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Penn-Ohio set for Heacock Stadium
By John bassetti
BELOIT
A few years back, Larry Taddeo was an assistant coach for the Pennsylvania-Ohio Stateline All-Star Football Classic.
On Friday, Taddeo will be a first-time head coach for the 31st annual event.
“It’s an honor to be around so many athletes and I’m sure Ohio is the same way,” Taddeo said last week when the two squads gathered at East Palestine’s stadium for media day.
This year’s game will be in Ohio, at West Branch’s Clinton Heacock Stadium. The Keystone State leads the series, 21-9.
Taddeo is familiar with his western Pennsylvania talent, but he’s closest with three of his own Center High players: kicker Luca Campos, quarterback Preston Dawson and his son, Tory.
“This will be the last time I get to coach my kid,” Larry Taddeo said of Tori, who was the football team’s center at Center.
Tori Taddeo is bound for Geneva College.
Taddeo noted the maturity and development of players since their senior seasons began.
“It’s not even a year, but you could tell the difference in some of these kids who are getting ready for the next level,” he said. “They’re adjusting to what’s ahead.”
While this is Taddeo’s last chance to coach his son, Center’s final game in the fall of 2009 was his last as the school’s head coach because of a merger with Monaca.
The merger ended his eight-year stint as Center’s head coach and a 27-year period at the school.
He’s now slated to be an assistant at Aliquippa High.
“Since the merge happened and things didn’t work out for me to get the head position, Aliquippa coach Mike Zmijanac asked me to join him.”
The name of the newly merged school with a new head football coach is Central Valley.
“It [Center] was the first district to volunteer for a merger,” Taddeo said. “Monaca was older than Center, but it was a good fit academically and economically.”
One of Pennsylvania’s quarterbacks will be Ambridge’s Zach Nichi, who comes into the game following a 3-6 record his senior year.
“It was a disappointing year, but the past two years haven’t been that successful, either, so it was definitely something to build on,” said the 6-2, 190 Nichi. “It was progressive.”
If there was a senior-season highlight, it was against Franklin Regional.
“That was a big win for us,” Nichi said of Franklin, which was ranked fifth at the time in the WPIAL. “That helped us out a lot and lifted our spirits. Even though we didn’t have that great of a record, we never quit in any of the games.”
Nichi was also chosen for the WPIAL Class AAA All-Star baseball game, which was played recently. “That was a great time and I’m sure this [Stateline football] will be a great time, also.”
Besides Nichi, another Duquesne-bound football player on the Pennsylvania all-star squad is Hopewell’s Toby Thuer.
Duquesne’s camp begins Aug. 8.
The only other Ambridge player in the Stateline game is lineman Sean Kincaid.
“We car-pool to practices,” Nichi said of sessions at Blackhawk High in Darlington.
Nichi was considering baseball in college, but earlier this year he received word from the Duquesne baseball coach who apologized because the Dukes dropped their baseball program.
Nichi hopes to become an optometrist.
While the Ohio all-star team’s uniforms displayed Ohio State Buckeyes colors scarlet and gray, the Pennsylvania team wore blue and gold colors similar to the Pitt Panthers, but it was clarified that the uniforms don’t reflect any one school.
“They represent the Keystone State in general,” said Tom Marsilio, Pennsylvania’s game coordinator. “Think of our colors as those on the turnpike sign.”
Full speed ahead.