Former Fostoria Senior football coach Dick Kidwell told me something once about high school football that I have never forgotten.
I was standing next to him on the sidelines in 1996 at Massilon Paul Brown Tiger Stadium, minutes before his Redmen team kicked off the Division II state title game against heavily favored Akron Buchtel.
The 12-1 Griffins, who lost in the state finals in 1995, had blown through the playoffs, including a 32-10 win in the semifinals against a previously unbeaten Solon team.
The Redmen were also 12-1, but few gave the small-town team a chance against a fast, powerful Buchtel team full of great athletes destined for college football.
Watching the teams warming up, I asked Kidwell how he thought his team would fare. He smiled at me and said, “If we played them 10 times, they would win nine. But we only gotta beat them once.”
The underdog Redmen did just that, taking advantage of early Buchtel mistakes and an unrelenting, unyielding Fostoria defense, shocking the Griffins, 14-6.
“We only gotta beat them once.”
Six powerful words for an underdog.
I am certain by now fans of the Mansfield Senior Tygers and Lucas Cubs are tired of hearing about the amazing Trotwood-Madison Rams and the perennial powerhouse Marion Local Flyers.
Trotwood-Madison has won multiple state titles and posted perfect 15-0 seasons in 2011 and 2017. Marion Local is playing in its ninth straight state title game and has won 10 state titles in the last 20 years.
But guess what?
The Tygers and the Cubs don’t have to play against any of those past-perfect teams and past state champions this weekend. Those teams no longer exist in those configurations.
All Mansfield Senior (13-1) and Lucas (12-2) have to do is beat the current versions of those two schools.
Sports history is replete with underdogs who have knocked off heavy favorites.
— The U.S. men’s hockey team shocked the world with a win over the USSR in the 1980 Olympics, en route to the gold medal in Lake Placid, N.Y.
— The North Carolina State men’s basketball team took down Houston’s Phi Slamma Jamma outfit to win the 1983 NCAA title.
— Appalachian State, then a Division I-AA program, went into Ann Arbor in 2003 and saddened the 5th-ranked Wolverines, 34-32.
— Columbus native James “Buster” Douglas knocked out heavyweight boxing champion “Iron Mike” Tyson in 1990, a previously unbeaten fighter who entered the ring as a 42-1 favorite.
— Back on the hardwood, Villanova shot 78 percent from the field in 1985 in the national title game, beating defending national champion Georgtown and center Patrick Ewing, 66-64.
— In Super Bowl III, the AFL’s New York Jets and quarterback Joe Namath knocked off the NFL champion Baltimore Colts, 16-7, who came in as 18-point favorites. That win started the process which ultimately led to the merger of the two leagues.
I don’t cite these examples because I think either the Tygers or Cubs are those kind of heavy underdogs. They simply are not.
Honestly, I covered my first high school football game 40 years ago and have seen too many great teams to believe such a herculean effort will be required by Mansfield Senior or Lucas this weekend.
These Richland County young men and their coaches have put in all the required work in the weight room, on the practice field, in the classroom and under the stadium lights. They have prepared themselves to win state championships since they were youngsters.
This is the moment for which they have dreamed. They have set Richland County history already this season by earning slots in state title games.
Now, to paraphrase the words of Dick Kidwell, they only gotta do it one more time.
