Here and there

In mid-August, Xavier held its awards night for its state championship golf team ... the award winners were: Most Improved, Jonathan Colavito, Senior Award for Leadership, Mitch Nappi and MVP, Chris Fosdick.

Former Middletown High lineman Jeff Woodcock is a member of the UConn football team ... he made the squad as a walkon, reported MHS coach Sal Morello.

Matt Conyers, the crackerjack sports reporter for The Hartford Courant who covered high school soccer, hockey, indoor and outdoor track, Legion baseball and just got the football beat, will resign from The Courant and become Public Relations Director at Xavier High School effective Oct. 5 ... Conyers was also President of the Connecticut Sports Writers’ Alliance.

Alex “Sandy” Tucci, retired England teacher and assistant football coach at Middletown High — he still coaches the MHS sprinters on the track team — is coaching wide receivers and defensive backs at ChoateRosemary Hall in Wallingford.

Interesting note ... Xavier scrimmaged three Central Connecticut Conference teams — East Hartford, South Windsor and Southington — while Middletown scrimmaged three Southern Connecticut Conference teams — West Haven, Wilbur Cross and Hand of Madison.

WCNXRadio.com will carry two games this weekend ... it will broadcast the Bristol Eastern at Middletown game Friday at 7 and will carry the Glastonbury at South Windsor game Saturday at 11 a.m . ... preliminary data shows that 1,149 devices were logged on to the Xavier vs. NFA game Friday ... co-owner John Clark pronounced himself “very happy” with the results ... one device that logged onto the game was in India.

It now looks like the Red Sox will win the AL East ... my guess is the season turned for both the Sox and Yankees last Tuesday ... the Yanks were leading the Orioles 6-1 and the Sawks were down 2-0 to Toronto in the ninth ... if those scores held, the lead would have been down to one game ... but the Yankees blew the game, losing 7-6 when Dellin Betances — who would never, ever be my closer — gave up a two-out, two-run home run to Manny Machado in the ninth and the Sox tied the game in the ninth and won it in the 17th.

What looked like a onegame lead suddenly was three ... then Masahiro Tanaka was awful Friday, blowing 4-0 and 5-1 leads over the Rangers ... the Yanks better hold on to the wild card, huh? ... the 3-1 win Saturday over the Rangers helped ... the Yanks play the Rays three games this week at Citi Field, games moved out of St. Pete because of Hurricane Irma ... Yankee Stadium is booked.

Gee, the Patriots — about as annoying an organization as there is — looked awful in losing to the Kansas City Chiefs ... what a shame.

Complaint Dept. from a sometimes grouchy old man ... the canned music that is blasted at H-K games takes the lead for most annoying music of the fall season ... the screens in front of the windows at the otherwise excellent press box at Xavier’s Larry McHugh Field have to go ... so hard to see uniform numbers on the field through that mesh ... H-K hot dogs are very good, but at $3.50 are the most expensive dogs on the high school beat ...the opening day rosters were inaccurate or just missing ... NFA and SMSA produced no rosters and H-K’s and Xavier’s had errors .... I know, first week .... but that has to get better ... without accurate rosters, announcers, reporters and radio folks are flying blind.

If this week is any indication, high school football games are too long ... the Xavier vs. NFA game took almost three hours and the H-K game was more than two and half ... too long ... maybe halftime could be shortened, maybe time between plays could be shortened, or maybe we should do what Massachusetts does and play 11 minute quarters ... three hour games are ridiculous ... OK, end of complaints for this week.

Today is the 16th anniversary of the attacks of 9/1½001 ... no kid in school is old enough to remember ... we have to teach them about the horrors of that day ... and we need to note that both President Bush and President Obama kept us safe ever since.

The security in place today that so many take as par for the course was unknown prior to that day ... truly, 9/11 changed the world.