December 29, 1972, 50 years ago: Jay Doyle dies. The football game program at East Brunswick High School in East Brunswick, Middlesex County, New Jersey notes that the school's stadium is named Jay Doyle Field, in his memory, and says that, "Most of you never had the pleasure of meeting this man."
When he died, my family had just moved to East Brunswick, and I had just passed my 3rd birthday, so I never came close to meeting him. Most people reading this post have never been to East Brunswick, much less to the campus of EBHS, my Alma Mater, and are unlikely to have ever even heard of him.
James Francis Doyle III was born on February 1, 1931 in Brooklyn. He grew up in Baldwin, Nassau County, New York. Long Island did not have a tradition of playing high school football games on Thanksgiving. As a result, he didn't like it when schools did so, and East Brunswick only ended up doing so once in its 1st 14 seasons of varsity football: In 1963, when their game against Sayreville for November 23 was postponed due to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Doyle served in the U.S. Marine Corps during the Korean War, and earned a Bachelor of Science degree in education from Rutgers University in 1956, and a Masters degree from RU in 1957. Several other men for whom nearby high school football stadiums were named were also Rutgers graduates, including Jay Dakelman of Highland Park and Nicholas Priscoe of Woodbridge.
He married Joan Philedius, and they had 2 daughters, Susan and Kathleen; and 2 sons, Michael and James IV. They lived in Farrington Lake Heights, a section of East Brunswick that uses the post office of neighboring Milltown.
Doyle served on Rutgers' football coaching staff in the 1956 and '57 seasons, as a swimming instructor there from 1956 to '58, as the Township of East Brunswick's recreation director from 1956 to '59, and a gym teacher at East Brunswick grammar schools from 1957 to '59.
This made him a natural to be appointed as East Brunswick High School's 1st athletic director when the school opened for the 1958-59 schoolyear, even though he was only 27 years old. He was also named its 1st wrestling head coach in 1960, and its 1st football head coach in 1961. He also served a term as president of the New Jersey Wrestling Coaches and Officials Association.
He hired one of his Rutgers fraternity brothers, John Emery, as the school's 1st head basketball coach in 1960-61, and as one of his assistant coaches in football. Emery would remain head coach in basketball until 1977, and on the football staff into the 21st Century.
After 2 seasons, going 4-4 and 2-7, he left the football position, but remained as A.D. and wrestling coach. He coached a District Champion team in 1969, and 3 individual State Champions: Richie Aiello in 1963, Max Guidoboni in 1965, and Lenny Cassidy in 1966.
Until the late 1970s, the Middlesex County Wrestling Tournament was held on the weekend between Christmas and New Year's Eve. It was eventually moved to the 1st weekend in February. On Thursday, December 28, 1972, Doyle coached 3 of his wrestlers into the Semifinals, to be held on Friday, December 29: Joe Rishar, Mark Morrison and Roger Kissling. (The article in the football team's game program says it was 4 wrestlers, but the newspaper account of the time only mentions 3.)
But he suffered a heart attack on the 29th, and was taken to St. Peter's Hospital in New Brunswick. He died there, only 41 years old.
Jim Rishar, one of Doyle's assistants and older brother of Joe Rishar, had to step in. He told the wrestlers that Doyle would want them to compete anyway, but that he would respect their choices regardless. All 3 of them wrestled, in tribute to their fallen leader. But, being emotionally spent, all 3 of them lost. It didn't matter: The fact that they competed anyway matched the Olympic ideal, and would have pleased their coach.
Jay Doyle Field
EBHS' 4,300-capacity football stadium did not have an official name at the time of Doyle's death. Before the 1973 season began, it was named Jay Doyle Field. When the Greater Middlesex Conference was formed in 1985, taking in nearly every school in the County, the trophy for the overall team wrestling champion was named the Jay Doyle Trophy.
Doyle's monument inside the stadium
Doyle was laid to rest at Holy Cross Burial Park and Mausoleum, on Cranbury Road in East Brunswick, 5 miles down the road from the High School. His widow, Joan, lived on until 2010. Son Michael is a professor of communications at Rutgers. Son James is a lawyer in Hammonton, South Jersey. Daughter Susan Doyle-Lindrud is a doctor, and stayed in East Brunswick. And daughter Kathleen Doyle is a physical therapist in neighboring North Brunswick.
Jay Doyle was succeeded as football coach by Ronald A. Gonier. "Rock" coached the Bears from 1963 to 1967, winning Conference Championships in 1965, 1966 and 1967, and the Central Jersey Group IV Championship in 1966. He continued to teach math at EBHS until his death in 1979, also much too young, a few days away from turning 50.
Gonier's successor was a bit luckier, in every sense of the word. Mel Caseiro, brother of assistant principal John Caseiro, coached from 1968 to 1976, after having been an assistant under Doyle and Gonier. He won Conference Championships in 1968, 1969 and 1970, and both the Middlesex County Athletic Conference and Central Jersey Group IV Championships in 1972. He was fired after 2 losing seasons, and then served on the staff of Rutgers University coaches Frank Burns and Dick Anderson until 1985. He taught chemistry at EBHS until his retirement, and lived until 2012, at 75.
The next EBHS head coach was George Tardiff. He was the 1st to lead the Bears into the State Playoffs after their institution in 1974, doing so in 1980. Despite some success, he ruffled a few feathers, and when he got an offer from an NCAA Division II college after the 1982 season, there was not much effort to convince him to stay. He later returned to New Jersey, coaching at 3 different schools in the Shore Conference, having previously coached at 3 other schools in that league. Like Caseiro, he died in 2012 and was 75.
Marcus Borden coached, and won, more football games at EBHS than any other man, all while teaching foreign languages. He guided us to the Playoffs in 1984, '85, '87, '88, '90, '94, '98, 2004, '09 and '10; won Conference Championships in 1984 (the MCAC, from here on out the Greater Middlesex Conference Red Division), '86, '87, '90 and '94; and, after some gut-wrenching close calls, the Central Jersey Group IV title in 2004 and 2009.
He was succeeded in 2012 by Bob Molarz, who had achieved great success at nearby Carteret, but it just didn't happen at EB. In 7 years, he never had a winning season. In 2019, Andy Steinfeld became the 1st EBHS alumnus to become head coach, and he led us to the Playoffs in 2021.
I'll let Mel Caseiro have the last word on Jay Doyle, from a column that Barry Levine wrote in The Home News, one of the predecessor newspapers of the Home News Tribune, Middlesex County's lone remaining daily paper: "He was a great man, a great educator. If I had to choose a boss to work for, it would have been Jay Doyle. He was very fair, and kept all the coaches working together."
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