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Mount Union 35 Capital 7 by Dick Ross |
SOMETHING BIG On the final morning of Daylight Savings time, the sun was up later than usual due, in part, to the season and to a steady drizzle on the west side of Cleveland. Just about the time we finished loading all the heavier jackets and rain gear into the car, the rain stopped. The sun finally peeked between the clouds enough to start turning off the streetlights as we headed east on I-90. Fall colors shown, with the sun, along the way. Crimson reds, brilliant oranges, tans, deep browns, bright yellows, and some greens were displayed at their peak, or just a tad past as the overnight rains had brought many leaves to the ground, leaving some trees with just their winter skeletons.
Arriving in Alliance just before 11:00 a.m., I got one of the last legal
parking spots in the student lots, out beyond Shields Hall, the second new
dorm behind the Campus Center and joined the crowd at the buffet.
Front page news in Alliance today was the tenth birthday of our team mascot, MUCaw, the purple parrot, in conjunction with the NCAA's "Take a kid to the game" day. According to Jack Weber's story in "The Review," the idea originally came from College Vice President Harry Paidas when he observed how his younger children reacted to the Mascots at sporting events.
"First we had to define what our Raider was," said Paidas. A pirate, a
medieval knight or an "Indiana Jones" type character might not appeal to the
kids. At the time the Raiders defense was known as "The Purple People
Eaters" after a 1950's song by Sheb Wooley. The sketches of the "one eyed,
one horned, When the first prototype was unveiled, the college had no intention of naming the bird, until it was suggested to Paidas that some species of Macaw, a large South American parrot, are in fact purple. Paidas made the connection, changed the first "a" to "u," capitalized three letters to come up with "MUCaw" and the rest, as they say, is history.
Over the past ten years the mascot, which originally appeared in a baseball
cap, has become more purple and has had subtle changes to increase its
visibility (from inside) and mobility. Though the figure is
In the interests of gender equality there have been some guest appearances by males in the costume. There is one unconfirmed report that a rambunctious visiting mascot, who had been playing overly rough, discovered that one of Don Montgomery's wrestlers had been substituted at the half. MUCaw, who is traditionally mute, declined to comment for the story.
Our opponent today is Capital, founded as a Lutheran Seminary in Canton, in
1830, admitting only men and teaching all classes in German. Prior to
World War I, German was much more of a second language, in this country,
than Spanish is today. Two years later, in a period of financial trouble, Columbus offered $500 more than Canton for the privilege of hosting the school. In 1850, after settling in Columbus and a couple of moves inside Columbus, the seminary was chartered as Capital University in 1850 and moved again. In 1875 the university moved to its current location in the rural town of Bexley on the banks of Alum Creek which, further north, is also the western border of Otterbein. In 1918, after 88 years, Capital admitted women and hasn't moved since. Guess that's part of the difference between finding God and finally finding women. Capital arrived at today's contest 6-0 and tied for the lead in the OAC. In recognition that this game could be the conference title game, Mount Union broke out their black jerseys, with purple numbers and trousers, an outfit usually reserved for playoff games. Capital has a variant on this outfit, purple jerseys with black numerals and black pants, worn at home. Today they brought the black trousers and white jerseys with black numerals and three black stripes on the shoulders.
The Mount Union College Marching Band took the field and introduced their senior members, mostly four-year starters and foretold the afternoon by playing "This Could be the Start of Something Big," as the team took their position behind the women's restroom, outside the south tunnel. The crowd stood, clapped and sang while the purple and black team poured onto the field, still coming after three choruses, so they played another for the guys brining up the rear, the assistant coaches and trainers. The weather which we had feared would be cold and rainy peaked in the low sixties. Shirtsleeve weather for the crowd of 4,832, at least until halftime.
Capital won the coin toss and "deferred." Mount Union took the ball
and headed into the wind coming out of what I used to call the Dairy Isle
corner, now long vacant. Injuries to co-starters #12 Sr. QB Jesse
Burghardt of Uniontown/Lake and # 22 Jr. RB Jeff Strauch of Avon Lake both
seemed to turn out more serious than first thought and the first drive,
against the mild wind, was mostly # 8 Jr. QB Zac Bruney of Martins Ferry
handing to # 34 Jr. RB Ricky Ciccone of Coshocton, establishing the run
against a team that Because of a holding penalty Capital started from their own 10-yard line led by second year freshman QB #2 "Rocky" Pentello of Columbus/Westerville South who was "redshirted" last year after an injury five minutes into his first game. They were using a "hurry up" no huddle offense that, at times, seemed to confuse them as much as us. After gaining to their 36-yard line, Capital had to call "Time" to get organized.
When play resumed, the Crusader quarterback scrambled backwards, while
Mount's # 5 So. DL Justen Stickley of Massillon/Jackson slipped his block,
went high, batted down the ball, pulled it in, hit the ground running and
was into the end zone, in less time than it takes to tell about it, with
Wilders adding the point. If there could be a "turning point" so early
in the game, this was it.
