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It has been a season like few others for the Ocean City High School football team. Their 45-10 triumph over Long Branch last Friday not only gave the Red Raiders an 11-0 record for just the second time in school history, it set up this Friday’s matchup against Millville in the South Jersey Group 4 championship game. “This is playoff season, the real season,” Head Coach Kevin Smith said of the postseason in an email to friends of the program.

It’s been an exciting few days for the Ocean City High School football team, and especially its defensive coordinator, Sean Matthews. Just eight days ago, Matthews’ wife Katie gave birth to a new son, the couple’s first, Bo Charles Matthews.  On Friday night, his defense gave the family a new baby gift, shutting down high-powered Long Branch in the South Jersey playoffs semifinal at Carey Stadium by a 45-10 count.

On a night that Ocean City High School honored a legend, its football team turned in a legendary performance in the opening round of the Group IV playoffs. The Red Raiders improved their perfect record to 10-0 with a 41-7 drubbing of archrival Mainland following the dedication of the Tom Williams Press Box at Carey Stadium on Friday night.

It may not have been a wakeup call of epic proportions, but Ocean City’s 31-14 defeat of Williamstown on Saturday was a wakeup call nonetheless. On a Senior Day game postponed from Friday’s originally scheduled date due to stormy weather, the Raiders gave up two touchdowns in a game for the first time all year. They were also tied in a game in the second quarter for the first time. Whether the wakeup call was mild or epic, it had a good result. After Williamstown, a West Jersey Football League independence Division foe, went on a 13-play, 70-yard scoring drive to make it 7-7 with 6:28 left in the first half, Ocean City scored the next 24 points to put the game out reach.

Long before Martin Z. Mollusk, there was Hobo. Decades prior to Martin, Ocean City’s official hermit crab mascot who is, with all due respect, a person in a costume, there was a living, breathing four-legged ambassador named Hobo. A stray pooch of mixed breeding found in a snowdrift in 1920, Hobo would become one of the best known and best loved inhabitants of Ocean City for the next 16 years. 

Ocean City High School’s football team spent approximately two and a half hours on the bus -- traveling 60 miles each way for a conference game at Pemberton, Burlington County, on Saturday. In the end, it was the host team that wound up having the long day. The undefeated Red Raiders improved their record to 7-0 on the season by laying a 37-0 smack down on the Hornets.

The Endless Summer. Yes, it's the title of a classic surfer flick. But also an apt description of the recent weather pattern in Ocean City. The point wasn’t lost on the hundreds of folks taking advantage of the summer-like conditions on their bikes, lounge chairs, beach blankets or just strolls along the Boardwalk.

Ocean City’s sixth straight win, 24-7 on the road at Egg Harbor Township, had its high points. But the football contest was anything but easy. The Red Raiders came back from their first deficit of the season, and relied on the running and defensive prowess of Sean Mazzitelli, an historic kicking performance from Brandon McGonigle and a stingy defense to stay undefeated.

It will be a “very Brady” event Saturday at the Ocean City Music Pier when Barry Williams appears to interact with fans at a special meet-and-greet. Williams, who portrayed Greg Brady, the big brother in the iconic 1970s sitcom, “The Brady Bunch,” will be on hand in Ocean City to meet fans and to lead the 46th annual Classic Car and Street Rod parade of street rod and exotic cars down the Boardwalk.

The Best of the Press awards are important to Mike Monichetti because of what it takes to win them. They require loyalty and action by customers, qualities Mike and staff are proud to have attained. Monichetti is the third-generation owner of Mike’s Seafood and Dock Restaurant, at 4222 Park Road in the heart of Sea Isle City’s historic Fish Alley. His establishment is the two-time defending “Best Seafood Restaurant” champion – and gunning for its third title in a row.