Falcons beat Bonner 69-49. Move to Semi-Finals

Maybe today being Valentine’s Day had something to do with it, but there weren’t nearly as many people at this quarter-final game as there was last year when the Falcons beat LaSalle, to reach the Semi-Finals. But, certainly were a lot of people at this game, as the Falcons dismantled the Friars to become the only remaining team still in the playoffs from last season’s semi-final round.

Did You Notice……
…..that North was the home team, yet sat on the traditional away side of the court?
…..that even though it was a home game, we didn’t have Taylor Rand sing the National Anthem before the game.
…..that Gloria was selling tickets at the door. Gloria, who has been selling tickets for North basketball, football games, as well as North wrestling matches for like forever, told one of our staffers a couple of years ago that she was retiring. Every time she thinks she’s out, they pull her back in. It was nice seeing her smiling face at the door today.

…..that Mike Kaiser ‘71, our regular home announcer, was in the house and called on to do the announcing duties. I sometimes get on Mike about his announcing, but he is one of the better announcers in the league. And when he can’t make a game, his son, Mike Jr, takes over for dad.
….that the smell of hotdogs was filling the gym in the second half…….Or, was that just me?
….that soccer assistant, Tom Crossett, seemed to be making amends for failing to call Tim Murphy for the soccer banquet. It’s good to see that they are still on good terms. (Here's a picture of Murph with all of his friends.)

Faces in the Crowd……
There were a lot of people at this game, so we’ll just try to hit the highlights.
…..From the class of 1970, John Connors, was taking in the game from the north bleachers.

…..Also in the north bleachers, and hanging out with NC Athletic Director, was John “Cutty” Cutsavage ’71.
…..Holding up the bottom row on the east bleacher was football coach, Chalie Szydlik, along with his son, and assistant football coach, CJ Syzdlik (photo below).

….Next to the coaches were the contingency from AOH Division 87, Bob Murph, his buddy John, and Bob’s brother, Tim (below Tim, Bob, John to the left of CJ Szydlik),
….Having the night off and enjoying the game was Will Puchalski, who is usually working the scoreboard at North games.
….Also in the house was former North teacher and long time AD, Fran Dougherty ’59......Also in the house were Brian Smith '82, Ed White '55, Mike McBride '81 and Gene Bryan '81. (sorry, no pics)

Where in the world was Drew Colfer??? One person who was noticeably missing from the game was Drew Colfer. For anyone who has attended a home game, you had to have noticed the little guy, with the #12 jersey, who takes to the floor before each game and during halftime to shoot some hoops. Well, Drew had a conflict today. He had Flyers’ tickets and couldn’t make it to the basketball game. We’re told that he was very happy to be at the Flyers game, but was just as upset that he couldn’t see his beloved Falcons play in this playoff game. Even Woody Redding, Drew’s favorite Falcon player, stopped by to chat with Drew, as he does almost every game. Woody was told why Drew couldn’t be there, but he was assured that he would make it to the semi-final game on Wednesday night. Seems that the nest wasn’t the only people who missed little Drew.

Come out to the Palestra on Wednesday night to catch the Falcons play in a semi-final matchup with Neuman-Goretti. Game time is 7:00pm.

North Soccer Unveils Hall of Fame Class of 2009

On the day the Phillies climbed the mountain for the first time in 28 years (October 29, 2008), your North Catholic Falcons captured its 22nd Catholic League Championship in front of a packed and frenzied student body and its prestigious alumni. Not too shabby when you consider the Catholic League started 52 years ago and in time, North Soccer climbed this mountain 42% of the time, or one in every four years. Consider this if you will, in the past 10 years, North Soccer has played in 5 Championship Games and has won 4 of them. In also winning the City Championship again (4-peat), North soccer has played in 18 of 24 title contest and winning 7 times. In some sports, this would be Hall of Fame material.

Now speaking of Hall of Fames, the North Soccer Alumni Association, Inc. announces with great pride and honor the CLASS OF 2009. These men will be honored on March 29, 2009 with great fanfare at Ramonos Caterers, to celebrate their soccer success, what it means to the school and our program and to extol the Salesian tradition that North Catholic stands for.

Without further adieu, here is this years inductees:

Ray Lynch, Class of 1938
Rich Sheridan, Class of 1971
Mat Noel, Class of 1946
Andy Rymarzcuk, Class of 1969
Lou Dollarton, Class of 1946
Dennis Maguire, Class of 1970
Thomas Scanlon, Class of 1957
Mike Robinson, Class of 1976
Jack Ruggero, Class of 1965
Rusty Bono, Class of 1979
John McIntyre, Class of 1991

DID YOU KNOW...................

North Catholic Soccer Alumni, Inc. is comprised of volunteers representing the 60s, 70s,80s and 90s. Their task is not an easy one. Their goal is to compare and contrast different players from different teams in different eras. Not to mention, there have been thousands of boys who have played soccer at North starting in the late 1920s! I hope that you noticed that this group does not identify the candidates. That very important job is left to you and me. If you played at North or are just a fan of the game and you believe that someone has been overlooked or not considered, please let us know.

How you might ask? Well, you can go to the website: wwww.northcatholicsoccer.com and sign the guest book and let us know who that person is. You can contact any of the coaches of the current team. You can come and celebrate with us on 3/29 and fill out a nomination form. These are just three ways, I am sure you can think of many more.

