Honoring The Best

Most people know the story of Brian Piccolo from the 1971 ABC TV movie “Brian’s Song”, one of the great tear-jerkers of all time. Piccolo was a pro football player for the Chicago Bears, who died of cancer at the age of 26.
He is best known for his friendship with teammate and Hall of Famer Gale Sayers and the courage he displayed through his illness which was portrayed in the movie. Piccolo’s memory is honored each year by UNICO, which gives out awards to courageous and outstanding athletes of Italian-American heritage. I mention all of this because last night I was the guest speaker at the Brick chapter of UNICO’S Scholarship Dinner at Woodlake Country Club. The organization honored five high schools seniors with the Brian Piccolo Memorial Scholarship Award which came with a $1000 towards their college expenses.

Those saluted for best-displaying the attributes of Piccolo were Nicole Binetti and Lexus Guarino of Brick Township High School…Phil Segonia and Jake Vescovi of Brick Memorial and Monsignor Donovan’s Alex Pangaro, a Brick resident. All five of them had to overcome obstacles during their high school careers from injuries to academic challenges. In addition to those awards the club honored Brick High School’s Gianna Pizzella with their second annual Vincent DiLeo Scholarship. Congratulations to all of them and to Anthony Argondizza, who headed up the scholarship committee for UNICO and is a longtime assistant football coach at Brick Memorial. I also want to thank them for accepting me…only after I disclosed I was married to an Italian.

So Toms River South and Jackson Memorial will play for a fourth time this baseball season when they meet in the finals of the Shore Conference Tournament next Wednesday at FirstEnergy Park. Both won their semifinal games Wednesday….the Indians beating Manalapan as pitcher Andrew McGee improved to 11-0 and the Jaguars topping Jackson Liberty on Matt Meleo’s game-winning, three-run homer in the bottom of the 7th. South has won two of the first three meetings, including the Ocean County Tournament Championship game. Jackson will first host Manalapan tomorrow afternoon for the Central Jersey Group 4 title.