2025 Shore Sports Insider Football Most Valuable Player – Holmdel’s Jack Cannon
Jack Cannon was already a star in the history of the Holmdel football program.
This season he became a legend.
The senior turned in one of the greatest seasons by a quarterback in New Jersey history and helped the Hornets (9-3) win their first state sectional title in the program’s 53-year history.
Cannon has been selected as the Shore Sports Insider Most Valuable Player as the Shore’s top player after throwing for a school-record 2,747 yards and 30 touchdowns and running for 1,673 yards and 33 touchdowns. His 63 total touchdowns are a single-season state record, passing the mark of 61 set by former Freehold great Ashante Worthy in 2017.
(Photo by Tom Smith/tspimages.com)
Cannon engineered the Shore Conference’s No. 1 offense, which averaged 43.1 points and 433.3 yards per game. No team held Holmdel under 28 points in a game all season.
Cannon had seven games of more than 200 yards passing, with a high of 342 yards and three touchdowns in a win over Marlboro. Holmdel also finished No. 3 in the final Shore Sports Insider Top 12, one of its highest rankings in program history. He had nine 100-yard rushing games, with a high of 200 yards and four touchdowns when the Hornets ended Rumson-Fair Haven’s 15-game winning streak. Cannon averaged 368.3 yards of total offense per game.
In the state playoffs, the Dartmouth recruit ran for 509 yards and 10 touchdowns in four games, while throwing for 897 yards and 13 touchdowns. Holmdel has six state playoff wins in its entire history, and four of them came with Cannon as its starting quarterback over the last two seasons. In a 41-20 win over Seneca that gave Holmdel the Central Jersey Group 3 title, he had 188 yards passing and two touchdowns and ran for 113 yards and two touchdowns.
The two-time, first-team All-Shore selection finished as the school’s all-time leading passer (5,870) and rusher (3,299) while also setting the record for career passing touchdowns (60) and rushing touchdowns (58). His 118 total touchdowns are second in Shore Conference history among quarterbacks behind the 121 by Worthy.
Hold it up high! Jack Cannon and Holmdel celebrate winning the program’s first state sectional title. (Photo by Tom Smith/tspimages.com)
You’re also not going to find a player more connected to Holmdel football history. His father, Scott Cannon, is a former Hornets’ star lineman who played at Murray State, and Scott’s brothers and Jack’s uncles, Gary and John, both played Division I football after starring at Holmdel. John Cannon played nine seasons as a defensive end with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Cannon follows the inaugural SSI MVP, Abdul Turay, who led all of New Jersey in rushing last season at St. John Vianney before transferring to St. Peter’s Prep before this season.
Cannon brought it every week against arguably the toughest regular-season schedule Holmdel has ever played in its history. The Hornets were realigned into the rugged Class A North and finished second behind No. 1 Red Bank Catholic, which they took to the brink in a 29-28 loss. Cannon had 208 yards and a touchdown passing and 92 yards and three touchdowns rushing in the loss.
Holmdel also faced Central Jersey Group 4 champion Brick Memorial, Central Jersey Group 2 semifinalist Rumson-Fair Haven, Class A South co-champion Donovan Catholic and Central Jersey Group 4 finalist Middletown North and went 3-1 in those games. Even in the loss to Brick Memorial, Cannon had 183 yards rushing and five touchdowns and threw for 277 yards.
Plain and simple, he will go down as one of the best Shore Conference quarterbacks to ever play.
Scott Stump is the football editor and a reporter for Shore Sports Insider. He first started covering Shore Conference football in 1999 and has covered basketball, baseball and seemingly every other Shore Conference sport at some point.
Email: scottstump25@gmail.com
