ST. MARYS — Tony Defilippi is the source of both envy and pity as he heads into his 12th season as a varsity football coach in the Big 30.
With the prospect of being able to dress 58 players on Friday nights this fall, the 21 other coaches throughout the Big 30 region can merely dream of having such a luxury.
Fact is, St. Marys boasts one of the largest enrollment figures of any Big 30 football school with 252 male students in grades 10-12.
Conversely, Defilippi heads into this season with minimal starting experience.
With graduation claiming 19 seniors from last season’s 6-4 squad, the Flying Dutchmen have only four returning varsity players that started in 2016.
Only seniors Tim Beimel, Mario Chiappelli, Brendan Dornish and Nick Anders started.
Here’s a plus: Three of those four were two-way linemen — Chiappelli, Dornish and Anders.
“We had a really nice group of kids that worked hard a year ago,” Defilippi said. “We got dinged up with the injury bug early and got off to a 1-2 start. That made for some nail-biters in the early going.
“Then we rattled off some games and got into the playoffs.”
To be sure, three of their first five games last year were decided by one point — a 26-25 win over Moniteau in Game 1, 15-14 loss to Clarion-Limestone in Week 2 and 7-6 victory over Punxsutawney in Week 5.
But in a five-game win streak, the Flying Dutchmen outscored their opponents 152-54.
In the postseason, St. Marys hosted Perry Traditional (Pittsburgh) and dropped a 38-27 decision in the first round of the District 8-9 Class AAA regional tournament.
“It was a good game … an entertaining game,” Defilippi said of the playoff loss. “The kids went out and played hard that night.
“So if you look at it from one side, it was a pretty good year for football here. On the down side, we graduated 19 seniors.”
So where does that leave the Flying Dutch?
“We’re going to pull up our freshmen and dress 58 kids,” Defilippi said. “We do things a little different here than other schools.
“We’ve adopted this two-grade split concept where the seventh- and eighth-graders will make up our junior high team, the kids in grades nine and 10 will make up the JV squad and the juniors and seniors will play on the varsity.
“When we run our practices, I split my staff into a defensive and offensive staff so the nines and 10s are on offense and the 11- and 12-year kids are on defense, so it’s like running two different practices at the same time.
“Kids get better opportunities. We’re not going to have freshmen or sophomores standing around not getting reps. So everybody gets to do something in practice.
“It’s kind of hectic for the coaches,” he added, “but everybody gets acclimated to the system and picks up on what we expect on each side of the ball.
“By doing it this way, we hope to develop depth so if somebody gets injured, we have capable backups that we can rely on to get the job done.”
How will the Flying Dutch stack up against the other teams in the Keystone Shortway Athletic Conference this year?
“I think we’ll be comparable to the competition,” Defilippi said. “I don’t know that we will be overly big or fast.
“But I think we’ll be able to hold our own. We have a lot of young kids, of the 58 we want to dress, 33 are either freshmen or sophomores.”
Defilippi is confident that, despite the limited amount of starting experience returning, he’s got a handful of very capable leaders.
“I think Mario Chiappelli and Carter Julian have strong leadership skills,” he noted. “In fact, all of our seniors can be good leaders.
“There’s about a dozen and they’ve been involved with the program for three years now so they know what it’s about. Plus, we ran a mini-camp here at the school back in May. We saw a lot of enthusiasm, and some of that leadership started to emerge.”
Having lost 19 seniors, Defilippi knows exactly what one of the biggest keys for the coming season needs to be.
“The first thing I believe we need to address is meshing, coming together, developing a team unity,” he noted. “When you graduate that many seniors and know that most of them played.
“We need to see how quickly these kids can get acclimated to being in the lineup on Friday nights. We have a bunch of seniors (12) but very few of them with varsity experience.
“In our conference, I’d have to think Karns City and Clarion will be the two teams at the top of the pile heading into 2017. Karns City is always tough and Clarion, even though they are a Class AA team, returns a whole bunch of kids from last year.”
While this is Defilippi’s third straight year at the helm for the Dutch, it’s actually his eighth year at the school.
“I coached here for five years back from 1999 to 2003,” he said. “Then I ended up at Cameron County for a couple of years.
“I’ve learned a whole lot about myself and how to approach the job over time.
“I think, more than anything, coaching comes down to organization and it’s about looking at the long-term. It’s not about today, it has to be long-term. If you worry too much about today, you are very likely going to get bogged down in frustration. You are going to have good days and bad days. You want the good days to outnumber the bad days.”
Recently, that’s exactly how the seasons have panned out for Defilippi.
In his first stop at St. Marys, he posted a record of 12-38. In four years at Cameron County (2005-08), he led the Red Raiders to a mark of 32-14. And over the last two years at St. Marys, he is 13-8.
Hence, Defilippi heads into his 12th season as a Big 30 coach with an overall mark of 57-60.
