The Thanksfelix Bowl

Date: November 30, 2009
Start Time: Probably 1:00 PM
Location: Thomas Fitzwater Elementary School

Attendees
4 Teams (no particular order)

Team 1 (Brian Maggio was captain)
Brian Maggio*
Francis Ferruzzi
Tom Plasket (?)
Mark Pyfer
Zach Jacobs (?)

Team 2 (Mitch Sacks was captain)
Mitch Sacks*
Jarrett Felix
Mitch Silver
Evan Mao
Joe Lauman

Team 3 (I believe Max Massey was captain)
Ian McGrath
Dan Johnson
Max Massey*
Justinas Paskevicius
Charlie Smugar (?)

Team 4 (Ed Brown was captain)
John Miller
Ed Brown*
Pete Schartel
Josh Lowenstern
Todd Warszawski

What I Wrote in 2011's Felix Bowl, A History

For the first time in Felixbowl history Felix was not a captain, and neither was 3 time champion MarkPyfer. There was much hype about the Massey Felix rivalry from the previous bowl, as well as much hype surrounding first time players Evan Mao, John Miller and Pete Schartel. The tournament started with John Miller really making his presence felt by scoring a boat load of early touchdowns. Three squads went 2 and 1 while Pyfer and Maggio’s squad went 0-3 in the regular season. Then came the playoffs, a double elimination tournament to decide the champions.  Massey and McGrath lived up to their #1 seed knocking off the winless Maggio squad, while in the 2^nd straight game Ed Brown and Mitch Sack’s teams battled it out in intense rivalry and once again Miller and Schartel as well as Todd and Josh Lowenstern just proved too much for Silver, Mao, Felix, Sacks and company. So in the winner’s bracket, Massey and his team continued their winning streak and roared on to the finals with a bye, meanwhile Felix’s team edged out Maggio, eliminating them from the tournament. This meant it was a Brown v. Sacks rematch again, the rivalry having been brilliantly built up. Ultimately it was a stunning upset as Felix and his team beat Ed’s team by implementing their wild cat offense and taking down a tired John Miller and maybe slightly injured Pete Schartel. In the championship game the Felix v. McGrath/Massey rivalry was certainly talked about, but proved to not be the story as Felix’s team took a lead into the half behind touchdowns by Silver and Mao, and a key interception by Sacks. In the second half Massey’s team hung tough and battled to within one on the game’s final play. Johnson heaved a bomb downfield which McGrath just couldn’t quite get a grip on. To this day this is the only loss McGrath has in a Felixbowl championship. Meanwhile it is still Felix’s only championship he has won.

What I Remember Now
This tournament was held on my 18th birthday and also provided my first ever Felix Bowl victory. But it was not without controversy. In a classic Felix Bowl set-up, it started with every team playing each other team once. That set up the seeding for a double elimination tournament. So naturally that is a lot of games, many of which don't mean anything.

I remember Ed's team (featuring John Miller) came out the gates very hot and John scored maybe 4 TDs in his Felix Bowl debut. Ed's team and Mitch Sacks's team (AKA my team) had some epic battles as well. We lost to them the first two times we played, but then we played against each other in the semi-finals and defeated them. It seemed kind of silly that we had gotten beat by them twice, but with one victory we were able to get to the finals and there was definitely some arguments about this. Especially because John was not a distance athlete and he didn't quite save himself for the finishing stretch (admittedly its definitely possible the tournament structure may not have been adequately explained upfront).

In the championship, we managed to squeak by with a victory. The Massey/McGrath/Johnson team memorably tried a hail mary at the very end of the game that was barely missed by McGrath and otherwise would have served as a game tying touchdown. Instead, it fell incomplete and I won my first ever Felix Bowl.

Results
Winning Team: Mitch Sacks, Jarrett Felix, Mitch Silver, Evan Mao, Joe Lauman
Runner-Up: Ian McGrath, Dan Johnson, Max Massey, Justinas Paskevicius, Charlie Smugar

Pretty sure it was a one score game, maybe like 4-3 or something

I was still giving out MVPs at this point: Mitch Silver Offensive MVP, Mitch Sacks Defensive MVP

UDXC Bowl

Date: November 2009
Start Time: No clue, but when it doubt 1 PM
Location: Sandy Run Middle School, then Thomas Fitzwater Elementary School

Attendees
2 Teams - One for each of the XC Captains, Desch's Team and Felix's Team

I can't remember who exactly was on which team but I think practically everyone from the team was there: Jarrett Felix, Ryan Desch, Tom Lorenzi, Ed Brown, Francis Ferruzzi, Zach Jacobs, Charlie Smugar, Mitch Silver, Zach Hordeski, Ian McGrath, Brian Maggio, Chris Montague (AKA Desch's cousin), Gilad Gabbay, Dave Lerman, Todd Warszawski, Tom Plasket (?) (AKA Bro-Tom), Andrew Zeng, possibly Matt Rhodes

What I Remember
I mostly just remember this game being a hot mess. Obviously there were a lot of us playing in the game so things were pretty crowded. I think at some point we switched from touch to tackle and then maybe switched back. We also were destroying the muddy Sandy Run Middle School football field (it's always muddy at the Felix Bowl) and some parks person came and kicked us off the field so we all had to drive to Thomas Fitzwater.

