From the 1967 EBHS Yearbook
November 19, 1966: East Brunswick High School, in Middlesex County, New Jersey, which would one day be my Alma Mater, beats Sayreville War Memorial High School at home, 33-0. This clinches the school's 1st State Championship in football, in only its 6th season.
EBHS had opened in 1958, due to the growth that the Township of East Brunswick had already had, and was forecast to have in the 1960s, thus taking its students out of next-door South River High School, which was, and has frequently been since, a football powerhouse.
EB's 1st varsity season was 1961, under head coach Jay Doyle. They went 4-4. They went 2-7 in 1962, and Doyle, also the school's 1st athletic director and its 1st head coach in wrestling, handed the head football coaching job over to his assistant, Ron Gonier. "Rock" led the Bears to records of 5-2-2 in 1963, and 6-3 in 1964 and 1965.
EB opened the 1966 season on September 24, home to Madison, a next-door neighbor, and won, 35-6. In 1975, to avoid confusion with Madison Borough in Morris County, Madison Township changed its name to the Township of Old Bridge. But the name of the school was changed from Madison Township to Madison Central. The town had opened a 2nd high school, Cedar Ridge, in 1969. In 1994, the 2 schools were reconsolidated due to declining enrollment, and have been Old Bridge High School ever since.
The next game was away to Woodbridge. I talked to Wayne Beck Jr., an EBHS baseball player in the late 1980s, whose father Wayne Beck Sr. played in the 1966 season. Wayne Jr. said his father told him that it poured that day, and that Woodbridge Stadium (now Nicholas A. Priscoe Stadium) was practically a field of soup. Not surprisingly, the game ended in a 0-0 tie.
The next game, at home on October 8, was against South River, who, naturally, became our 1st arch-rival. EB had Dave Wohl at quarterback, and he would go on to become the first (and still only) EBHS graduate to play in the NBA. South River's quarterback was senior Joe Theismann (then pronounced "THEEZE-man," it was at Notre Dame where it was changed to "THIGHS-man" to rhyme with the Heisman Trophy he ended up not winning), and his top receiver was sophomore Drew Pearson, who succeeded him as SRHS quarterback, and then opposed Theismann in some classic Washington Redskins vs. Dallas Cowboys games. The Rams beat us, 27-0. EB were now 1-1-1, and there was no indication that this would be a special season.
In spite of this rough start, EB won the rest of their games. They went to Edison, and won, 34-12. They went to Perth Amboy, who had beaten them the last 2 years, and won, 13-6. They came home to face Essex Catholic, and won, 32-14. This was the 1st time EB had ever played a religion-affiliated school. Essex Catholic was established in Newark in 1957, moved to East Orange in 1980, and was closed due to declining enrollment in 2003.
On November 5, EB hosted John F. Kennedy Memorial High School of Woodbridge, so named because JFK was assassinated while it was under construction, and won, 26-0. On November 12, they beat New Brunswick at their Memorial Stadium, 31-21.
They closed on November 19, at home, beating Sayreville, 33-0. This gave us the Championship of the Greater Jersey Group IV Conference, Central Division II, our 1st league title. And, due to our 7-1-1 record, it also gave us a share of their 1st Central Jersey Group IV Championship. Our first "State Championship."
That November 19 clincher against Sayreville was played the same day as the Michigan State-Notre Dame Number 1 vs. Number 2 tie game that was labeled "The Game of the Century." I have a separate entry for that event.
EB would repeat the story in 1972: We went 7-1-1, with our only loss being to South River, but won the Championship of the Middlesex County Athletic Conference, and a Co-Championship in Central Jersey Group IV. At the end of the year, Jay Doyle died of a heart attack, only 41 years old. The EBHS stadium, not yet named, was named Jay Doyle Field in his memory.
In 1974, the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) dropped the best-record method, and came up with a "power points" system based on record and strength of schedule (in other words, the records of the teams that a team beat) to assign Playoff seedings.
East Brunswick would just miss the Central Jersey Group IV Playoffs under the 4-teams-per-section-and-group format in 1977, '78, '81, '86, '92 and '95; reach the Quarterfinals in 1998 after the expansion to 8-teams-per-section-and-group; reach the Semifinals in 1980, '87, '88, '90 and '94; and the Finals in 1984 and '85.
