Leading off today: Churchville-Chili running back Averin Collier will accept a football scholarship to Syracuse University and enroll there in January, the
Democrat and Chronicle reported today.
The 5-foot-11, 200-pound senior picked the Orange over Pittsburgh, where his older brother, Kevin, is a redshirt sophomore running back. He will be eligible to take part in SU offseason workouts once he arrives on campus.
Collier ran for 1,170 yards and scored 15 touchdowns in eight games as a senior.
Syracuse CBA receiver Marcus Sales also announced today that he will sign with the Orange, giving Greg Robinson a rare recruiting victory.
Section 6 musings: Buffalo News reporter Keith McShea is stirring things up again, God bless him.
McShea, who annually pleads with coaches and ADs to schedule private-vs.-public football games like Orchard Park vs. St. Francis, has taken it a step further now by giving Gene Tundo a platform for an intriguing idea.
Tundo, the Orchard Park coach who said he wants no part of a game with St. Francis, asked McShea if Western New York could do what Long Island does: hold its own championship.
for champions of Section 6, the Monsignor Martin Association and the Harvard Cup.
The positive, obviously, is that it would settle arguments about who has the best team. The negative, even more obviously, is that Section 6 would have to exit from the NYSPHSAA tournament.
The cynic might ask, "Haven't they already withdrawn from the tournament? We never see them in the semifinals." That's a cruel exaggeration, based on Section 5's record of 20-5 vs. Western New York in quarterfinals the last five seasons.
Even McShea admits that the idea of breaking away isn't the way to go.
The current format works," he concludes. "All we’re asking for is for Orchard Park to play a Catholic school in one nonleague game which would be a whole lot of fun for Western New York high school sports. It shouldn’t be the most difficult thing in the world, but somehow it is, and it’s too bad."
Surely, you jest: Marcellus beat Westhill, we believe, by what may have been a final score of 56-53 in what I think was possibly a boys basketball game that may or may not have been played last night.
I'm sorry that I couldn't be more definitive on that, but sixth-year Westhill (5-2) coach Kevin King refused to provide certain details of the contest to The Post-Standard.
"We decided during the past week not to release individual scoring totals for our players because scoring is an overrated statistic," King told the newspaper. "Our goal is to emphasize team play rather than to publicize individual scoring performances. I was, however, pleased with the way my kids played tonight. It was probably our best overall game so far this year."
The sentiment may be somewhat noble, but it's completely misguided. The scoring data is material information that's essential for an accurate reporting of the game. The newspaper is not your adversary, coach, it's the
