Commentary
Sankovich to be recognized for pioneering Falcons’ baseball success When Connellsville hosts Albert Gallatin on Thursday it will be more than a game to close Section 2-AAA baseball play for both teams and the final home appearance for the Falcons this season.
It will also be more than a day to recognize the seniors who will be playing their last game ever at home in Blue and White livery. It will also be a day to recognize the school’s all-time winning baseball coach.
The Falcon Baseball Parents Association will also honor Tom Sankovich, the first and winningest baseball coach the school has ever had. “Sank” said recently that he would also retire from teaching after almost 40 years with the former Dunbar Township High School and the current Connellsville Area School District.
When baseball was added to the Connellsville athletic program in 1971, Sank was the first coach, and under him it was nothing but success for the Falcons. That has continued after his retirement from coaching and succession by Bob Renzi, the current coach.
I don’t know how many other schools can make this statement, but in the entire existence of its baseball program, Connellsville has never had a losing season. The closest the Falcons came was two years ago, with a 10-10 finish, and they still won the section title. That was also the only season that has been a double-figure losing one. The 1983 and 1998 teams lost nine games, but until two years ago that was the closest any CAHS team had ever come to losing in double figures.
In its total existence, the Connellsville baseball program won 19 section titles, four WPIAL championships and in 1989 the Falcons finished 26-1 on the season, sweeping the section, WPIAL and state championships.
Going into this season, the program had a record of 591 wins and 172 losses, increased to 604-173 at this writing. That figures out to an average of better than three wins for every loss. Of that total, Sankovich guided the Falcons to 422 wins and 105 losses. Renzi is 182-65 since taking over in 1991.
A dozen of Sank’s teams won 20 or more games, and the 1976 section champs won 31. The 1973 team was his first section and WPIAL winner, and had the state playoffs been in effect then, there has never been any doubt in my mind that the ’73 lineup would have been the school’s first state champion. Of all the teams I ever covered, I’m as certain as can be that the 1973 Falcons and the 1970 Mount Pleasant WPIAL champs would have also been state winners.
There was a time when schools could schedule any number of baseball games, but now the PIAA limits them to 22 regular season games. Strange, isn’t it, that the PIAA will rigidly enforce the rule allowing only X-number of regular games, played out in the open where everybody can see them, but then will look the other way when football coaches schedule sneaky, hidden, illegal pre-season camp scrimmages from which the public is barred. And then overrule the WPIAL for taking action against such clandestine doings.
Looking at the Sankovich and Renzi records, one can pose the question of what does it say about working in a school district where they have been able to amass winning records in triple figures, plus Tom Dolde has over 400 wins as Falcon wrestling coach (an all-time WPIAL record as well), Dan Spanish is closing in on 200 football wins, Hal Weightman had 260-plus basketball wins and Jim Sherbondy just missed 100 in his basketball tenure.
It’s a record of success, and I certainly have enjoyed covering that long tenure and working with those successful coaches. It will be great to see Sank recognized, but at the same time knowing that this will be the last season of working with him in a scholastic sense.
There is still the Bud Murphy’s baseball team in the County League, and it’s never a dull game when Sank is on the coaching lines.
Jim Kriek is a Herald-Standard sports correspondent.