A series of shocking moments, reminiscent of the Boston Red Sox, the Chicago Cubs, the Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Rangers before those teams finally ended their World Championship droughts, and the Buffalo Bills and Minnesota Vikings who still have them as of 2022, prevented EB from winning another State Championship. Finally, in 2004, everything fell into place, and we won another, ending a 32-year drought. We won another in 2009, and have made the Playoffs again in 2010, '14 and '21.
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November 19, 1966 was, of course a Saturday. Other notable college football games played that day, aside from the nationally-televised Michigan-State Notre Dame game:
* In the 2nd half of ABC's nationally-telecast doubleheader, Number 8 UCLA beat Number 7 USC, 14-7 at the Los Angeles Coliseum. This game forced a tie for the Championship in the Athletic Association of Western Universities (AAWU), and, head-to-head, UCLA should have had the tiebreaker. The next week, Notre Dame went into the Coliseum, and walloped USC, 51-0.
But USC still got the Rose Bowl bid, and lost to Purdue. UCLA, hampered by a rule in the league now known as the Pac-12 similar to the Big Ten's, couldn't go to a bowl, despite finishing the regular season 9-1. Wow, if ever a 20th Century college football season needed a playoff, this was it. The next season, USC and UCLA would play a "Game of the Century."
* Number 3 Alabama and Number 4 Nebraska both had the week off. The following week, Nebraska lost to arch-rival Oklahoma. But they still won the Big Eight Conference title. Alabama beat Southern Mississippi and then arch-rival Auburn, and beat Nebraska in the Sugar Bowl.
* Number 10 Purdue crushed arch-rival Indiana, 51-0 at Ross-Ade Stadium in West Lafayette, Indiana.
* Michigan beat Ohio State, 17-3 at Ohio Stadium in Columbus.
* Wisconsin beat Minnesota, 7-6 at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin.
* Southern Methodist beat Baylor, 24-22 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, clinching the Southwest Conference title. But they lost the Cotton Bowl to Georgia, who were off this week, and ranked Number 7.
* Harvard beat Yale, 17-0 at Harvard Stadium in Boston.
* Penn State beat Pittsburgh, 48-24 at Pitt Stadium.
* Army and Navy both had the week off. The following week, Army beat Navy, 20-7 at John F. Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia.
* In New York City, Columbia beat Brown, 40-38 at Baker Field.
* In New Jersey, Princeton beat Cornell, 7-0 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton.
* And Rutgers lost to Colgate, 26-7 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway.
One more football score I want to mention, but not in college, nor in the pros. The school that would one day become my high school, East Brunswick in Middlesex County, New Jersey, beat Sayreville 33-0. This enabled them to win both the Greater Jersey Group IV Conference, Central Division II Championship, and, due to their record, winning a share of their 1st Central Jersey Group IV Championship. Our first "State Championship."
There were 5 games played in the NBA that day:
* The New York Knicks beat the expansion Chicago Bulls, 116-104 at the old Madison Square Garden.
* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Cincinnati Royals, 134-110 at the Philadelphia Civic Center.
* The Boston Celtics beat the Baltimore Bullets, 147-125 at the Baltimore Civic Center. (The building still stands, under the name of the CFG Bank Arena.)
* The St. Louis Hawks beat the Detroit Pistons, 105-87 at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis.
* And the San Francisco Warriors beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 144-109 at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena. For the Warriors, Rick Barry scored 45, and Nate Thurmond had 24 points and 27 rebounds.
And the entire NHL -- all of the "Original Six" teams -- were in action:
* The New York Rangers played the Boston Bruins to a tie, 3-3 at the Boston Garden.
* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Montreal Canadiens, 5-1 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.
* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Detroit Pistons, 7-2 at the Chicago Stadium.
Also on this day, Gail Devers, an American sprinter who won Olympic Gold Medals, was born. So was celebrity chef Rocco DiSpirito. So was actor and martial artist Jason Scott Lee. Although not related to Bruce Lee, he played Bruce in a film biography.
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