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In 1965, during my sophomore year at Yale, football coach John Pont abruptly resigned to take a more prestigious job at a Big Ten school. Instead of tapping another WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant), the school replaced him with an Italian American, assistant coach Carmen Cozza. I still remember how outraged the alumni were. Yale had always had W...

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As the country remains disgusted and transfixed by another sporting-world child sexual abuse case, HBO released its trailer for Paterno. The film, which debuts this spring, stars the legendary Al Pacino as winningest coach in college football history Joe Paterno, who tumbled abruptly from grace amid evidence that he was aware that his assistant coa...

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Chicago Bears head coach Matt Nagy Friday announced the hiring of Brock Olivo as assistant special teams coach. Olivo comes to the Bears after serving as the special teams coordinator with the Denver Broncos this past season. Prior to that, Olivo worked alongside Nagy in Kansas City from 2014-16 as the Chiefs' assistant special teams coach. During...

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Retired National Football League tight end Marco Antonio Battaglia was born on Jan. 25, 1973, and raised in Howard Beach, Queens. After capping a stellar football career at Rutgers University as a consensus first-team All-American in 1995, Battaglia played for five pro teams in eight seasons. He retired from the NFL after playing for the Carolina P...

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A rocket scientist has blasted his way into the lead to be the Giants' next head coach. The Daily News has learned that all signs are pointing to Matt Patricia, the New England Patriots defensive coordinator with a degree in aeronautical engineering, as the man the Giants will hire to point Big Blue back in the right direction. The Giants' glory da...

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Giorgio Tavecchio’s story is one of those stories that should be told to youngsters. His story is an example of how tenacity and grit in sport, and especially in life in general, can really help dreams come true. Much has been said and written about how he fought to play in the NFL, America’s top-flight American football league, and succeeded in be...

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If you've been outside the U.S. you know that despite whatever the NFL might say, finding someone with an even passing interest in American football isn't always easy. That is, unless you go to Italy and bump into Fausto Batella. Though he's a soccer fan, like pretty much everyone there, Batella is especially passionate about professional American...

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Things have been so bleak for San Francisco in recent years that one successful start by the franchise quarterback of the future was enough to get the 49ers faithful dreaming big. Jimmy Garoppolo is already being compared to greats such as Joe Montana by the fans and talk radio shows after winning his first start for San Francisco, praise he quickl...

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Of the five coaches Vince Promuto played for in his 11-year NFL career – all with the Redskins – the two-time Pro Bowl guard admired Vince Lombardi by far. Despite being a quarter-century apart in age, the two felt a kinship for each other, in large part because of their Italian ethnicity. They were also tough guys from New York City. Lombardi coac...

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Giorgio Tavecchio, a huge international soccer fan, wanted to take home a piece of history from the Oakland Raiders game at historic Estadio Azteca. So the Raiders kicker grabbed a ball that had the NFL In Mexico logo emblazoned upon it when the team arrived back at its headquarters on Monday. Then he wondered if the K-ball he grabbed, labeled No....

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