Our goal at Central Jersey Sports Radio since our founding in 2020 has always been to bring attention to all the great things done by the many outstanding student-athletes in our area, both on and off the field.
Even with Honorable Mentions in each category, just having one each of Offensive, Defensive Special Teams and Two-Way Player of the Year isn’t quite enough to cover the massive 59-team Big Central Conference.
So, in our quest to honor as many great student-athletes as possible, here are our 2024 Central Jersey Sports Radio Specialty Awards:
“Hard Nosed Runner” Award: Sam Dech, Phillipsburg
Last year, it was Jett Genovese and Matthew Scerbo, Jr., receiving the “Dynamic Duo” award. This season, it’s another Phillipsburg football player with a specialty award.
Sam Dech seems to define Phillipsburg football. They all say they live by D.I.G. – Discipline, Ignore the Noise, Grit – but for Dech it’s however much more that can be possible.
Even in a postgame interview, he’ll tell you “that’s what we wanted to do and we just came out and did it.”
Well, they don’t get there without Dech, who is a bruising runner who’s nearly impossible to bring down. Okay, not impossible, but be assured that if you hit him at the ten yard line, he’s going to bring you at least another five yards toward the end zone by the time he’s down.
That was invaluable on a 2025 team that lost Genovese and Scerbo – the second of whom was the school’s all-time leading receiver – as well as fellow receiver Felix Matos to graduation.
Click below to hear Mike Pavlichko talk with Phillipsburg’s Sam Dech:
The “Great Hands” Award: R.J. Wortman, Colonia
Good Hands was already taken, but Wortman is more than good hands. He’s great hands.
Colonia always seems to be a place where things happen without a lot of fan fare. But one day, you turn around, and Tom Roarty has his team in a sectional semifinal game in one of the hallowed grounds of high school football in New Jersey, Maloney Stadium.
The same could be said for R.J. Wortman, who heading into that North 2, Group 4 semi against Phillipsburg, was nearing 100 receptions on the year, and finished with a cool 101. The next highest wasn’t even that close.
They weren’t all long passes from senior QB Dylan Chiera, who threw for over 2,000 yards this season, one of three Middlesex County quarterbacks to do so in 2025. There were a few dinks and dunks in there, but it kept defenses on their toes, that’s for sure, with so many different ways to use him.
Couple that with the fact Wortman is a great teammate. No sooner did he commit to Greg Schiano and Rutgers – where he signed last week and will enroll early in January, skipping his senior season on the basketball court – but he was already active on Twitter, propping up all of his teammates, trying to make sure college coaches take a look at them just like they did with him.
Overall, Wortman finished with 101 catches for 1,307 yards (118.8 per game) with 15 touchdowns for the 7-4 Patriots.
Click below to hear Alec Crouthamel talk with Colonia’s R.J. Wortman:
“Is He A Lineman? Is He a Fullback” Award: Mike Bellamy, Montgomery
Senior Mike Bellamy has football in the family. His father, Joe – owner of Bellamy & Son Paving – played it, and has coached it for years at the youth level in their previous hometown of Piscataway. His brothers Joe and Rocco played for the Chiefs, with Joe on that 2018 team that won the North Jersey Group 5 Bowl Championship, beating Ridgewood at MetLife Stadium to become the first Middlesex County school to go 13-0 in a season, setting a county win record that still holds.
So, it was clear Mike would play football.
He’s an accomplished long-snapper, and has been a solid two-way lineman for a few seasons now. But this year, a new wrinkle was added: he would run the football.
Bellamy’s is not the story of an offensive lineman who fell on a couple of luckily-timed fumbles in the end zone to give his offense a score. No, no. This was all by design.
In fact, Bellamy carried eleven times this season for 38 yards, scoring four touchdowns, one each against Linden and Woodbridge in the regular season, then against Westfield and the Barrons again in the playoffs.
Click below to hear Mike Pavlichko talk with Mike Bellamy of Montgomery:
“I’m Back” Award: Devin Thomas, Plainfield
The last time we saw Devin Thomas the football player, he was quarterbacking the junior varsity at St. Thomas Aquinas, where Donald Jones, now Plainfield’s head coach, was an assistant.
Thomas transferred to Plainfield as a sophomore to represent his hometown, then gave up football to focus on basketball as a junior. It seemed a pretty good decision; Thomas scored in double-figures 12 times, helping lead the Cardinals to a Group 4 championship last March.
When Jones took over as Plainfield head coach last spring, he gauged Thomas’s interest in coming back to the gridiron.
“Why not?”
