4 FCIAC teams play in state football finals, three bring home trophies

New Canaan High School, Greenwich High School, and St. Joseph High School. Three high schools which have had very strong football programs for a long time and have so often had an excellent season which ended with each of them riding home with a state championship plaque on their team bus.

Sure enough, each one of those three perennial FCIAC powers brought home yet another state championship plaque this year.

New Canaan won its third consecutive Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference Class L Football Playoffs championship with a 35-21 victory over Darien. Greenwich shut out West Haven, 14-0, to win the CIAC Class LL state title, and St. Joseph copped the CIAC Class M crown with a thrilling 21-20 victory over Brookfield.

New Canaan now has 15 state championships, all of them under coach Lou Marinelli since he guided the Rams to their first one 42 years ago with a 20-12 victory over Naugatuck in the fall of 1982. Greenwich won its 10th state title and St. Joseph won its 16th state championship.

New Canaan and Greenwich were ranked No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, and St. Joseph was No. 5 in both final state polls. The FCIAC had four teams ranked among the top eight in both polls. Darien was ranked No. 7 in the Final 2024 GametimeCT Top 10 Football Poll and No. 8 in the Hartford Courant Top 10 State High School Football Coaches’ Poll. Last year, Class LL state champion and FCIAC member Staples was ranked No. 1 and New Canaan was No. 2 in both polls.

New Canaan defeated Darien for the second year in a row in this year’s Class L final. The Rams now have 6-3 record against their bordering town rival Darien Blue Wave in state championship showdowns. New Canaan has won 13 of its 15 state championships since 2001.

New Canaan quarterback Luke Robinson threw three touchdown passes and Andrew Esposito scored two touchdowns to lead the Rams to that 35-21 victory over Darien in the Class L state championship game on Dec. 14 at Central Connecticut State University’s Arute Field.

Esposito scored on a 55-yard TD run and caught a 69-yard touchdown pass from Robinson, who also fired TD passes of 36 yards to Chris Cuesta and 11 yards to Jake Valente. James McInerney had a 35-yard touchdown run for New Canaan, which finished the season with a 12-1 record.

Ben Rolapp threw two TD passes while completing 20 of 28 passes for 288 yards and he had a 4-yard touchdown run to lead coach Andy Grant’s Darien Blue Wave, which finished 10-3. Thomas Herget caught seven passes for 139 yards, including a 65-yard touchdown reception. Charlie Thom caught a 6-yard TD pass. Darien advanced to the Class L final with a 35-21 victory over Notre Dame-West Haven and New Canaan had a 35-20 semifinal victory over Newtown. In the first round: Darien defeated Fairfield Ludlowe, 55-13, and New Canaan advanced with a 41-7 victory over Maloney.

Greenwich outscored its three opponents 55-6, including shutout victories by the identical score of 14-0 in the semifinals and final, to win its second state Class LL championship in the last three years. Coach Anthony Morello’s Greenwich Cardinals opened with 27-6 victory over New Britain and blanked defending champion Staples, 14-0, before their 14-0 victory over West Haven in the championship game on Dec. 14 at CCSU’s Arute Field.

Greenwich’s elusive senior quarterback, MJ D’Angelo, scored both touchdowns on runs of 58 yards and 2 yards and he rushed for 202 yards on 18 carries. Jack Kelly contributed 68 yards on 19 carries to Greenwich’s 299-yard rushing attack and Noah Steele was among several Greenwich stars on defense with an interception and a pass breakup in the end zone. The Cardinals finished with an 11-2 record. West Haven finished 10-3.

Some very strong defensive play enabled St. Joseph to end its season with a 10-3 record after its semifinal and final victories over two previously unbeaten teams. Jake Rios opened the scoring for St. Joseph when he returned a fumble 42 yards for a touchdown, and sophomore quarterback H.T. Jones threw a two TD passes and completed 10 of 18 passes for 195 yards to lead the Cadets to their 21-20 victory over Brookfield in the championship game of the CIAC Class M Football Playoffs at Pratt and Whitney Stadium on Dec. 14.

Lameik Black caught Jones’ first touchdown pass from 29 yards out in the second quarter. Jones fired a 19-yard TD pass to T.J. Wright and Rios added his third point-after-touchdown kick to stake the Cadets to a 21-0 lead in the third quarter. Brookfield’s Bobcats rallied back with 20 unanswered points and opted to go for a two-point conversion for the potential game-winning points. But it was a strong defensive stand that gave the Cadets a 16-3 record in 19 state finals appearances as they stopped Michael Walters 1 yard short of the goal line on the two-point conversion attempt. Walters had just cut Brookfield’s deficit to 21-20 with a 4-yard touchdown run with 1:02 left in the fourth quarter. Brookfield finished 12-1.

Coach Joe DellaVecchia’s fourth-seeded Cadets came up huge on defense with four interceptions in their 17-10 semifinal victory over No. 1 seed Daniel Hand. Jermaine Hackett had the most important interception as he returned it 70 yards for a touchdown. St. Joseph opened the Class M playoffs by rolling to a 42-7 victory over fifth-seeded Watertown.

