Luke Vizzoni was determined to win the Most Valuable Player award at the Snapple Bowl.
It was a lofty goal since Vizzoni is, after all, a defensive player.
Yet after recording a safety and seven tackles, he received the game’s MVP award when the 25th Snapple Bowl was played on July 25 at Woodbridge High School.
The Bishop George Ahr High School linebacker spearheaded a defense that guided the Middlesex County all-star team past the Union County all-stars, 22-6.
He was named MVP during a ceremony held on the field after the game. He held up the big trophy and posed for pictures, smiling wide the whole time.
“It was surreal, being named that,” Vizzoni said. “I came into this game pumped and told myself I wanted to win MVP. And look what happened, I won MVP.”
Middlesex County’s victory snapped Union County’s two-game winning streak in the series. The result also gave Middlesex County a 15-10 advantage in the series overall.
The Snapple Bowl, which features players who just gradated high school from both counties, raises money for the Children’s Specialized Hospital in Mountainside and the Lakeview School, a private school for children with disabilities, in Edison.
Vizzoni and his defensive mates dominated from start to finish, holding Union County to 141 total yards. The game was physical throughout, and late in the second half, two shoving and shouting matches broke out. The second one forced officials to call the game with 1:25 remaining in the fourth quarter.
Union County’s defense was actually matching Middlesex’s defense for most of the first quarter.
But late in the first quarter, Middlesex County took possession at the Union County 48. After a methodical drive, Edison High School’s Donavan Benoit plowed into the end zone from one yard out.
“We just kept driving down their throats and got it in. Donavan Benoit, baby,” said Benoit’s Edison teammate, wide receiver Ahmed Aly. “Donavan is huge. They can’t stop Donavan.”
Early in the second half, after Vizzoni’s safety made it 9-0, Aly leaped over a cornerback and caught a 12-yard touchdown in the corner of the end zone.
After the touchdown, he leaped again and bumped shoulders with a teammate. Middlesex County led 16-0 and the game looked out of reach.
Union County scored a touchdown late in the third period to cut is deficit to 16-6.
But Middlesex County answered early in the fourth, when quarterback Paul Cocozziello of Saint Joseph Regional High School in Metuchen hit Tyler Jack of Perth Amboy High School along the right sideline for a 64-yard touchdown.
“I rolled right and saw Tyler there, and I hit him. That’s how it was,” Cocozziello said. “To be totally honest, I was a little nervous when I rolled right. It was a tight window. But I put it there and he took it up the sideline.”
The touchdown pass put the game out of reach, as Union County was not able to mount another drive against Middlesex County’s stifling defense.
Vizzoni was the forceful leader of that defense all night. It was a fitting send-off for the high school graduate, since he will not play in college next year.
Vizzoni will just go to the University of Alabama and study “creative media and communications,” he said.
“I want to go into sports film maybe, and hopefully film football,” he said.
In other words, he wants to film performances like his own from Thursday night.
“It’s my last time strapping up for a football game, so I just want to leave it out on the field,” Vizzoni said.