Assistants for the Flying Dutch this year include Jim McGonnell (defensive coordinator, linebackers), Mike Kunes (defensive backs), Paul Bullers (defensive line), Ray Benjamin (quarterbacks), Jim Allegretto (receivers), Zach Hoy (running backs), and volunteers Jim Swanson and Shad Boschert.
THE RETURNING starters:
Tim Beimel, senior, 5-9, 170, running back/defensive back
Mario Chiappelli, senior, 5-10, 240, line both ways
Brendan Dornish, senior, 5-8, 260, lone both ways
Nick Anders, senior, 5-10, 260, line both ways
ALSO LETTERING were:
Alex Agosti, junior, 6-2, 215, line both ways
Dan Dumich, ,junior, 5-10, 195, tight end/linebacker
Matt Fleming, junior, 5-11, 250, line both ways
Austin Goodrow, senior, 5-8, 145, running back/defensive back
Morgan Holtzhauser, senior, 5-5, 150, kicker
Carter Julian, senior, 5-10, 160, running back/defensive back
Jackson McClain, junior, 5-10, 150, running back/linebacker
Devin McGrath, junior, 5-11, 220, running back/linebacker
Todd Taylor, junior, 5-11, 190, quarterback/linebacker
THE PLAYERS, by position:
Offense
Quarterbacks: Taylor, Roman Sura (jr., 5-6, 135), Brandon Weichman (so., 6-0, 185), James Davis (fr., 5-5, 125)
Running Backs: Beimel, Goodrow, Julian, McClain, McGrath, Matt Anderson (sr., 5-10, 175), Brad Nussbaum (jr., 5-11. 165), Austin Pritt (jr., 5-8, ,160), Robert Anderson (so., 5-7, 125). Forest Cressley (so., 5-7, 155), Connor Gausman (so., 5-2, 130), Cain Pfoutz (so., 5-9. 150), Parker Watson (so., 5-8, 130), Nicholas DeMonte (fr., 5-7, 130), Jacob Kline (fr., 5-6, 135), Josh Robinson (fr., 5-9, 145), Connor Bressler (fr., 5-10, 140), Bryce Walker (fr., 5-9, 140)
Ends: Dumich, Shane Price (jr., 5-11, 200), Tim Wehler (sr., 5-10, 155), Blake Greishaw (jr., 5-9, 160), Cody Ritter (jr., 6-1, 175), Alex DeMonte (so., 5-7, 130), Scott Potter (so., 6-2, 160), Gage Burford (so., 5-7, 125), Michael Fitzgerald (so., 5-5, 110), MItchell Reiter (so., 5-11. 140), Shane Burke (so., 5-9, 125)
Linemen: Anders, Chiappelli, Dornish, Agosti, Fleming, Sam Nicklas (sr., 5-11, 200), NIck Goodwill (jr., 5-5, 165), Caden Burke (so., 5-11, 250), Sam Dush (so., 6-1, 250), Daniel McFall (so., 5-7, 215), Alex Newara (so., 5-11, 225), Jake Walter (so., 5-10, 250), Simon Sheeley (fr., 5-10, 185), Erik Rakieski (fr., 5-6. 160), Bryce Schatz (fr., 5-7, 180), Garrett Bauer (fr., 5-10, 220), Logan Bauer (fr., 5-5, 145), Kirt Taylor (fr., 5-8, 200), Charlie Vennard (fr. 5-6, 155)
Center: K. Taylor
Defense
Down linemen: Anders, Chiappelli, Dornish, Nicklas, Agosti, Fleming, Goodwill, Burke, Dush, McFall, Walter, Newara, Rakeiski, Schatz, G. Bauer, K. Taylor, Vennard
Linebackers: M. Anderson, McClain, McGrath, Nussbaum, Price, Pritt, T. Taylor, R. Anderson, Cressley, Pfoutz, L. Bauer, Robinson, Bressler, Walker, Sheeley, Kaleb Pesce (fr., 5-10, 155)
Defensive Backs: Beimel, Goodrow, Julian, Wehler, Grieshaw, Ritter, Jackson Lindemuth (sr., 5-8, 155)., Burford, A, DeMonte, Gausman, Hailey Penfield (so., 5-10, 155), Potter, Surra, Watson, Fitzgerald, Reiter, Burke, N. DeMonte, Kline, Davis
Kickers/Punters: Holtzhauser, Zachery Hart (so., 6-3, 185)
THE SCHEDULE:
September
1 – Moniteau, 7 p.m.
8 – at Clarion-Limestone, 7 p.m.
15 – Karns City, 7 p.m.
22 – at Union/A-C Valley, 7 p.m.
29 – Punxsutawney, 7 p.m.
October
6 – Keystone, 7 p.m.
13 – at Redbank Valley, 7 p.m.
20 – at Brookville, 7 p.m.
27 – Clarion, 7 p.m.
