By Walter Elliott &
William Hathaway, Jr.
EAST ORANGE – Neither rain nor traffic nor 12 rival football teams could keep the undefeated East Orange Campus High School Jaguars and the city from celebrating their state championship here Saturday.
“Local Talk” was relieved when a rain shower, encountered in downtown Newark at 10:12 a.m. Dec. 11, dissipated upon arrival here at Central Avenue and Oak Street at 10:28. The East Orange Marching Jaguars band were practicing just south of the intersection while wearing red ponchos.
The up-to-40 mph wind gusts and a short but intense storm front respectively held off until 3 and 7 p.m. This system would spawn some of the worst tornado damage in six Midwestern and Southern states.
“Local Talk” disembarked from a westbound CoachUSA No. 24B bus two minutes before East Orange police officers closed the avenue at Arlington Avenue with traffic cones.
Police would close street and driveway access ahead of the Jaguars’ victory parade along Central Avenue, Halsted Street, Freeway Drive East and South and North Clinton Avenues to Paul Robeson Stadium. Buses on eight CoachUSA and NJTransit routes were among those who were detoured or detained while the parade made its 1.6-mile route.
The celebration was for the players, coaches, support staff, parents and relatives of the 13-0 gridiron Jaguars – and the community.
The football team’s drive netted them their first NJSIAA North 1 Group 5 state championship. They prevailed over the Clifton Mustangs, 30-24 in triple overtime, in the Dec. 5 title game at Rutgers SHI Stadium.
Previously, the closest the Jaguars came to a state football championship was a 2007 sectional title against Montclair. Its EOHS Panthers and the Clifford J. Scott Scotties predecessors may well have won earlier football titles. (Records for the 1980 Essex Catholic Bishop Francis High School Eagles were not immediately available.)
In talking with veteran observers – some of whom were wearing Panthers or Scotties jackets or sweatshirts – no one remembers having East Orange’s gridiron heroes so welcomed home at least since the EOCHS era began in 2002.
“Local Talk,” when asked for the person behind the celebration, was directed to Mayor Theodore “Ted” Green on one of the parade’s three floats.
“This came out of a dinner I had with the team,” said Green. “I told them that, if they win the championship, I will throw a parade. East Orange has a rich tradition of producing world-class athletes – and we want the entire city to come out, show love and celebrate this historic victory.”
Green, City Council members, East Orange School District Superintendent AbdulSaleem Hasan, EOCHS Principal Willie Worley, Cicely L. Tyson Community School of Fine & Performing Arts Principal John English, East Orange STEM Academy Principal Dr. Vincent Stallings, Jaguars Head Coach Rae Oliver and Police Chief Phyllis Bindi had six days to pull the victory parade and Robeson Stadium reception.
They help from many quarters, including the East Orange Junior Jaguars Pop Warner Football team, East Orange Police Explorers, the East Orange Old Guard, East Orange General Hospital, the NFL New York Giants, the Essex County Sheriff’s Office, EOSD food contractor Sodexo and several local business owners.
Many players and dignitaries, for example, were wearing red and blue “Jaguar by Nature” sweatshirts whose logo was a variant of the “Naughty by Nature” music group. “Uncle Vinnie” Brown, a “Naughty” musician and EOHS Class of 1988 graduate, made up those sweatshirts.
There were several marchers and spectators who still wore sweatshirts reading “Refuse to Lose” or “13-0” and the 12 opponents’ logos. (The West Orange Mountaineers played both a regular season and a playoff game.)
The parade, whose procession spilled back on Oak Street to alongside Elmwood Park, stepped off at 11:18 a.m. It would take the band, three float loads of Jaguars, 29 motor vehicles and assorted marchers an hour to reach Robeson Stadium. The upper several hundred bystanders, shopkeepers, motorists and at least one inflatable Santa Claus saw several EOPD cars ahead of and in the procession plus an EOFD LT 1 Rescue ladder truck bringing up the rear.
Jeneen Henry, holding a “1” mylar balloon, was waiting with two relatives on North Clinton by Melmore Gardens, waiting for her grandson to appear. Their pride was No. 77 senior tackle Elijah McClain – whose video of congratulating three Clifton Mustangs for a good game while all were awaiting an official’s call went viral.
Some 60 fans, family and neighbors welcomed the Jaguars parade at North Clinton and Park avenues. At least one had a music-playing bull horn and another two cowbells. The marching Jaguars obliged by performing to “It’s so hard to be a Jaguar” in the intersection. It was hard to follow who changed they lyric to “I’m so proud to be a Jaguar.”
Within the parade were a car each carrying Essex County 2021 Teacher of the Year Theresa Maughan (STEM Academy social studies) and 2020-21 Governor’s Educator of the Year Joi Paisley (Althea Gibson Academy).
There were STEM Academy and Tyson School names alongside EOCHS on the floats to recognize those two high schools’ contributions to the Jaguars. 10 Jaguars, including quarterback Raden Oliver, are STEM scholar-athletes. Nine, including receiver BJ Covington, study and perform at Tyson. No. 29 senior fullback Jessica Felix, EOCHS’s second female player, was also on a float. She earned Nov. 25’s Jaguars-Barringer “Player of the Game” by running in the first touchdown by a female for EOCHS and ever in the Thanksgiving Day annual classic.
Head Coach Oliver, a 22-year EOHS/EOCHS assistant coach who got the top job in 2017, has said that his team are indeed scholar-athletes. Many are poised to become enrolled to some top colleges with their 2021 season performance making the difference in being accepted.
Oliver, for all his East Orange loyalty, may not be on the 2021 mountaintop if it were not for the Orange Tornadoes. He was set to become an EOHS player when the family moved to Orange. Oliver got to play as a Tornado in his last two years – leading him to become a Kean University player and into coaching.
The Jaguars disembarked from the floats at Robeson’s main gate and prepared to run through the inflatable tunnel onto the field for fans for the eighth time this season.
Mayor Green doubled as master of ceremonies at the stadium. He re-introduced the 67 players, Coach Oliver and his staff. Green also brought up Assemblywoman Britnee Timberlake, Acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore “Ted” Stephens II and Council Members Christopher Awe, Brittany Claybrooks, Bergson Lenus and Vernon Pullins – among other dignitaries who offered congratulations.
That run through the tunnel was the last for 31 of the players as Jaguars. The 31 are seniors who are to graduate in June.
“We’re 13-0 – there’s nothing that anyone can say that can take that from us,” said Jaguars staffer Jihad Abu Hanif at the reception. “Seniors, I thank every one of you for the job you’ve done. Junior and underclassmen, we’ve work to do.”
