By James Olivola
Final scoreboards were truly irrelevant this past weekend.
For the first time since the awful acts of terrorism on September 11, 2001, when the lives of 2,977 victims were tragically claimed 25 years ago, Bridgewater-Raritan High School served as host to a Friday football game at John Basilone Memorial Field on that dark day’s anniversary.
Starting with the opening coin toss at midfield and ending with the game’s final horn, numerous playmakers’ names were called by longtime Bridgewater-Raritan P.A. announcer Jim Gano. Specifically, these were players from both the hometown Panthers and the visitors from Hillsborough High School in both teams’ Big Central Conference American Football Silver Division opener.
The following six names Gano read prior to kickoff, however, were paramount: Evan Jay Baron, Noel J. Foster, Thomas H. Polhemus, Ronald G. Tartaro, Lance R. Tumulty, and Alison M. Wildman.
They were the six victims of the September 11, 2001, attacks who resided in Bridgewater and were just 38, 40, 39, 39, 32, and 30 years old, respectively, and were also amongst the 39 victims from Somerset County, New Jersey. Their names as written above are engraved on a memorial that stands on the lawn of the Bridgewater Municipal Building, which is across the street from John Basilone Memorial Field on Commons Way.
On that aforementioned lawn, which is the area of grass directly adjacent to Garretson Road, the football game’s eventual spectators who walked around that area towards the Panthers’ home venue immediately noticed six large flags: one for each of these six victims from Bridgewater, and a wreath standing directly in front of the referenced memorial bearing their names.
That was not all.
Along that stretch of grass directly adjacent to the sidewalk, those same spectators passed by numerous more small American flags on their path to and from the Panthers’ longtime football venue, as they were planted during a Bridgewater Township ceremony just before Friday’s 4 p.m. kickoff.
2,977 American flags, to be exact: one for each victim lost on September 11, 2001.
“When you hear the names, it just really puts things into perspective,” explained Bridgewater-Raritan head coach DJ Catalano, who is in his fourth year as the Panthers’ skipper and is coming off guiding the Panthers to their first-ever NJSIAA North New Jersey, Section 2, Group 5 playoff championship last season. “How lucky are we to be playing a game right now, and how lucky am I that I get to do the job that I love and come to work every day because there are people who are protecting us? Those people on 9/11 were doing the same thing and going to work, but then the terror attack happened.”
“I’ll never forget where I was on that day.”
While no current student at Bridgewater-Raritan High School was alive on one of the darkest days in our nation’s history, Catalano and his staff’s personal experiences have continued to be shared in order to ensure that the present and future generations never forget the tragic events of 9/11.
On the afternoon of Bridgewater-Raritan’s home football opener, which started with a powerful tribute to their community’s six residents who perished on September 11, 2001, it ended with the Panthers finally reclaiming their throne over the Raiders.
Six touchdowns were produced by Bridgewater-Raritan (2-1, 1-0), including three scores in as many drives to begin the game to open up a 20-point lead on Hillsborough (1-2, 0-1) on the first play of the second quarter. That drive was extended when a pass by sophomore quarterback J.B. Baxter (165 pass yards, one touchdown) intended for senior Evan Woodring (three carries, 30 yards, one touchdown & two receptions, 58 yards, one touchdown) was bobbled upwards by Woodring and directly into the arms of senior DJ Krizan for a 33-yard catch deep in the Raiders’ territory.
While the Raiders got to within two possessions just before halftime, Baxter immediately responded by hurling a 31-yard touchdown pass to Woodring to preserve the Panthers’ 20-point lead at the break. Another touchdown run by Bridgewater-Raritan senior running back Jonathan Okolo (21 carries, 87 yards, one touchdown) run just over halfway into the third quarter put the game far out of reach.
That did not stop the Panthers from taking their feet off of the gas pedal at any point during their emotional game, which also had an earlier-than-usual kickoff that occurred just under an hour after the campus’ final dismissal bell on Friday due to Rosh Hashanah beginning at sundown.
“It gave us a sense of humility and told us that life can change in an instant,” said of hearing the names of Bridgewater’s six victims prior to kickoff by Bridgewater-Raritan senior Anthony Lorino (three receptions, 53 yards & 3.5 total tackles), who led the Panthers’ offense in receptions and defense in total tackles on Friday evening and also caught a similarly incredible bobbled pass for 29 yards that kept Bridgewater-Raritan’s early momentum intact in the second quarter. “It told us to stay where your feet are and to live in the moment.”
“We were excited to play Hillsborough.”
Clearly, he and his teammates were fired up from start to finish on Friday evening, especially given the critical opportunity they had on the table against a Hillsborough team that defeated Bridgewater-Raritan in eight straight regular season meetings.
One play after a massive tackle early in the fourth quarter by Lorino, who let out a huge scream of triumph even despite the Panthers’ big 26-point lead at that moment and the game’s outcome hardly in doubt, he along with his fellow defenders put an exclamation point on Bridgewater-Raritan’s massive performance. Thanks to heavy pressure applied by the Panthers’ defense on a pass that was heavily obstructed, Lorino’s classmate in Jasper Schwamberger intercepted the ensuing pass and returned it 40 yards the other way for a touchdown with 9:14 remaining.
This punctuated a statement 40-14 victory for Bridgewater-Raritan in its home opener against Hillsborough Friday, September 11, at John Basilone Memorial Field in Bridgewater.
“When you think about 9/11, it’s so sad what happened, and it brings you back to the fact that anything can happen at any time,” said afterwards by Bridgewater-Raritan senior running back Jahmier Black (21 carries, 146 yards, two touchdowns & one reception, 19 yards), whose team’s longtime home football venue famously bears the name of Raritan’s own John Basilone (1916-45): the only enlisted U.S. Marine during World War II to earn both the Navy Cross and Congressional Medal of Honor.
“You just have to be thankful for everything you have and the way you are, because life can be taken away from you at any second.”
After defeating the Raiders for the first time since 2017, Bridgewater-Raritan (2-1, 1-0) will now try to squash a similar eight-game losing streak against Ridge High School (2-0, 0-0), which the Panthers will try to defeat for the first time since winning twice against the Red Devils in 2015.
“What we love to say is that we’re happy but not satisfied,” Lorino went on to say of the victory. “Our conditioning is going to be our biggest advantage over our opponents. [Coach Catalano] said that we can have a bad practice, but at the end of the day, we’re going to get better because we’re going to be more conditioned.”
“We know we’re good, but we’re trying to be great.”
The opening kickoff for Bridgewater-Raritan against Ridge will be at 6 p.m. Friday, September 18, in Bridgewater.
“The job isn’t finished,” Black went on to say about what lies ahead on Bridgewater-Raritan’s football schedule. “Last year was last year, but this is a whole new year and a whole new squad. Our seniors from last year are gone now, so the juniors had to step up.”
“That’s what we’ve done.”
Even the Panthers’ big game result against Hillsborough, however, was not on the forefront on an evening that began with a tribute to Bridgewater’s six victims who were lost, a flyover from a New Jersey State Police helicopter, the National Anthem, and four key words on everyone’s minds on the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
“Every year for 9/11 since I’ve been head coach, we talk about it after practice, so we talked about it [after practice on Thursday],” continued Catalano, whose team had only played two prior Friday games on an anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks: both of them occurring on the road in Bridgewater-Raritan’s 2009 and 2015 season openers at Union High School and Hunterdon Central Regional High School, respectively. “Coach Fromberg, who was working in New York City at the time, always has a different story. Last year, it was about his experience when he was there. [On Thursday], he was really talking about how everyone came together afterward, and that’s how we want to be as a team.”