Huge Moment Last Night for Hopewell Kicker Rocco Marcantonio

HOPEWELL TOWNSHIP– The Hopewell Vikings football team split up their practice Wednesday night as they continue to prepare for their season opener on August 23rd against Riverside.

After torrential rain wiped out Tuesday’s session, Coach Matt Mottes had his team on the field twice last night, from 4 until 6 pm and then again from 7 until 8:30 pm.

The first session focused on special teams (kick return, kick coverage, FG and PAT formation) and finished up with working on their redzone offense.

While it’s still too early to come to any conclusions and most of the players as things are still a work in progress, it isn’t too early for me to make a statement about one aspect about the Hopewell team.

The Vikings have a huge weapon on offense with junior kicker Rocco Marcantonio.

Marcantonio is player with the type of talent that should earn him a D-1 football scholarship. That’s how good he is.

This isn’t normally the case with high school players, but the Hopewell coaching staff realizes that with Marcantonio’s leg, getting to the opponents 30-yard line is most times an automatic 3 points. I’ve been in attendance for the first two practices and Marcantonio hasn’t missed a field goal attempt from 50 yards in. His kicks split the uprights and clear the posts easily.

To end one of the special team’s sessions, the coaches Marcantonio started with extra points and continued moving out until Rocco missed. Things finally ended when things were extended out to 60 yards.

Right before that, HSN got video of Marcantonio easily connecting on an attempt from 55-yards. As you can see, he makes this 55-yard field goal with ease.

This will be a fun story to cover over the next couple of seasons as college coaches will no doubt be making their way to check out Marcantonio.