Somerville football coach Matt Bloom (File photo by Mike Pavlichko)
“You learn a lot about what to do from the people before you.”
That thought from Matt Bloom may best sum up the reason the Somerville Board of Education officially appointed him as the full-time football coach at the high school at its meeting Tuesday night, after he took over with just two games to go in the season from first-year head coach Ian Pace.
Though the move was not disclosed publicly and inspired a bit of a sense of mystery around the Big Central Conference, there’s no mystery as to why Bloom now has the job. He was the lone holdover from the highly successful Jeff Vanderbeek/Dallas Whitaker era, which saw the program go 57-8 under the two head coaches – winning a state title in 2017 and reaching two other sectional finals – after losing 25 straight from 2012 through 2015.
Bloom went 2-1 after being elevated from offensive line coach to head coach in time for the Pioneers’ October 14th home game against Hillsborough. With a 2-5 record at that point – in part due to a forfeit against Mastery Charter of Camden for using an ineligible transfer – and needing to likely win two games to clinch a playoff berth, Somerville did just that.
They beat the Raiders 35-14 at Brooks Field, then came up with an equally as critical and convincing 41-28 road win at South Brunswick on the Friday night of Cutoff Weekend to make the postseason at 4-5, though they eventually dropped a first-round game at Seneca.
Click below to hear Mike Pavlichko’s exclusive interview with Matt Bloom upon being approved by the Board of Education as Somerville’s full-time head football coach:
Coach Bloom will do an outstanding job as the head coach of The Ville- IMO if he was the head coach at the beginning of the season the record would have been different- I was saying all year long that they were better than their record and I believe they will be much improved record wise next year- Great job by CJ Sports radio on the covers of BCC sports- GO VILLE!!!!
Nobody can ever match the 85 Ville State Championship Team. Those kids kept it fun and had a ton of class and made their first year coach look like a genius. Jerry’s orphans. They taught the coaches that year.