By Jeff Appelblatt
If someone guaranteed Woodbridge High School football coach Kevin Coleman that his club would give up 20 points to its crosstown rival from John F. Kennedy (JFK) Memorial High School, he would be worried. Woodbridge topped 15 points just once in its first four games, struggling on the offensive end in each of the four.
But on Oct. 7 in Iselin, 20 points wasn’t enough to beat the Barrons.
Led by a monster game from Keshaun Henry, who scored six touchdowns, the Barrons defeated the Mustangs, 52-20.
“We had a really good game,” Coleman said. “[Henry] had a really good game.”
Of course, Henry couldn’t have caught the ball for 130 yards and four of his six touchdowns without his quarterback finding him.
That was Donovan Tabon’s job. On the day, the first-year quarterback completed nine of 11 passes for 261 yards. In addition to getting the ball to Henry for four scores, including a 63-yard bullet he sailed to Henry en route to the end zone, Tabon threw a fifth touchdown pass to Quassim Glover.
“He did a good job,” Woodbridge’s coach said about his quarterback, before adding on how well he’s played all year, despite the three losses Woodbridge had entering the latest contest. “He’s only a sophomore. Win or lose, he’s continued to maintain his confidence.”
Really, it was a tale of two quarters for Tabon, Henry and the Barrons, who scored 40 of its points in the second and third quarters.
“Our practices [before the game] — we were just doing what we normally do,” Coleman said, insisting nothing special went into the game in Iselin.
Fortunately for the Barrons, as identical as their practices were between the three losses — Sept. 16, Sept. 23 and Sept. 30 — something did change against JFK Memorial.
“We just executed,” Coleman said.
Sure enough, it does take solid execution to put up 52 points and a win.
Woodbridge’s coach doesn’t expect his team to put up that many points anytime soon, but he hopes the offensive outburst is a good sign for the rest of the season.
“I hope this was the start of us playing a lot better,” Coleman said. “Hopefully we could keep it going, going forward.”
The next chance the Barrons (2-3) will have to add to the win column comes Oct. 14 in Woodbridge, where they host Carteret High School. However, picking up another victory won’t be easy. Carteret (4-0) won its first four contests by an average of 28 points, including a 40-0 bashing of North Brunswick Township High School in September.
