After a one-year hiatus, Greg LaCava is back among the football head coaching ranks in the Shore Conference.

LaCava, who led Colts Neck to its best season in history in 2013, was approved as Holmdel's new football coach by the Holmdel Board of Education on Wednesday night. He becomes the third head coach in three seasons for the Hornets after Jay Graham stepped down following a 2-8 season this past fall.

Former Colts Neck coach Greg LaCava has been approved as the new Holmdel football coach. (Photo by Cliff Lavelle)
Former Colts Neck coach Greg LaCava has been approved as the new Holmdel football coach. (Photo by Cliff Lavelle)
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Colts Neck won a school-record 10 games in 2013 and reached its first NJSIAA sectional final in program history, losing to Brick in the Central Jersey Group IV championship game. LaCava decided to step down after the season and was not a head coach for any team this past fall. In 2012, the Cougars won what was then a school-record nine games and won their first state playoff game since 2000.

He also coached Navy-bound senior Anthony Gargiulo, the school’s all-time leader in rushing yards, touchdowns and tackles, and quarterback Mike Campbell set the single-season school record for passing yards as a senior in 2012.

LaCava was previously the head coach at Allentown and has a career record of 44-60, which includes a 30-24 mark at Colts Neck, where the Cougars went a combined 19-4 in his last two seasons.

He inherits a Holmdel program that has not had a winning record since winning a school-record 10 games and a division title in 2007. That was the Hornets' first division title since 1999, and they have only made six state playoff appearances and one state final appearance in their history. The Hornets return one of the Shore's most prolific passers, sophomore Aneesh Agrawal, whose 1,611 passing yards were sixth in the Shore and whose 18 touchdown passes ranked fourth in 2014. Top wideouts Pete Savrides and Steven Walier also returns after Savrides made 45 catches for 713 yards and six touchdowns, and Walier had 39 catches for 487 yards and four touchdowns.

LaCava's hiring means there are no more coaching vacancies among Shore Conference football programs. He joins Colts Neck's Darian Barnes, Asbury Park's Tim Fosque and Freehold Township's Cory Davies among the new coaches in the Shore for 2015.

 

 

 

 

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