Carty Set For First Year for HIllsborough

The Hillsborough High School football program has a tradition of excellence.

The Raiders are two-time state champions and have made the postseason 11 times in the 36 years of football at Noonan Field. Hillsborough also has the distinction of sending three of its graduates—Ricky Proehl, Shaun O'Hara and Shaun Mayer—to the National Football League.

Yet the program had stalled under Vince Coviello, who was just 20-30 in his five years as head coach. He has been replaced by Kevin Carty Jr., who will step in and take over as the team's head coach.

"I'm really having fun," Carty said. "I really like working with the kids."

Carty is familiar with the Mid-State 39 and the now-defunct Skyland Conference. Carty is a graduate of Somerville High School, and coached most recently at Bound Brook High School, where he was 34-17, and took the team to the state playoffs twice in his five years.

Carty is excited to be involved with a program such as Hillsborough and is encouraged by what he sees in the Raiders' program.

"They know the fundamentals," he said. "They are working hard with the intent of getting better."

The team's offense will be led—as most Carty led teams are—by quarterback play, and senior John Von Nessen. Von Nessen will have one of the best feature backs in the area in junior John Banaciski to hand the ball to, as well as throw out of the backfield.

Tight end Eyshon Murdock will also be one of Von Nessen's targets, as well Dom Picarrello. Von Nessen will need time to deliver the ball to these offensive weapons, and he will have seniors Andrew Kincaid and Owen Thomson protecting him.

On defense, Carty wants to put pressure on the team's opponents and will with linebackers Thomson, Picarrello and James Stavrakis. Murdock and Kincaid will be asked to slow the running game and also get pressure on opposing quarterbacks.

The uncertainty from Carty comes from jumping to the highest level of the Mid State 39 from one of the smaller divisions of the superconference. Bound Brook and Hillsborough did not have a common opponent over Carty's tenure at Bound Brook.

"That's the hard part," he said. "I haven't seen what other teams in our league have had for years now."

The Raiders will open the season against their biggest rival, and a North 2, Group 4 playoff team from 2010, Bridgewater-Raritan. Hillsborough has not beaten the Panthers since 2005.

"That's why I'm here, and that's why the kids play, is to play in big games," Carty said. "I'm excited."

Carty also realizes that if his team plays as he expects them to, there is no reason why Hillsborough can't be a state playoff team for the first time since 2005.

"We want to build a program," he said. "But I don't want to sell the kids we have short now. The potential is there and we want to be that good right now."