Six months later, everyone agrees it paid off.
Thomas threw for 2,214 yards and 29 touchdowns. He ran for another 482 yards and 4 scores. Week-in and week-out, Thomas put up video game numbers under center for Plainfield.
He put an exclamation point on his stellar season with a 296-yard, 4-touchdown masterpiece in Plainfield’s final regular season game – a 28-27 come-from-behind win at Linden that clinched the Cardinals’ spot in the North 2, Group 5 playoffs.
Click below to hear Justin Sontupe talk with Devin Thomas of Plainfield:
“Comeback” Award: Jack Kalikas, A.L. Johnson
A.L. Johnson standout athlete Jack Kalikas broke his leg in October 2024. Faced with the same situation, some might wonder if they’d ever play at a high level again.
Not Jack; he wondered if he’d be able to return to play hockey that season.
While that goal proved to be a bit out of reach, it kept him going.
Jack then set his sights on returning for lacrosse in the spring. And although he couldn’t fully come back in time, the determination accelerated the recovery process.
By summer, Jack was full go and back on the football field for A.L. Johnson. On top of that, he’d be playing for his dad, Gus Kalikas, A.L. Johnson’s athletic director-turned-head coach.
Almost one full year after breaking his leg, Jack led A.L. Johnson to a 7-2 record, playing quarterback and linebacker for the Crusaders.
Next up: hockey and lacrosse.
Click below to hear Justin Sontupe talk with Jack Kalikas of A.L. Johnson:
“Body Builder” Award: Brady Gallogly, Piscataway
Originally nominated for the Longevity Award, this one really fit him more.
Brady had always played wide receiver, but an opportunity came up where Piscataway needed a center. Ever the eager freshman, he made the suggestion.
Now, he wasn’t quite dealing with a coach who barely knew him, because his father, Frank Uhrin, is the team’s offensive coordinator. He played at Piscataway, too, as did Brady’s uncle, Robert, who also was a smaller-sized lineman on the 2002 Central Jersey Group 4 championship team, the last to be coached by legend Joe Kuronyi. His uncle, Tommy “Guns” Uhrin, was a skill player for the Chiefs in the 1990s.
But beyond all that, Gallogly had work to do. He only weight 160 pounds at the time, but with weight lifting, diet, and a training regimen, he got where he needed to be and became adept at making all the movements offensive linemen need to make.
Click below to hear Chris Tsakonas talk with Piscataway’s Brady Gallogly:
The “Tough Break for a Record-Breaker” Award: Thomas Diemar, Bernards
Coming into Game Three of the 2026 season, with at least a half-dozen games to go, you’d figure, senior Thomas Diemarr should have blown away the school’s all-time career sack record.
He already had it, with 22: ten each his sophomore and junior seasons, and two already in the first two games. This was his chance to make it nearly untouchable.
Then, in the first quarter, he plants funny in the end zone on a kickoff, with no one around him.
He sorely wanted back in the game, which turned out to be a win over Delaware Valley.
As it turned out, he tore his ACL, and his senior season would be done.
Diemar was a bit surprised when head coach Jon Simoneau picked him for first team All-Patriot Gold Division. But he shouldn’t have been. He deserved it, or he would have had he played.
Coach decided to honor a young man who, himself, has honored and respected the program Simoneau has built. That’s why he got the recognition, and that’s why he gets ours!
Click below to hear Alec Crouthamel talk with Thomas Diemar of Bernards:
The “Sure, I’ll Play Quarterback” Award: Alex Schwark, Summit
The “Best Player Not To Play A Snap” Award: Cole Sabol, Summit
These two awards go hand-in-hand, if you’ll just follow along.
Cole is a multi-sport athlete, and he tore his Achilles last spring in lacrosse, on the very first day of the season. After getting evaluated, he found out he’d also miss football season. That’s when Alex Schwark took the job, having never played it before.
And he did well. In fact, when he got hurt later in the year, the Hilltoppers dropped those two games, then continued winning when he was back in the lineup, three weeks later in a 10-7 win upset at previously-unbeaten Woodbridge.
But Schwark never would have done so well without Sabol, who was nominated for the Leadership Award by Coach Kevin Kostibos. Why? Because he could have walked away and sulked, but instead led the team in practices, meetings, gatherings, and games. He took his teammates under his wing, including Schwark, helping to make him the quarterback he became, even if he was sharing time with Matt McKeever down the stretch, with both of them on the field at the same time.
Click below to hear Alec Crouthamel talk with Summit’s Cole Sabol and Alex Schwark:
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