STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.—The Broncs swept the Seahawks in a non-conference match Thursday afternoon. \”Everyone played well,\” said head coach Ed Torres. \”We’ve played a tough fall schedule so it was nice to get the win today. It was a morale booster.\”

For Rider (3-6), junior Casey Jedlinski (Manalapan) won at first singles 6-2, 6-3 and teamed up with freshman Josh Rultenberg (Lafayette Hill, Pa./Plymouth-Whitemarsh) to win at first doubles 8-3. Rultenberg won at second singles in three sets 6-4, 3-6, 6-3.

\”Josh played a steady Wagner player and everything that Josh sent over got returned,\” said Torres. \”He hung in there and had to play overly aggressive to end the points. Josh has very good night vision because it was pretty dark when his match ended.\”

\”Casey and I finally put the pieces together on the doubles side,\” said Rultenberg. \”I give Casey more of the credit, he played better than I did and picked me up. Overall it was a team effort to get the win today.\”

\”Despite the fact that I was playing in darkness for the third set of the singles, I was able to keep putting the pressure on him and I finally wore him down,\” Rultenberg added. \”Knowing that we clinched the match, I was able to play more relaxed knowing the match didn’t come down to me.\”

Sophomore Will Haight (Turnersville, N.J./Washington Township) won his third singles match 6-2, 6-1 with fellow sophomore Marc Ashed (Vineland) posting a 6-3, 6-1 win at fourth singles. Haight and Ashed teamed up for an 8-1 win at second doubles.

Bronc freshman Chris Esposito (Ocean Grove, N.J./Neptune) (6-0, 6-1) and freshman Robert Olsen (Marlton, N.J./Cherokee) (6-4, 6-1) also posted wins at fifth and sixth singles. Esposito and Tom Becker (Cinnaminson/Holy Cross) won 8-1 at third doubles.

\”Chris is an excellent doubles player,\” said Torres. \”As we enter the conference matches going into the spring, he is going to see more action on the doubles side. He is a good volleyer.\”

\”We did all right,\” said Esposito. \”My partner Tom [Becker] and I dominated the match and I used that momentum to carry through the singles match. It was basically serve, come to the net and put it away. It was pretty much serve and volley.\”

Rider defeated the Seahawks 6-1 last fall and 7-0 in the Spring of 2006.

\”Within the past few matches, we’ve battled,\” Torres added. \”That isn’t evident in the final team result but we have been playing better as the fall has gone on.\”

The Broncs host Saint Francis-Pa. on Saturday in a non-conference match.

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\”David Rebovich has easily been the most outstanding graduate student I have taught during my years at Rutgers. Rebovich has an exceptional mind; his intelligence is subtle, even mercurial . . . He is a person of rare qualities and character, who can make a major contribution to political science,\” McWilliams wrote.

\”That was 30 years ago,\” said his mother, following the Funeral Liturgy at St. Nicholas Byzantine Church in Perth Amboy. \”They\’re saying the same thing today.\”

Though now it can be said of Rebovich he did make a major contribution to political science.

Rebovich, who graduated from Perth Amboy High School in 1967, died Friday at the age of 58, suffering a massive heart attack while teaching a class at Rider University where he was managing director of the New Jersey Institute of Politics.

For those of us covering New Jersey politics he was our go-to guy. A search on his name in The New York Times archives comes up with 277 entries.

\”When I called it was always, \”Brian, what can I do for you?\’ \” said Brian Thompson, the New Jersey reporter for WNBC-TV.

It was the same for the rest of us. \”Rick, what can I do for you?\”

\”He was the voice of reason in a very unreasonable climate,\” said Woodbridge Mayor John McCormac, who attended the funeral service Wednesday at the Costello-Greiner Funeral Home in Woodbridge.

When McCormac was state treasurer in Trenton he understood it would be wise to run ideas past Rebovich. \”If he supported something you did, you had it made. If he didn\’t, you probably shouldn\’t do it,\” McCormac said.

Lilo Stainton got to know Rebovich when she was a reporter in the Trenton bureau of Gannett New Jersey. She later switched sides and became press secretary for Gov. Jon Corzine, who attended Wednesday\’s funeral service.

\”Dave was one of the first persons I reached out to when I came over (to the executive branch),\” Stainton said.

