Bench hopes to grow culture, numbers at Shenandoah Valley
Shenandoah Valley's offense runs a play during practice Wednesday morning.
SHENANDOAH — Dave Bench knows the odds are stacked against him.
Shenandoah Valley’s rookie head coach inherits a program that has posted 11 consecutive losing seasons and one that fights low numbers on an annual basis.
The 45-year-old has a plan, however. And it starts with promoting the program in the community.
“It’s going to take time to grow a new culture,” Bench said Wednesday as his team went through morning workouts. “We’re just hoping we can do something different, where more kids come out and we get bigger numbers.
“You do that by going around town, talking to more people. The more you’re around, the more you can get buy-in from parents and kids knowing, ‘Hey that’s the football coach.’ ”
Bench is a familiar face among Shenandoah Valley athletics, in several different sports. A 1997 Hazleton Area graduate, Bench is entering his 10th season overall with Shenandoah football, previously coaching at the midget, junior high and varsity levels.
The Shenandoah Heights resident has also coached girls’ softball for five years, was the president of the Shenandoah Little League for a time, coached two seasons of junior high boys’ basketball, two seasons with the Shenandoah Teener baseball team and was a North Schuylkill biddy basketball coach for six years.
Bench is employed as the director of supply chain logistics for Bimbo Bakery, managing 17 different brands on the East Coast, including Stroehmann, Entenmann’s, Arnolds, Ballpark, Maier’s, Sara Lee and Thomas’. His son, Ethan, is a freshman quarterback/defensive end on this year’s squad.
“I’ve coached some of these kids since they were in kindergarten,” Bench said. “I’ve grown up with them. Knowing them, not wanting to turn my back and give up on them, that’s how I stuck it out. They’re a great bunch of kids.”
Shenandoah has had some success in recent years in the Tri-County Midget Football League and went 7-1 two years ago at the junior high level.
Getting players from those age groups interested in playing varsity football so they stick with the sport when they get to high school is a main goal for Bench moving forward.
“I’m always interacting with the younger teams down below,” Bench said. “I’m going down there once or twice a week when they’re practicing just to talk to people, getting more people to buy-in and stick it out.
“When you get to that 12-, 13-year-old mark, that’s when you see a lot of kids dropping out of sports. Hopefully we can keep them more engaged, have them stick with it and continue with it.”
Winning football games would also help Shenandoah Valley build its numbers.
Shenandoah Valley has gone 12-101 over the past 11 campaigns, a stretch that included a 34-game losing streak from Week 4 of the 2017 season to a Week 7 win over Col-Mon Vo-Tech in 2020.
The Blue Devils haven’t had a winning season since 2012, when Shenandoah Valley went 7-4 overall, 5-3 in the Anthracite Football League, and lost to Williams Valley in the District 11 Class A semifinals.
The season was Nick Sajone’s final season with the Devils, going 64-40 in nine years at the helm. Shenandoah Valley has had four head coaches since — Randy Maksimik (2013-14, 2-19), Kevin Bolinsky (2015-16, 3-18), Kevin Keating (2017-19, 1-30) and Ed Moran (2020-23, 6-34).
Shenandoah Valley was 2-9 a year ago, 0-5 in the Blue Division of the Schuylkill/Colonial Football Cooperative.
“A lot of our (assistant) coaches played on those better teams back in the day. They live here, they’ve played college ball,” said Bench, who is assisted by Mark Palubinsky, Glenn Weist, Noah Allegretta, Mike Elchisak, Angelo Maskornick, Nick Reese, Joe Alshefski, William Burke and Shea Mealia.
“A lot of these kids don’t know the past (history) of Shenandoah Valley football, unfortunately,” Bench continued. “So we’ll give ’em some history and hopefully they want to build their own story. It’s your story, build it. Everybody has their own story for football.
“The past is the past. We did our thing in the past. Can we grow and learn from that, hopefully yes. Let’s create our own story.”
For 2024, Shenandoah Valley has a roster of 30 players that includes eight seniors, three juniors, eight sophomores and 11 freshmen.
The Blue Devils must replace two big cogs from last year’s squad as quarterback Ben Dempster and wide receiver Nick Ryan were among several key players lost to graduation.
Dempster threw for 821 yards and 11 touchdowns last season, with 46 of his 56 pass completions going to Ryan. Ryan hauled in 46 passes for 775 yards and 11 TDs last season, finishing his career as Shenandoah Valley’s all-time leading receiver with 130 receptions for 2,231 yards and 26 TDs. As a junior, Ryan had 50 receptions for 879 yards and 10 scores.
Senior Tristan Karosas will take over as the Blue Devils’ quarterback, with senior Jeremy Thomas, sophomore Joel Nunez and sophomore Mike Elchisak expected to split carries in the backfield at running back.
Sophomores Jonnuel Reyes and Todd Seiger and freshman Gene Sinkus will man the wide receiver spots, with sophomore David Burrous returning at tight end. Seniors Brayden Lutz, Ivan Ramirez, Isiah Rodriguez and Christopher Castro give Shenandoah Valley an experienced offensive line.
“It’s been pretty fun so far. Being the starting quarterback for the first year, I’m really excited for it,” said Karosas, who completed 8-of-20 passes for 96 yards and a touchdown in a backup role last season. “Shenandoah football is a really big thing in the town. It would mean a lot to have a successful season.”
Elchisak is expected to lead the defense from his linebacker spot. Sophomore Sam Mentusky, who had a strong season a year ago as a freshman, returns as Shenandoah Valley’s kicker and punter.
“Defensively, Mike Elchisak is a sophomore and a very aggressive linebacker,” Bench said. “He was one of our leading tacklers as a freshman last year. Obviously, he has another year under his belt and we expect big things out of him. He’s a very athletic kid.
“We have a good 7-8 kids to build around and go from there.”
