Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011: Four defending football champs start at No. 1

   Leading off today: A trio of defending state champions from Section 5 begins the 2011 football season with No. 1 rankings from the New York State Sportswriters Association.

   Rush-Henrietta (Class AA), Aquinas (A) and Hornell (B) are all off to 2-0 starts in the 2011 season. Joining them at No. 1 are defending Class C champ Bronxville and Class D Walton. Tuckahoe, which won the NYSPHSAA Class D crown last fall at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, starts off at No. 10.

   The large-school rankings (classes AA and A) and small-school-rankings (B, C and D) have been posted on out RoadToSyracuse.com website.

   Vindication but no relief: The Observer-Dispatch in Utica reported Ryan Grogan's 74-yard interception return for a TD -- negated by an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty -- should have counted, giving West Canada Valley a late 19-14 lead. Instead, Westmoreland won the Week 2 contest 19-14.

   The Indians thought Grogan's long return had given them the lead, but an official following the play made contact with a West Canada assistant coach in the two-yard restricted zone on the sideline. Officials disallowed the TD and penalized West Canada 15 yards from the spot of the foul; on Tuesday, Dave Bovi, the rules interpreter for Mohawk Valley Certified Chapter of Football Officials, said the TD should have counted and the penalty should have been assessed on the extra point or ensuing kickoff.

   "This happens once in a blue moon, but that doesn’t make it right,” Bovi told the paper. "There was a mistake made, no question about it. ... It was correctable then, but not now.”

   Said coach Mike Moody: "It’s tough but you have to move on."

   Scathing remarks: Bill Tribou went off on some people this week in a way unlike anything I've heard from a high school coach in a long, long time. The Horace Greeley football coach was nothing short of furious with what he witnessed before and after his team's 56-14 win against Yonkers Roosevelt in the Section 1 opener.

   "What I saw is a dangerous situation for that team," Tribou told The Journal News.

   Tribou, a 1974 Roosevelt graduate who was an assistant there and then the head coach at Yonkers Lincoln, said the Indians showed up at Greeley on Saturday with just 19 players and inadequate equipment. After the game, the Roosevelt squad was still waiting for its bus by the time Tribou had packed up and was leaving to go home.

   Tribou said Roosevelt showed up with an equipment bag contained little more than three footballs, a dirty cooler, no water bottles or cups, no ice and little if any medical equipment.

   "Do not tell me that was a meaningful learning experience or a fun day playing football," Tribou said. "That was torture. ... When is somebody going to look out for the kids in Yonkers?"

   That's a fair question. The Yonkers school district -- as well as the city itself -- has been in a financial quagmire for years, and the budget is a daily crisis situation. Roosevelt was one of seven Yonkers teams to have varsity football reinstated in late July after the district finally allocated funding.

RoadToSyracuse.com football site

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   Up until this year, there were five public schools in the district, and for the most part they have recently been capable of beating almost no one but each other. Throw out a 5-4 mark for Gorton in 2007 and Roosevelt's 8-2 season in 2009 and the teams are a combined 25-121 the past four seasons. They got off to a 1-5 start this weekend, outscored by 155-59.

   "Our coaches in the City of Yonkers work very hard with our players to make our programs," Jim Rose, the Yonkers district AD told the paper. "Our kids met the New York State requirements, were suited properly and played to their potential."

   Tribou posted his entire e-mail to the paper on The Journal News blog.    One of his conclusions definitely deserves consideration. Unless and until Yonkers can sufficiently fund one team -- let alone seven -- the district should consolidate its football teams into two Class AA programs.

   Investigation continues: Manhattan police are still hunting for two men who they believe shot and killed Murry Bergtraum girls basketball player Tayshana “Chicken” Murphy early Sunday.

   The New York Post reported that Tyshawn Brockington and Robert Cartagena, both 21, are wanted on charges that they gunned down Murphy, 18, in a case of mistaken identity.

   Surveillance video places both men at the scene and apparently carrying guns, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said. A third suspect, Terique Collins, 24, was arrested Monday and ordered held on $250,000 bond, charged with criminal possession of a weapon. Collins has 13 prior arrests on charges that include drug and weapon possession, police said.

   “She was shot with a gun provided by this man,” Assistant District Attorney Jefferey Levinson said.

   Extra points: Jamestown basketball player Jaysean Paige has not returned from Kentucky and appears unlikely to do so, The Buffalo News reported.