FCIAC Football Blog

Forgot to post this one the other day. I saw Bunnell head football coach Craig Bruno over at Bassick on Tuesday (both at the State Farm ceremony and at the Bassick-Stamford boys hoops game), and he let me know he will be the head coach of the Fairfield County team for this season’s Hall of Fame Classic.

Bruno does not have a roster yet. By now, New Haven County most-likely has its roster in place, and has had its annual meet-the-team pizza party. This is New Haven County’s game, and they want bragging rights over Fairfield County.

Heck, New Haven County already has the bragging rights this season, with the state’s number one and two teams in the polls (Fairfield County teams were third and fourth), but they want to mop the field up with Fairfield County sweat once again.

A few years ago, I think it was the summer of 2006, Fairfield County head coach Jim Santomassimo summed it up after a New Haven County win. To paraphrase: Fairfield County kids would rather go to Nantucket than play in an all-star football game.

Whether you want to believe that or not is up to you. There are a lot of commitments kids have to make, or that their families make for them. Vacations are a part of that equation. So are other sports (Chris Evans last season stuck with AAU hoops, and he earned a scholarship with Sacred Heart as a result), so is getting a head-start on college (I think Ludlowe’s best senior in 2007 went off to college the day after high school graduation).

And you’re not going to get Khairi Fortt or Silas Redd to play. They’re both enrolled at Penn State and will participate in spring drills soon.

Here’s how the process works for selecting a team, from what I understand: The coaches of each high school within the Fairfield County chapter of the National Football Foundation (your FCIAC and SWC schools) nominate their players. The coach and a committee then select a team based on those players, with an effort to include one player from every school. If a player is forced to drop out because of another commitment or an injury, the coach can call in players to fill the roster.

Bruno could probably use your help building the roster. So if you can think of some worthy seniors, go ahead and leave a comment below… within the guidelines of acceptable behavior, or course.

First let me apologize to Pat Pickens of the Fairfield Citizen. For 364 days, since he heard how exciting the 2008 Hall of Fame Classic was, Pickens was gearing up to cover the game himself instead of sending a freelancer. With my car in the shop, he even let me bum a ride to Sacred Heart off of him.

Needless to say, Pickens was disappointed with a 49-0 final. He’s in a spot though where he can write about both sides: Fairfield Prep is a part of the New Haven chapter.

Enough stalling, let’s get to some links from the dailies, the blogs, and the real-time media outlets:

• New Haven Register: Classic Rocked: New Haven thumps Fairfield
• New Haven Register: ‘Cochran Rule’ joke gets plenty of mileage at Classic
• The Road to Boyle: 50-Point Rule Almost Played Out in Hall of Fame Classic
• Valley Independent Sentinel: Ansonia’s Roberts Dominates Hall Of Fame Football Classic
• News-Times: Long night for area all-stars
• Waterbury Republican-American: Ragone leads New Haven County All-Stars in rout
• Connecticut Post: New Haven all-stars dominant Hall of Fame Classic
• The Hour: County grid stars routed
• Stamford Sports Scene: Mr. Dixon Meet Mr. Florian
• Warrior Nation: Wyde Out Wyman Doing His Thing
• WTNH: New Haven beats Fairfield in Classic

And for more, I’ll be on WNLK/WSTC’s Final Score with Matt Levine live today at 1:15 to talk a little more about the game.