The GameTimeCT final state poll voted on by the media and the final Hartford Courant coaches’ poll were identical with the same top six teams in the same order. Top-ranked New Canaan (12-1) and No. 2 Greenwich (11-2) were followed by Class MM champion Masuk (10-3), Class SS state champion Killingly (13-0), No. 5 St. Joseph (10-3) and Class MM runner-up Windsor (12-1).

Darien (10-3) was ranked No. 7 and Brookfield (12-1), Newtown (11-1), and Class LL runner-up West Haven (10-3) completed the Top 10 in the media poll; while the last four teams in the coaches’ poll Top 10 were Class S state champion Ansonia (12-1), No. 8 Darien, West Haven, and Brookfield.

Ansonia received the 11th most polling points in the media poll. Staples (10-2) got the 12thmost points in both polls and fellow FCIAC member Fairfield Ludlowe (8-3) finished in a four-way tie with the 20th most points in the coaches’ poll.

There were four FCIAC players who received the highest accolades possible from four separate all-conference or all-state teams by being selected to the 2024 All-FCIAC Football First Team, the 92nd Annual New Haven Register/GameTimeCT All State Connecticut High School Football First Team, the Walter Camp All-Connecticut First Team, and the Connecticut High School Coaches Association All-State Football Top 27 Team.

Those four players were Michael Smith and Andrew Esposito of New Canaan, St. Joseph’s T.J. Wright, and Greenwich’s Pete Vomvolakis. Smith was a 6-foot-1, 178-pound senior defensive back who had nine interceptions, one of which he returned for a touchdown, and four fumble recoveries. Smith’s junior teammate, Esposito, was a 6-foot-2, 180-pound wide receiver who caught 15 touchdown passes among his 57 pass receptions for 1,014 yards, and he added six TD runs and 203 rushing yards on 18 carries in 11 games. Wright, a 5-foot-8, 165-pound senior, excelled so much on offense, defense, and special teams that he was selected as a wide receiver on the CHSCA Top 27 and as a defensive back on the other top all-state teams. Wright scored 13 touchdowns, including a kickoff return TD, and had three interceptions on defense.

Vomvolakis, Greenwich’s 6-foot-2, 290-pound senior offensive lineman who will play for Navy, is now in elite company by being a former FCIAC player selected to the highest level of the New Haven Register all-state teams three times. Bobby Valentine, the fantastic running back for Rippowam High School in Stamford from 1965-67, was selected to what was then called the Class A All-State Team after his sophomore, junior and senior seasons. Former Darien star defensive end Mark Evanchick matched that feat after the 2015 season when he had 20.5 sacks and was selected the GameTimeCT Player of the Year.

When Evanchick made his second all-state team on defense following the 2014 season, the Player of the Year was New Canaan’s Zach Allen, who 10 years later had his best NFL season ever as a Denver Broncos defensive lineman who was selected to the Associated Press’ 2024 NFL All-Pro Second Team. The AP’s NFL all-pro teams are generally considered the most consequential all-pro teams, so Allen was basically recognized as one of the four best interior defensive linemen in the NFL this season.

DellaVecchia, a former valuable St. Joseph player who helped the Cadets win their first state championship in 1980, was selected Coach of the Year in the state by GameTimeCT .

New Canaan, Greenwich, Darien, and Staples each had four players chosen to the 2024 All-FCIAC Football First Team which consisted of 42 players. Smith and Esposito were joined on it by New Canaan teammates Connor Mazza and Simon Tchakarov. The Greenwich quartet was Vomvolakis, Jack Carroll, Hector Lopez and Richie McMurray. Darien’s four all-conference first-teamers were Herget, Rolapp, Dylan Geddes and Kevin Roche. The four Staples selections were Davis Crandall, Charley Leahy, Shane Sandrew, and Eddie van der Merwe.

St. Joseph, Trumbull, Norwalk, Fairfield Ludlowe, Wilton and Danbury each had three players on the All-FCIAC First Team. Those 18 players were Wright, Rios and Jason Pagano of St. Joseph; Will Carley, Wes Dayton and Lorenzo Sevilla of Trumbull; Kevin Gordon, Ethan Hudson and Edgardo Torres of Norwalk; Ryan Menozzi, Cooper Seek, and Grant Stupak of Fairfield Ludlowe; Cael Dexter, Joey Hagerty and Jack Schwartz of Wilton; and Danbury’s Asher Jones, Bear Schoenberg, and Steven Langley.

The other eight players on the All-FCIAC First Team were Jermel Bynum and Lorenzo Laracca of Brien McMahon, Trevor Chojnacki and Matt Tash of Ridgefield, Stamford’s Ralph Boynton, Westhill’s Adriel Lemus, Bridgeport Central’s Trey Walker, and Fairfield Warde’s Colin Walker.

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