This chronicle is a biographical construct from various archived personal newspaper interviews, and personal accounts from Bob Liberatore's career as head coach of the Bensalem Owls, Conwell-Egan Eagles, and Archbishop Ryan Raiders Ice Hockey Teams.
By Ross Porubski Youth Hockey Info 1/20/2025
Bob Liberatore grew up in Bensalem, Pennsylvania. As a youngster, he went to his first hockey game in 1967. After having the opportunity to see the Philadelphia Firebirds play at the Cherry Hill Arena he was hooked, and Bob started playing youth hockey around that time. Libertore was a student at Bensalem High School and played for the Owls from 1975 through 1980. After the 1979 - 1980 season with the majority of the players graduating it left the roster decimated. After Bob graduated the Owls played another season in 1980 - 1981 at which time it was determined there would not be enough players to continue forward at season's end.
The team folded and the program ended.
1977-1978 Bensalem Owls
Liberatore moved on to college at Temple University and played in the University YMCA summer league program which was played in Conshohocken. Coincidentally Temple's team name was also the Owl's. After graduating from TU, Bob restarted the Bensalem Owls program as the new founder and head coach of the program in 1982.
He credits Bob Pat, who taught him how to play tennis at the time, for getting him started and headed in the right direction. Two players he looked up to in high school while he played were Perry Rascioli who played for Dellhass and Doug Gould. Professional players that Liberatore looked up to were Bobby Clark and Bernie Parent. Bob also looked up to professional and amateur head coaches, Mike Keenan, Scotty Bowman, Rich Slack, Ken Hitchcock, and EJ Maguire.
After seven seasons at the helm for the Bensalem Owls change came, in 1988 Bob was approached by Rich Slack and was offered an opportunity to work behind the bench as an assistant coach with him as Slack was about to take over the Bishop Egan Eagles head coaching Role. Liberator jumped at the opportunity and accepted without hesitation. Slack confided in Liberatore, "Big things are about to happen." And with that, the two coaches headed off on what would become Bishop / Conwell-Egan Ice Hockey's historic decade-long run of playing among the supreme talents of hockey supremacy in the Lower Bucks County Hockey League.
As assistant to Slack, the Eagles piled up wins. Along with those wins came numerous league titles, and Flyers Cup championships in two different classes.
88-89 - l5-0-2 - League best record - Won Commissioners Cup 89-90 - NO RECORD ON FILE - 2nd place in LBCSHL - Runner-up Commissioners Cup 90-91 - NO RECORD ON FILE - 3rd place in LBCSHL - Lost in playoffs 91-92 - 10-2-1 - 4th place in LBCSHL - Lost in playoffs 92-93 - 15-5-0 - league-best record - Runner-up Commissioners Cup 93-94 - 11-9-1 - 3rd place in LBCSHL - Runner-up Commissioners Cup 94-95 - 19-7-2 - 2nd place in LBCSHL - Runner-up Commissioners Cup 95-96 - 19-0-2 - 2nd place in LBCSHL - Won Commissioners Cup 96-97 - 19-3-1 - 2nd place in LBCSHL - Runner-up Commissioners Cup 97-98 - 22-0-2 - league-best record - Won Commissioners Cup 98-99 - 22-1-1 - league-best record - Won Commissioners Cup
LEAGUE TOTALS
4 - Time league-best record 4 - Time Commissioners Cup Champions 5 - Time Commissioners Cup Runner-up 9 - Time Commissioners Cup appearances in 11 seasons
FLYERS CUP / PENNSYLVANIA CUP
1990 - Won Class A Pennsylvania Cup 1994 - Won Class AA Flyers Cup - Class AA Runner-up Pennsylvania Cup 1995 - Won Class AA Flyers Cup - Class AA Champion Pennsylvania Cup 1999 - Won Class AAA Flyers Cup - Class AAA Champion Pennsylvania Cup
Bob's most memorable moment was winning the Class AAA state championship in 1999.
1999 Conwell-Egan Eagles post-game photo after the states win!
CAREER COACHING HISTORY
Bensalem Owls - Head Coach 1982-1988 Bishop Egan, CEC Eagles - Assistant Coach 1988-1999 Bristol Blazers midget B - Head Coach 2000-2001 Archbishop Ryan Raiders 2002-2005 Conwell-Egan Eagles - Head Coach (second time around) 2006-2007 (CEC folded in 2008)
Bob also had a hand in working with the Flyers Youth Hockey Foundation as a coach. Liberatore had the pleasure of working for the Flyers youth coaching department from 1987 to 1997. During this time he was able to do on-ice clinics with many of the Flyers players, coaches, and staff members and was in the locker room and press area for every home game. Liberatore did coaching seminars, college planning, seminars, player clinics, and elite All-Star games, goals for dollars, and mites on ice. Bob attended the York University international coaching symposium along with many of the Flyers staff, including Mike Keenan, EJ Maguire, Paul Holmgren, Greg Scott, Pat Ferril, and many others. Bob graciously received his advanced coaching certification in 1987. At the time, there were only nine other coaches in the world who had achieved their advanced certification at that time I could be wrong.
Some photos from Flyers Youth Foundation - Click on the images to increase the size
