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Once again, the Colonial League had a number of competitive contests this past weekend, although it’s doubtful if any of our football experts could say that there were any surprise winners.
Our number one ranked Colonial League team, Notre Dame, defeated our number three Palisades and our number two Northwestern defeated our number four team, Salisbury. Saucon Valley also had an entertaining game edging out Palmerton in a see-saw battle, 42-41.
In the EPC , it was not a good weekend for most of the inner city schools. Nazareth easily defeated Freedom, and Bethlehem Catholic defeated Easton. Northampton, Parkland and Whitehall all had blowout victories against Liberty, Dieruff and Allen, respectively.
That brings us to this week’s input from the RCN SportsTalk pollsters — a random collection of local coaches, athletic directors and media members. We never announce nor release the names of our non-media voters to get their honest opinions on the local football landscape while avoiding any thoughts of retribution or potential “bulletin board” material. Our “media voters” usually reveal themselves when we have the pleasure of having them on our weekly SportsTalk program, seen on Thursday nights on RCN TV and available through RCN on Demand.
This year, instead of having a big school and small school poll as in seasons past, we are going to break the two polls down into EPC and Colonial League schools, within the RCN broadcast area. With the reduced schedules, this change for our poll will make things a bit more interesting since many of the top teams within the local conferences will not have the opportunity to actually face each other this fall.
Without the crowning of an official Colonial League and EPC champion, our poll will be an intriguing barometer to who in fact is the best team in each conference (and, of course, bragging rights through the winter months).
So below we have our first week of high school polls for both leagues, along with the listing of all of the teams that are included in our respective categories.
Feel free to email me at Chris.Michael@rcn.net for your thoughts on this week’s poll and we might read and respond to your emails on this week’s SportsTalk show.
EPC-LV TOP 5
1) Nazareth
2) Parkland
3) Emmaus
4) Freedom
Eligible Teams (in no particular order):
Allentown Central Catholic, Bethlehem Catholic, Easton, Freedom, Liberty, Dieruff, Allen, Parkland, Whitehall, Emmaus, Nazareth, and Northampton
COLONIAL TOP 5
1) Notre Dame-GP
2) Northwestern
3) Palisades
4) Salisbury
5) Saucon Valley
Eligible Teams (in no particular order):
Bangor, Pen Argyl, Notre Dame – Green Pond, Wilson, Catasauqua, Salisbury, Saucon Valley, Northwestern, Northern Lehigh, Southern Lehigh and Palisades
Be sure to bookmark our high school football broadcast schedule here on the website and check it frequently as, with several games already postponed or canceled so far this season, there could be changes from day to day.
On this week’s “SportsTalk”…
Our guests will include Tom Housenick of the Morning Call who will join me to talk about high school football, boys and girls state golf tournament action and a look ahead to what is shaping up to be an intriguing high school wrestling campaign -complete with two Lehigh Valley teams competing as Pennsylvania’s first-ever girls wrestling teams this winter.
He will also talk about the Major League Baseball playoffs, the World Series, the Phillies‘ search for a new General Manager and other Hot Stove topics for teams in the National League East.
We’ll also continue to feature local coaches and players from different schools and teams from the RCN viewing area to talk about their fall seasons and issues they have been having while playing during the Coronavirus pandemic.
