Mike Van Zile, who steered me in the right direction.

I headed for the bleachers and was greeted by the familiar faces of the Vernon coaching staff, including boys head coach John Ryan, who has been a fixture at this event for almost 30 years. Sitting behind Ryan and the Vernon gang was Mike Juskus, the Hopatcong coach, who in his own right is one of the best track and field athletes the county has ever produced.

 The former Hopatcong star was an All-American in the javelin at Glassboro State College back in the day and helped mold Joe Martinek, a red-shirt freshman on Rutgers football team, into perhaps the finest track athlete in Sussex County history.

It made me appreciate the outstanding history and tradition that the event has, and spring track in general, in the county. The county has seen its fair share of outstanding athletes who have excelled on the state level. Sure, the county isn’t exactly a national hotbed for track, but it has come a long way.

A lot of that credit goes to Pope John coach Brian Corcoran for developing the Lions into a state power. I have chronicled in the past his accomplishments, but what some people don’t realize is that PJ’s success benefits the whole county. How you say? Well, if you are a competitor you want to go against the best. That motivation will make you work harder and as a result, you will get better. PJ’s track team, like Vernon’s and Sparta’s not too long ago, provides that same spark.

 What athlete wouldn’t want to aspire to do what Emily Carollo of Pope John did in winning four events (100, 200, 400 and 800) at the Festival? Or possess the power and grace of Chris Thomas of Pope John who won the long jump, high jump and triple jump?

Take Victor Boonham of Sparta, for example. Boonham had a fantastic Festival, winning the 400, 400 hurdles and 110 hurdles, while placing second in the 200 to Dylan Hurley of Pope John. I interviewed Boonham after his win in the 400 and he told me he was excited to win, but he knew the kid behind was fast, so he couldn’t let up. And who was that kid, that’s right, Hurley from Pope John.

The best example of a kid pushing to be the best was freshman Megan Kelly of Vernon who shocked everyone with her impressive win in the 3200, edging Sarah Cariati of PJ, who topped Kelly the day before in the 1600.

I’m sure Cariati would have loved to win, but maybe a few years down the road she will appreciate that her accomplishments served as a motivator for another athlete. I can’t think of a better tribute.

And the folks who organized the event should be commended for running the event as smoothly as they did. I have always said that covering a track meet is organized chaos. The Festival starts and multiple events get under way, and all of sudden, three hours later, it is over and everyone heads home in an orderly fashion.

The people who are involved in track and field in the county do an outstanding job. They may not get the recognition as say football and wrestling coaches, but the proof is in the pudding and how the Festival is run is evidence of that.

And they value the tradition in the county and give back. The fact that former Sparta track official Dave Karlberg, who passed away a few years ago, is honored by having the 1600 meter run named after him is a fitting tribute.

I thoroughly enjoyed being back at the Festival again. To watch athletes strive to reach their season-long goals in the final SCIL meet of the season is the essence of athletic competition and I look forward to coming back next year.

TORUNEY TIME—Every season, there is always a crazy story about a team facing the state tournament cutoff date finding a way to get in and qualify with a .500 record. But in the many years I have followed high school sports in Sussex County, Newton’s path to the postseason in softball is the wildest.

The Braves were sitting at a game under .500 after a devastating extra-inning loss to Wallkill Valley last Wednesday. The Braves knew they would have to top Pope John, no easy feat in itself, the following Friday in order to receive a bid to the tourney for the first time in over 20 years.

But, alas, (and by the way, who uses alas any more?), Mother Nature had other plans and wiped out the game and seemingly Newton’s dreams of playing in the postseason. Newton coach Curt Pakutka and Newton AD Kurt Walton did everything they could to get the field in shape at Memory Park.

"The town (Newton) did everything it could to get the field ready," said Pakutka, who is in his first year with the Braves. "The DPW (Department of Public Works) tried everything and did a great job, but it just rained too hard. We even tried to play at Pope John on the turf field, but it still was raining too hard. So we are all disappointed."

This is where most ADs and coaches would have said we did our best, it just wasn’t meant to be. But not Walton and Pakutka. Walton found out that New Providence was in the same boat as Newton and was looking for a team to play at 4 p.m. at the Randolph Indoor Sports Pavilion in Morris County.

But there wasn’t enough time to get there, but Walton pressed on and was able to rent time at the Pavilion at 9 p.m. Now the Braves only needed a team to play, and in stepped Sussex Tech.

The Mustangs had already clinched a tourney berth and were willing to play. Tech coach Ed Paiva and athletic director Debbie Schlesinger are always looking to play local competition and they accepted the invitation.

"Once we found we had a chance to play, the girls were so excited and their spirits were lifted," said Pakutka. "We were willing to play anybody and we knew Tech was a good team, so it wouldn’t be easy."

The final hurdle was getting umpires and after an hour delay, two umps arrived and the Braves posted a 12-0, five-inning win to get to the "Big Dance" right before midnight, so Cinderella Braves didn’t turn into pumpkins.

"It was an extremely wild day," said Pakutka. "I have to thank the town DPW for their hard work, our AD and the people at Sussex Tech. Now we just want to play well in the states."

Now this makes for a great story, which will have some twists and turns added as it is retold as the years go on. But it also begs the question, did Newton go over board in its efforts? Some cynics might say the Braves had almost the whole season to make it to .500, and probably lost a couple games along the way they should have won, so lesson learned, you don’t go to states.

I might agree with that if the Braves were an established program that made the states on an annual basis. But this was most definitely a special case and Walton did the right thing. If you have a chance to break a 20-year-plus snide, you go for it. That is one thing I’ve learned about Walton over the years-- he will do everything in his power to help his student-athletes. Great job, Kurt.

And Sussex Tech can’t be left out of the equation, either. This is just another example of how Tech and Schlesinger are doing their best to improve the perception of Mustang athletics. The Mustangs didn’t go down to Randolph as a sacrificial lamb. They went to win and lost to a better team. There was no backdoor-dealing going on.

No matter how you feel about the situation, it is a great story. As I said before, the story will get more colorful as the years go on. I can’t wait for the version that includes starting the game just before midnight and playing until dawn with the lights out.

That’s it for now, see you on the sidelines.