Gilad made an awesome catch at some point during the game. Dave got knocked in the face (I think also by Gilad) and had to leave and go get stitches (!). I think Charlie threw a knee into the back of Francis or something like that. Maggio apparently layed Gilad at some point. I also remember Tom Lorenzi caught and pass and was on his way into the endzone for a touchdown before, untouched, fumbling the football.

Results
I'm almost positive Desch's team won, but heck if I know the other details. It sounds like it might have been a close game actually based on Facebook posts that I've read researching this thing

Felix Bowl II

Date: Sometime around January 2009
Start Time: Usually 1 o'clock
Location: Mondauk Park, Fort Washington PA

Attendees
4 Teams - Named for each of the 4 remaining NFL playoff teams (I don't remember which set of guys went with which team so I kind of made it up)

First Felix Bowl with 4 Teams

Ravens
Gilad Gabbay*

Steelers
Eric Lau*

Cardinals
Jarrett Felix*
Dave Lerman
Brett Tannenbaum
Mitch Silver
Justinas Paskevicius (?)

Eagles
Mark Pyfer*
Matt Sidell/Ian McGrath
Charlie Smugar
Connor McCann (?)
Max Massey

Miscellaneous Players I believe were in attendance
Todd Warszawski, Matt Gordon, Seung Ho Choi, Terry Park, Ed Brown, Bryan Brown, Jake Rondinaro and Jack Mao apparently, for whatever reason I feel like this is the one Felix Bowl that Mitch Sacks didn't make it to, I'm speculating some others involved were Ben Razon, Tim Robinson and Joe Lauman, maybe one or two more as well

What I Wrote in 2011's Felix Bowl, A History

The first Felixbowl ever featuring more than 2 teams, the 4 team set up was held around the end of the NFL schedule on a snowy day towards the end of Winter Break. In classic Felixbowl fashion the ground started off covered in snow, but as the day turned sunny, the ice was broken up into a slush, and the fields were playable enough to hold the tournament. The original 4 teams were drafted and then the tournament started, however, after the first round of games the unexpected arrival of Max Massey and Matt Gordon slowed the tournament to a dramatic halt, that included a frustrated bit of yelling from the league commissioner. Ultimately, Felix chose to keep his team, and not enter the redraft. Felix’s team went on to maintain a perfect record for the rest of the regular season (each team played each other team once), while the newly revamped Mark Pyfer team (who played Felix’s team before the redraft and lost), also won their remaining two regular season games. After the first round of the playoffs the finals was as expected: Pyfer vs. Felix for the championship for the third straight year. Pyfer’s team lost key wide receiver Matt Sidell in the opening round of the playoffs after a rough slipping injury on the slushy fields, but the arrival of Ian McGrath, fresh off an intramural basketball game, gave Pyfer a new wide receiver to replace Sidell. Quarterback Max Massey had made a splash in the tournament as well, his aggressive blitz style rattled Felix from the beginning of the game. Things were definitely a bit chippy between Massey and Felix, especially after Massey threaded the needle to Ian McGrath and sacked Felix, grabbing a bit of his shirt in the process to frustrate the captain. Ultimately McGrath’s opening drive touchdown ended up being the only score of the game, as a smaller field and shut down defense on Dave Lerman stifled the opposing offense. On the last play of the game, Dave Lerman, replacing Felix as QB, threw up a potential game tying bomb down field: Mitch Silver dived into a puddle to try and catch it, but ultimately his effort was for naught, and Pyfer and company held on to win the title. It was Pyfer’s record 3^rd title as captain.

What I Remember
This wasn't one of my proudest moments, but I remember we originally drafted teams and my team was excellent. We rolled through our first game and I was feeling really good about my chances for victory. Then, in their Felix Bowl debuts Max Massey and Matt Gordon showed up. Now I don't think I had invited them personally, but I didn't mind that they came. The problem was that they came late and we had already picked teams. So now we had to re-pick teams and I got very angry. This also spawned the alleged Massey vs. Felix rivalry of this era of Felix Bowls.

I think I maybe gave up one member of my original team, but kept the rest and left everyone else redraft (can't remember the exact details). My team made it to the finals where we were playing against a familiar foe in Mark's team. Now Mark's team lost a significant player in Matt Sidell (reigning Offensive MVP of the Birthday Bowl) after he wiped out in a pile of melted snow (oh yeah, I forgot to mention the field was half covered in melting snow). Fortunately, Ian McGrath showed up from his intramural basketball game and he was able to sub in and take Sidell's place for the championship game. We also had to switch fields because we had absolutely destroyed the two previously used fields.

McGrath scored the only TD in the championship game on the first possession. The rest of the game was scoreless. The game included memorable moments such as me calling a timeout to take off my sweatpants and, even though nobody was being strict about it but me, not being able to get my shoes back on before the timeout was over so I played a snap or two barefoot in really cold, muddy, melted snow. Then later I mistook my sweatpants for the endzone marker and we missed out on a touchdown because of it. On the games final play, we launched a Hail Mary to Mitch Silver who tried to make a diving catch into a pile of mud. He didn't make the catch, but his heroic attempt inspired future generations of Felix Bowl players.

Results
Winning Team: Mark Pyfer, Matt Sidell*, Ian McGrath*, Max Massey, Charlie Smugar, Connor McCann
Runners Up: Jarrett Felix, Dave Lerman, Brett Tannenbaum, Mitch Silver, Justinas Paskevicius

Championship Score: 1-0

Co-Offensive MVP: Ian McGrath, Dave Lerman, Defensive MVP: Max Massey