Meet the 10 new Shore Conference football head coaches

It was one of the busiest off seasons in Shore Conference history on the head coaching front.

Ten schools will have new head coaches in 2024, which is 23.7 percent of the conference’s schools that have football programs.

The 2024 season will also be the first one since 1991 when neither Steve Antonucci or Mark Costantino is a head coach in the Shore.

Antonucci resigned as Middletown South’s head coach after 26 highly successful seasons. Costantino resigned as Shore Regional’s head coach after 32 years.

The two combined for 430 wins (220 by Antonucci and 210 by Costantino); 10 NJSIAA sectional championships (six by Antonucci and four by Costantino) and five unbeaten seasons (four by Antonucci and one by Costantino).

Antonucci and Costantino are two of 10 coaches who have coached at least part of their careers in the Shore Conference to record 200 wins.

The others are: The late Warren Wolf (364) of Brick and Lakewood; Lou Vircillo (311) of Lacey and Red Bank Regional; Chuck Donohue Sr. (275); of several South Jersey schools and Southern Regional; the late Vic Kubu (263) of Middletown North and Manasquan; the late John Amabile (252) of several North Jersey schools, Middletown/Middletown North, Wall, Neptune, St. John Vianney and Allentown; Antonucci's scholastic head coach Mike Ciccotelli (231) of Keyport;; Joe Martucci (206) of Matawan and St. John Vianney and John Wagner (201) of Roselle Park and Point Pleasant Beach.

Brick, Matawan, Keyport, Long Branch and Ocean are other schools who have won at least three NJSIAA sectional championships who'll have new head coaches.

Middletown South (10), Brick (seven), Matawan (seven), Shore (seven), Keyport (six), Long Branch (four) and Ocean (three) have combined for 44 sectional championships.

Five of the new head coaches have previously been head coaches in the Shore and three of them – Jay Graber (Brick), Chad King (Ocean) and Don Klein (Shore) - were head coaches last season.

King and Klein return to their scholastic alma maters.

Here is a brief look at the Shore’s new head coaches.

Jay Graber, Brick

Graber, Matawan Regional High School’s head coach the last five seasons, goes from one of the Shore Conference’s most storied programs to the Shore’s flagship program.

He succeeds Len Zdanowicz, who resigned at the end of last season. Graber is the fifth head coach Brick’s 67-season history after Wolf (1958-2008), Pat Dowling (2009-2010), Rob Dahl (2011-2014) and Zdanowicz (2015-23).

Graber, a standout quarterback scholastically at Notre Dame High School in Lawrenceville, did an outstanding job during his nine seasons at Allentown High School. He turned what had been a long-time struggling program and made it into a Central Jersey power.

His tenure there was culminated in 2016, when the Redbirds won the NJSIAA Central Group 4 championship with a 41-6 win over Brick.

Graber’s Matawan teams went 21-23 with playoff appearances the last two seasons. His career record is 82-57.

Brick went 49-40 under Zdanowicz, but has not qualified for the NJSIAA playoffs since 2018.

Derek Reichenbecher, Freehold Borough

It is the second go-around as a head coach in the Freehold Regional School District for Reichenbecher. He was Howell’s head coach in 2012 and 2013. His teams went 5-15.

Reichenbecher, who was a long-time assistant coach to current Freehold Township head coach Cory Davies at both Howell and Freehold Township, succeeds Dave Ellis. Ellis resigned at the conclusion of last season after 13 seasons.

Freehold went 54-72 under Ellis, but just 2-15 over the last two seasons.

Charlie Marsh, Keyport

Marsh, a long-time assistant coach in the Shore Conference, replaces Jason Glezman, who resigned after five seasons.

Keyport went 25-18 under Glezman, with NJSIAA playoffs the last three seasons under Glezman. It was 8-2 last season, when the team was led by graduated quarterback Nazir Treadwell.

Noel Kavanagh, Holmdel

Kavanagh was a veteran assistant coach in the Shore Conference until mid-June, when he was appointed as Holmdel’s head coach.

