TIGERS RECALL LOSS FONDLY Thursday, September 26, 2002 By Denny McPherson The Marion Star • • • • •   RICHWOOD -- Most former high school football players have positive memories from their glory days, of great victories, championships or outstanding plays. Ex-Richwood High School gridder Criss Somerlot, however, fondly recalls a game that his Tiger team lost 30-24 to Marion Catholic in 1963. The contest was the final one of that season for Richwood, which in 1965 consolidated with Magnetic Springs, Byhalia and York Center to form the current North Union High School. Another reason for Tiger fans to be fired up was Richwood's improvement from the 1-6-2 mark it posted the year before. The Tigers of the late coach Fritz Drodofsky came into the Nov. 2 clash on Richwood's home field with a 7-1 overall record and one of 5-1 in the now-defunct Mid Ohio Conference. Marion Catholic Their opponent was their biggest rival at the time.  Catholic entered the skirmish with a 7-1 overall ledger but was undefeated at 6-0 in the MOC. For Richwood to claim a share of the conference crown it had to beat an Irish team which featured running backs Steve Chaney, Bob Robbins and Larry Brown.  Those three had combined for 2,435 rushing yards in only eight games. "Chaney, who went on to Notre Dame and then a couple of years later was killed in action in Vietnam, was a great athlete," Somerlot said of the Irish runner for whom the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 7201 lodge in Marion is named. "Larry Brown was a big fullback who was a load to bring down or block, and Robbins had great speed," said Somerlot, a junior lineman on the 1963 squad who is retired from high school teaching and coaching. Somerlot, a resident of Westerville, now sells track and field equipment and will serve as a track coach for the U.S. team in the 2004 Olympic Games in Greece. "They had the horses and they used them," said Bob Webb, who as a sophomore tackle on the Tiger club had to contend with the likes of the Irish ball carriers. "I remember tackling Chaney.  He was tougher than nails, and I barely got him a couple of times," said Webb of the Len Webb Insurance Agency in Marion.  "That was more of a grind-it-out time period, the old Woody Hayes style of moving the football." Another aspect of the contest reminded Somerlot of Hayes, the late Ohio State coach. "It was cold that night, with the temperature in the 30s or 40s, and there was their coach, Max Ross, standing there in a short-sleeve white dress shirt and tie," Somerlot said. First Half Scoring Catholic's ground game helped the Irish to a big first-half lead. Brown scored on runs of 19 and 67 yards in the first quarter, and with two-point conversion runs by Robbins and Chaney, Marion had a 16-0 advantage by the end of the opening period. The Irish made it 22-0 early in the second quarter as quarterback Mike Piacentino scored on a 3-yard run. Richwood finally got on the scoreboard in the second quarter on a 1-yard TD run and a 2-point conversion by senior fullback Harry Marvin. Catholic, however, rounded out the first-half scoring on a 2-yard touchdown run by Robbins and a PAT pass from Piacentino to Kevin Everly to take a 30-8 lead. Sidelined in Third Quarter The Irish lost a lot of their ground attack in the third quarter when Brown went out with a knee injury and Robbins left following a personal foul penalty. Retired mail carrier and former North Union coach John Adams of Richwood, who was a senior tackle on the 1963 squad, also left the game due to injury in the second half.  His resolve to re-enter the heated rivalry was halted by a teammate who was more concerned with his friend's health. "I'd already had a cracked bone in my leg and I got hurt again in the third quarter," Adams said.  "I wanted to go back in, but someone on the team, and I'm not sure who, took my chin strap and I couldn't play." Second Half Scoring The Tigers played much better in the second half, holding Catholic to only 38 rushing yards while outscoring the Irish 16-0. In the third quarter, senior Tiger quarterback Dick Retterer scored a touchdown on a 2-yard run and also ran for the conversion.  In the final period, Retterer passed to sophomore end Jim Veach for an 8-yard TD and connected again with Veach for the 2-point conversion with 8:54 remaining. Somerlot recalled a play that could have turned the tide even more in Richwood's favor. "One of their backs fumbled, I grabbed the ball and I started running," Somerlot said.  "There was nothing but 35 yards of grass between me and the end zone, but the rules then stated no one could advance a fumble and the play was blown dead. "Later the rule was changed and I could only think what might have been." Richwood had a couple more cracks at the Irish end zone late in the contest but couldn't score as Marion Catholic wrapped up its first MOC title since 1954. "If we had had another couple of minutes we might have won it," Adams said. Looking Back Richwood coach Drodofsky told a Marion Star reporter following the game his squad did about all it could to win the contest but came up just short of victory. "We've got no excuses," Drodofsky said.  "We started late and we let them hurt us up the middle.  Our boys went all out, but they couldn't quite get the job done." The 1963 game was the first of seven straight contests between the two teams that helped determine the championship of the MOC. But for Adams, 1963 was the best. "It was the greatest football game I've ever been involved in," Adams said.

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