Citizens' Voice from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania • T30

Chargers' coach trying to make most of opportunity SHELDON STEWART Chargers head coach spell at Glassboro State College (now Rowan University) in the late 1980s before leaving due to financial reasons. He served in the U.S. Army from 1990-1996, played for the Army's football team and was named to the All-Army team as a middle linebacker and center. Following his tenure in the service, Stewart spent a training camp with the XFL's New York New Jersey Hitmen in 2000 until a knee injury suffered during a 20-yard shuttle drill ended that experiment. Undeterred, he played four seasons for myriad of Arena Football teams.

In 2004, he tore his labrum while with the Atlantic City CardSharks of the NIFL and retired as a player. In May 2006, a gentleman walked into wearing a polo shirt emblazoned with the logo of the Reading Express, then a member of the AIFL. Kelly Logan, head coach of the Express, wanted to buy a suit for his son. Stewart told Logan of his football background. Logan bought a suit and they exchanged information.

"(Logan) called me around August and said, "Are you still looking to get into coaching?" Stewart recalled. Stewart joined Logan's staff as a quality control assistant. He later followed possible head coaching Stewart recalled. After years of playing second fiddle, Stewart finally got his chance to be head hon-cho. He retired as a mail carrier for the United States Postal Service and moved to Wilkes-Barre.

Like his players, many of whom aspire to a career in Arena Football or the Canadian Football League, Stewart is a dreamer. His goals are lofty; he sees the NFL or Division I college football in his future. Said Stewart: "If you go through life with mediocre dreams, then you'll always be mediocre." By Evan Korn Staff Writer Sheldon Stewart did not travel the traditional road to his first head coaching job. He did not play major college football or serve an apprenticeship under a well-known coach. He did not enter the profession until his late 30s, an unusually late age to begin climbing the cutthroat and ultra-competitive coaching ladder.

Stewart was named head coach of the GDFL's Electric City Chargers in February and has led them to a 3-3 record entering Saturday's game against the New Eng- Logan to the Lehigh Valley Steelhawks, Harrisburg Stampede and, most recently as the defensive coordinator for the York Capitals of the American Indoor Football league (AW). Stewart met Chargers owner Tom Conserette and director of football opera-tionsco-owner Scott Garrity at the AIF league meetings in December, and like his chance meeting with Logan more than six years earlier, fate intervened. "They came up to me and said, 'We like the way you carry yourself and how you speak, and we were wondering if you'd be interested in sitting down with us for a land Soul at McCarthy Stadium. "This is my goal, to coach this team, put a quality staff together and bring a championship here," Stewart said. Stewart was working at a Fashion Superstore in New Jersey in 2006 when fate gave him a second crack at pursuing gridiron glory Stewart played for a short Semi-Pro: Former King's star takes over as Chargers' offensive coordinator The Electric City Chargers play their home games at King's College's McCarthy Stadium.

The Chargers have two remaining home games: Saturday night against the New England Soul and July 27 against the Red City Outlaws. Both games start at 7 p.m. ball," Singleton said. "What other thing do you do in life that you constantly bang your body against a guy two or three times your size and think it's fun?" FROM PAGE 28 The Chargers are a labor of love for Conserette, who retired last year after 37 years working for the Department of Defense. "We've never made a profit," Conserette said.

Neither do the players, each of whom pay a fee of $200, which covers uniforms, sideline fees and footballs. Travel costs and other incidentals are covered through sponsor revenue. As for the ill-fitting Electric City nickname, Conserette said he is considering the Diamond City or Scran-tonWilkes-Barre Chargers moving forward. When he struck a deal with King's College to play at McCarthy Stadium last season, they played their home games at Western Wayne High School the Electric City uniforms and promotional materials had already been ordered. It's football on a shoestring pro running back, a former King's College standout who still holds numerous school records.

He was an angry man during the loss to Lehigh Valley, growing more furious with each failed blocking assignment and scoreless drive. A former Chargers player and a respected figure within the organization, Saxon bellowed instructions from the stands. In the fourth quarter, after Lash's abrupt resignation, he had enough. He charged down from the stands to the sideline and began coaching the offense. "That gave him a lot of brownie points and a lot more respect in my book," Stewart said.

Following the game, Saxon addressed the team at midfield. "We will never not score a point again," Saxon bellowed. "If you give me two hours, I'll give you 21 points!" Two days later, Saxon was named the Chargers' new offensive coordinator. Close to 50 players showed up to the next practice, ready to right the ship that had nearly capsized three days earlier Last Saturday's game against the Capital City Atoms was canceled after the Atoms did not have enough players to field a team; their future in the GDFL is murky according to Conserette. It went in the books as a 21-0 forfeit victory Buckner is expected to replace Davis as the team's starting quarterback Saturday at home against the New England Soul, and Saxon has an extra week to implement his offensive philosophy And just like that, there is hope once again in Charger-land.

DAVE SCHERBENCO FOR THE CITIZENS' VOICE Electric City Chargers' Matt Talerico avoids a Lehigh Valley defender in a game on June 22 at McCarthy Stadium. The Chargers practice twice a week, 6 to 8 p.m. every Tuesday and Thursday on a turf field at the former site of the The Playing Fields Sports Dome in Jessup, which collapsed in 2007. The field is surrounded by beat-up trucks emblazoned with logos ranging from Tuscan Dairy Farms to the Scranton mayoral candidacy of Bob Bolus. On the Thursday before the Lehigh Valley game, only 13 of the 50-plus Chargers players are present for the beginning of practice.

Some are held up in traffic; others are stuck at work. But Stewart and company make do with what they have. "At this level, with the added responsibilities these guys have with jobs, it is tough sometimes," Stewart said." I won't make it into a bed of roses, but at the same time, the reward is there because you get to see the guys understand what they're here to do." The Chargers are chock full of characters, second-chance seekers who revel at the chance to become human battering rams. Singleton is 5-foot-10, 240 pounds and in his fourth season with the team. He doesn't practice much these days, not with a creaky right knee that gave him problems, even before his latest injury Singleton says he has 109 sacks in a semi-pro career that began in 2004 with the Scranton Eagles.

A Newark, N. J. native who starred at Essex Catholic High School in East Orange, Singleton tore his ACL the summer before his senior year. He missed about a month, but never regained the explosiveness that earned him five NCAA Division I scholarship offers. Singleton enrolled at Wilkes, blew out his other knee in the preseason, dropped out and did not play organized football for another seven years.

"For somebody like me, it validates you because you didn't get the experience of playing in college," said Singleton, who proudly wears his 2011 RAFL Championship ring. "It is a second chance for a lot of guys who never got the chance to do anything. I never wanted to be that guy that was 50 years old, wondering what if." Singleton lives with his fiancee Jayme and their three children in Scranton. He works the overnight shift loading trucks for D.W Richards Sons in Moosic and plays football, quite simply because he can't get enough. The head-to-toe aching on Sunday mornings is an occupational hazard.

"You have to be nuts to play foot- Damon Saxon is a longtime semi- WBVOICE CVDAILY 30 070513 WBVOICEPAGES T30 I 070413 20:01 I SUPERIMPSC.