For information on tickets, please contact: Joe Steffa at 215-783-8020 or jsteffa@comcast.net; Jerry Brindisi at 215-906-8496 or brindinski@aol.com; Tom Crossett at tcrosset@northcatholicsoccer.com.

CHAMPIONSHIP SWEATSHIRT AVAILABLE:

Get Your Championship Sweatshirt. Click Here for details

Contact any of the above for more information.

Falcons Clinch Playoff Bye with win over Prep

There are good games, and there are bad games. The game against St Joe Prep Tuesday night was more like “huh???!!!”. Get this; at the end of the first quarter, the score was exactly 4-1 (that’s not a typo, folks), with the Falcons leading. More than half the quarter was over before anyone scored, and that was a free throw by Prep’s Dan Fitzpatrick, when he made the only free throw by Prep all night. I was so excited; I almost applauded the point, because it came with only 3:34 remaining in the first quarter. It almost seemed like there was a cover on both baskets, as the ball just wouldn’t fall for either team. You’d think this game was a defensive battle. It wasn’t. It was just that nobody could put the ball in the hoop. Prep shot 13-42 from the field (30.1%), and the Falcons shot 11 for 28 (39.3%). But, the Falcons hit a respectable 15 of 19 free throws, while the Prep only attempted 2 from the charity stripe. To show that it wasn’t necessarily a great defensive effort by either team, you only need to look at the number of turnovers (NC 12 – SJ 10) and steals (NC 5 – SJ 1). It was one of those games where you’re grateful to get out of the gym with a 38-31 win, and hope that doesn’t happen again.

Coach McCarron Gets 100 Wins!
Coach will probably hate that I’m mentioning this, but the win tonight was significant in several ways. First, the win secures, at least, second place in the Red Division and assures the team that they will get a first round bye in the playoffs. Second, it is the 100th win of coach McCarron’s career at North. Finally, this milestone win was against coach’s mentor, Speedy Morris. But, with Mike being Mike, this milestone will be downplayed by him. As he has told me before, “Coaches don’t win games, players do. Coaches only lose games when they don’t put their players in a position to win.” This is classic Mike McCarron. He puts the collective success of his players over his own personal achievements. But, I’d like to say to coach, congratulations and thank you. May your players win another 100 in short order, and may they all be successful in life, in part because they had you in their lives during their high school years.

Hockey Puck Strikes Again!
During the varsity games, I usually sit at the scorers’ table and track stats for the Falcons. I generally only handle rebounds, assists, turnovers, steals, blocked shots and minutes. But, a few games ago, I started keeping track of timeouts, mainly because it’s something that the coaching staff is interested in down the stretch. But, Tom “Hockey Puck” McKenna keeps the “official book” at our home games. During this game, I noted that Prep had used both of their 30 second timeouts in the first half. In the second half, after Prep called their second full timeout (leaving them with just 1 full timeouts), the Prep scorekeeper checked the number of timeouts remaining for Prep. He and Puck agreed that Prep had two timeouts remaining. I said, “No, Prep used 2 30’s in the first half and two full in this half. One left.” Both of them looked at their books again and both said that they showed Prep with 1 full and a 30 remaining. Two different North coaches, who also track timeouts, also showed Prep with only one timeout remaining. Will Puchalski, the timekeeper, who enters timeouts into the clock computer, also showed Prep as having one timeout remaining. The ref came over to check, and Puck argued that because both he and the Prep scorekeeper showed 2 remaining, that must be right. The ref stated that Puck’s book was “official”, so Prep had 2 remaining. In the end, Prep ended up with 6 timeouts. I’m just glad that it didn’t matter much in the whole scope of events. The problem here is that Puck chats too much with the opponent’s scorekeeper to know what’s going on half the time. Maybe he should go back to wearing two pair of glasses. But, what do I know?

LASALLE STOPS NORTH IN THE DISTRICT TEAM SEMI-FINALS

the district 12 team semi-finals (formally the Catholic League Wrestling Championship) had all that you would have wanted in a wrestling match. close, hard fought victories, dramatic falls, coaching moves and even a snow delay, unfortunately the hard fought victories and dramatic falls seemed to go in lasalle's favor and allowed them to win 41-18.

we knew we had a tough road. this lasalle team is quite possibly the best lasalle team of all time. we had some great performances however, lasalle just had a little too much for us.

best of luck to lasalle as they represent District 12 in the PIAA Team Championships.

LASALLE JV TOURNAMENT

on super-bowl sunday the north catholic jv team traveled back to lasalle for their annual jv tournament. we brought a total of 14 wrestlers to the tournament and came away with 7 medals. the medal winners for north catholic were....

Riccardo Roman - 1st place
Joe Janda - 2nd place
Brian Sweeny - 2nd place
Tad Meyers - 3rd place
Tim Maguire - 3rd place
Gary Robinson - 4th place
Mark Brown - 4th place

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL OF OUR JV WRESTLERS!!!!!!

our jv season ends next week at the North Penn JV wrestling tournament

MATCH VS. RIDLEY

our last dual meet of the season will be this saturday morning at 11am. this will be a varsity only dual meet so get there early. come out and support our senior falcons in their last home match until the grind to states begins!!!!