He was an assistant coach at Freehold Borough last season. Before that, Kavanagh  was an assistant coach at Red Bank Regional and Neptune under head coach Shane Fallon and an assistant coach at St. John Vianney and Freehold Borough under head coach Mark Ciccotelli.

He succeeds Jeff Rainess, who resigned for personal reasons.

Holmdel went 41-34 under Rainess with five playoff appearances and two Shore Conference divisional championships under Rainess.

The Hornets were 9-1 last season and won the Shore Conference Constitution Division championship.

Benjamin Woolley, Long Branch

Woolley, who has been Long Branch’s head baseball coach the last six seasons, gets his first football head coaching job. He succeeds King.

He has been an assistant coach at Long Branch in recent seasons under legendary former head coach and current Bayonne athletic director Dan George and King.

Woolley was Long Branch’s offensive coordinator/offensive line coach last season.

Matt Walsh, Matawan

Walsh, who succeeds Graber as the Huskies’ head coach, was the quarterback for Middletown South’s 2003-2005 teams.

Those teams, led by running back Knowshon Moreno and linebacker Nick Macaluso and coached by Steve Antonucci went 36-0 with three consecutive NJSIAA sectional championships. one of the most dominant teams in Shore Conference history.

Walsh was Matawan’s defensive coordinator-defensive line coach the last two seasons. He was also n assistant coach at Raritan, Holmdel and Rumson-Fair Haven. Rumson-Fair Haven won four sectional championships during Walsh's time on the staff.

Marc Tomo, Middletown South

Tomo has succeeds Antonucci.

A 2003 Ocean Township High School graduate, Tomo was an assistant coach at Ocean for 11 seasons and then an assistant coach to Antonucci the last five seasons. Tomo was Middletown South’s defensive coordinator the last two seasons. He also was an assistant coach at Albright University for one season.

Chad King, Ocean

King was hired as the head coach at his scholastic alma mater after Don Klein’s Ocean’s head coach the last 17 seasons became Shore’s head coach.

A star running back/defensive back at OTHS in the late 1990’s and a 2000 OTHS graduate, King was Long Branch’s head coach the last two seasons.. Before that, he was an assistant coach to George for 11 seasons.

The Green Wave went 14-9 with three road playoff wins, including two over teams who  and an appearance in the 2023 Central Group 4 championship game.

Don Klein, Shore

Klein, a quarterback at Shore and a 1997 Shore graduate, succeeds Costantino.

He is Ocean’s all-time winningest coach with 93. The Spartans won four Shore Conference divisional championships and had seven winning seasons under Klein.

Among the players Klein coached at Ocean were current Philadelphia Eagles’ quarterback Kenny Pickett, current Syracuse wide receiver Trebor Pen, current Temple quarterback Tyler Douglas and running back Tyler Thompson.

Bobby Acosta, St. John Vianney

St. John Vianney is the latest stop for the well-traveled Acosta, who was the head coach at Marlboro in 2003 and Monmouth in 2006 and at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla.

Acosta has also been a head coach and assistant coach at several different collegiate programs over the last 25 seasons.

His IMG Academy team was the consensus national champion in 2020. The quarterback for that team was J.J. McCarthy, who quarterbacked the University of Michigan to the 2023 national championship and was the first round draft choice of the Minnesota Vikings this past April.

Among the collegiate coaching jobs, Acosta has had are: Assistant coach at Syracuse, Bucknell, Cornell, the University of Delaware, The College of New Jersey and Rowan University. He was also the head coach at Widener University.

Delaware went to the FCS National Championship Game in Acosta’s one season on staff. Among the players on that Delaware team was Baltimore Ravens’ Super Bowl-winning quarterback Joe Flacco.

During his season at Monmouth, the Falcons went 8-3, recorded their first playoff win and won the Shore Conference Liberty Division championship.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Meet the 10 new Shore Conference football head coaches