To their credit, Capital staged an extended drive all the way back to the
Mount Union one-yard line on the north end, where they again called "time"
after two unsuccessful tailback dives. The next play was a quarterback
keeper. Pentello headed left, then right , slicing back into the goal
line confusion. Suddenly everyone was waving their arms in the air,
with conflicting signals of triumph, while the referees concentrated on
unwrapping the ball. There were varying accounts after the unpiling,
but the ball was stopped short of the goal line by #90 Jr. DT Josh Ludwig of
East Liverpool, the fumble was forced by # 97 So. DT Jesse Wells of
Caldwell/Shenandoah and recovered by #16 Sr. DB Matt Caponi of
Pittsburgh/Baldwin, all of whom were assisted by # 99 Sr. DE Johnny Josef of
Mogadore, who was there in the center of it all.
Most of the second period was spent with the Mount defense chasing the
Capital quarterback around in circles, behind the line of scrimmage.
The guy seemed to have eyes in the back of his head and with a bit
The Raiders managed to put together one more long drive, going 72 yards in
10 plays, climaxed by a four-yard Bruney pass to #46 Sr. RB Brian Miller of
Orrville up in the McMaster Hall corner while the band circled the field, at
the opposite end, to get ready for their halftime show and storm clouds
gathered. The band presented another rousing halftime show while I visited around the south end and talked with cheerleading coach Stephanie Unkrich, who told me that she still has seats left on the cheerleader's bus to Wilmington, in three weeks, for the final game of the regular season. You can contact her through the college.
The third period included more clouds, thunder and reports of lightening
from the press box, and two long Capital drives. Only one of the
Crusader drives drew points, an 11-play, 78-yard effort that briefly
narrowed the margin to 14.
In less than two minutes, Mount Union came right back with long passes to
Hanley, #25 Sr. WR Nick Sirianni of Jamestown, NY, and a touchdown pass to
#82 Sr. WR Randell Knapp of Kent/Field, that returned the margin to three
touchdowns as the thunder and lightening seemed to pass to the north and
west of us.
As the fourth quarter opened Pentello, Capital's quarterback, seemed to be
seriously injured along the west sideline, trying to "make something happen"
on a fourth and 15. After he was helped off, Mount Union took the ball
to the south with a drive that consisted of 12 running plays by Bruney,
Miller and Ciccone, with Bruney scoring on an 11-yard quarterback bootleg
sweep. With Strauch and Burghardt out, and "job sharing" ended, at
least temporarily, Ciccone and Bruney both pulled ahead in the "to date"
statistics, with Ciccone becoming the first Raider to rush for more than 100
yards, this year. Bruney had 80 yards rushing on top of 173 yards
passing and three touchdowns, leading four drives of over 70 yards each.
The win extends our string to 49 wins, longest current streak in college
football. Next week Mount fans will "gather by the river" for our
annual meeting with the Marietta Pioneers, while Capital will play
Baldwin-Wallace for second place in the OAC and a possible ticket to the
post season. Next home game is in two weeks, Saturday, November 8th,
vs. Ohio Northern. The Bears have been wounded and have suffered this
season, let's hope that that does not make them more dangerous than usual.
As always, plenty of good seats available and everyone is welcome at the
pregame buffet. Dick Ross
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Almost a month beyond her official retirement Dorothy Davis, in purple and
white, was manning the "spirit"
table at the entrance to the dining hall where, well beyond his official
retirement, Lloyd Davidson was still
holding forth with the endless chain doughnut machine and his bottomless
coffee pot.
flying, purple people eater" came back "truly terrifying"
according to Paidas. The committee, including Paidas, Sports Information
Director Michael De Matteis and Cheerleading Coach Stephanie Unkrich
decided on a parrot, related to the pirate type raider. They contacted
a Cincinnati firm who came up with a
suggested design, "test marketing" drawings and stuffed toy models on the
children of faculty members and the coaching staff.
genderless,
it has traditionally been inhabited by a female member of the cheering team,
who must pass all
of the other requirements to make the squad. Interestingly, over the
years, some of the gals have chosen to
be totally anonymous, some have been identified, by name, posing inside the
suit and others have been
named and photographed holding the costume's head.
was known as tough to run against. The final four
yards were covered by a Bruney pass to #86 Jr. TE Drew Hanley of
Tiffin/Columbian. The Purple Raiders covered 72 yards, to score in
their first 12 plays, while consuming over a third of the first quarter.
# 48 Jr. PK George Wilders, of Loveland/Kings added the point to put the
home team up by seven and # 11 Jr. K Chad Teague of Orrville handled the
kickoff.
more help, he could be dangerous in the weeks left this year, or in
the years to come.