\”He understood he could be of service,\” she said. \”He loved the game of politics and he had fun with it. He understood that nobody was perfect and he loved to tweak the imperfect. I don\’t know how you can replace him. No one else in New Jersey had his skills.\”

Thompson recalled how Rebovich knew how to answer questions from reporters in the print media, who could write in long sentences. \”He knew how to speak to us in sound bites,\” Thompson said of those in television.

\”He was a teacher, even outside the classroom,\” said Thompson.

Rebovich\’s daughter Melissa attends Rider University, and some students asked her if there was anything they could do to help. There was. Six Rider students were chosen to be his pall bearers.

To Charles Burton of Edison, a senior at Rider, it was an honor. As a student at John P. Stevens High School Burton gained an interest in politics, and from reading the papers, he recalled, \”I always saw this name David Rebovich.\”

Burton, who explained that his father died when he was young, said Rebovich would become a mentor, a father figure and a favorite professor, who could give him the skinny on such politicians as Edison mayor Jun Choi and former Middlesex County Democrat Party boss John Lynch.

Another pall bearer, Nicholas Ballasy of Warrington, Pa., explained how Rebovich helped him produce \”On The Issues,\” a television program produced at the university. \”What you loved most was to sit down with him, kick back and relax and talk politics,\” said Ballasy, who took three courses with Rebovich, who peppered his lectures with humor.

I had the opportunity to experience that humor, occasionally working with him in the studio of Jersey 101.5 on Election Night, most memorably in 2000 when we left the studio wondering what\’s up with Florida?

Among those who knew Rebovich the longest is Georgeann Dillman, who graduated one year after Rebovich at Perth Amboy High School. While Rebovich played baseball and basketball in high school, \”His studies always came first. His goal in life was to be a professor.\”

Dillman explained how he loved history and was particularly fond of history teacher Elsie Perlin. \”She saw great things in him,\” Dillman said.

Corzine, who would occasionally be chastised by Rebovich in print, said of Rebovich, \”He was a gentleman.\”

Clearly Rutgers\’ W. Carey McWilliams was on to something 30 years ago.

At Warfield\’s home in Columbia, Md., no one answered the door this afternoon, and neighbors said his family had left for New Jersey after receiving the news this morning.

\”He was a really nice kid. He was involved with the church. I believe the whole family played instruments in the church choir,\” said Maureen Howley, who lives across the street. \”It seemed that he was very close with his family.\”

October 17, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

EASTON, Pa.—The Broncs lost a non-conference game at Lafayette Wednesday night. \”It’s the story of our season,\” said head coach Lori Hussong. \”We didn’t play well together. We played like individuals and when we do that we are very ineffective.\”

For Rider (7-8), senior goalie Jen LoCastro (Cherry Hill/Camden Catholic) made five saves as the Leopards out-shot the Broncs 10-3.

\”We should be winning more games for ‘J-Lo’,\” said Hussong. \”Our offensive productivity has been just bad for lack of another word. If we don’t shoot, we can’t score. If we don’t have the ‘one two scoring punch’ offensively and have everybody working together then we don’t do well and we don’t win games.\”

\”I think our defense needs to be tougher in the circle,\” said LoCastro who entered the week 12^th in the nation in saves per game, 13^th in save percentage and 40^th in goals against average (1.93). \”We need to work together more as a team. We have no excuse even though we are young. We need to understand that we need to come together more as a team and support each other and we aren’t doing that on the field.\”

Junior Tricia Crotty (Lewistown, Pa./Indian Valley) had two of Rider’s three shots with Lafayette goalie Kelsey Anderson making two saves for the shutout.

\”It’s not that we aren’t scoring,\” Hussong added. \”It’s that we aren’t making improvements. We need them to do what we tell them to do each time out instead of doing it one time after being told. We are going back to our same old ways and it is frustrating. Potentially we have the ability to be excellent. It is a matter of getting the players to believe in the program and believe in our philosophy. We waited for misses, we didn’t move to the ball. We just got out-hustled tonight.\”

After a scoreless first half, the Leopards scored off a penalty corner with 23 minutes remaining for the only tally of the night. Lafayette (6-9) held a 13-5 corner advantage.

Lafayette holds a 23-6 advantage in the series with the Broncs defeating the Leopards last season by a score of 2-1.

Rider travels to Monmouth for a Northeast Conference game on Friday at 4:00pm. \”We want any chance of making the NEC playoffs and advancing, we need to start tomorrow [Thursday] and work extremely hard in practice doing the things that we are supposed to do.\”

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