This
Date in Blue Devil Football
•
October 25th •
By
BOB MILLER
Daily Herald Sports Editor
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On October 25, 1968,
Bellwood-Antis defeated Central High School at Bellwood Memorial Stadium
to extend their record to 5-2-1.
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Bellwood-Antis would finish 5-3-2 for head coach Chet Dillen in 1968,
including a pair of 0-0 ties.
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Central (6-1), once beaten and both the top scoring and top defensive
team in Blair County was turned aside by the Blue Devils.
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B-A kept the Scarlet Dragons out of the endzone in the battle between
the top two defensive squads in the county. There was no score in the
first half, befitting the two teams defenses.
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In the third quarter, with seven minutes elapsed B-A speedster Chris Edmondson
broke through the middle and raced 68 yards to break up the scoreless
struggle and put the Blue Devils in front for good. Two plays earlier,
Larry Wyland’s pass interception set up the ball at the BA-30.
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In the fourth quarter, it was Edmondson again with the heroics. First,
he gobbled up a fumbled punt at the Central-5. Then he ran it in for a
touchdown on the first call from scrimmage. Quarterback Jim DelGrosso
rushed for the extra point to set the final score at 13-0.
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Senior Dan Davinsizer led the Blue Devils in rushing in 1968 with 570
yards on 141 carries with Edmondson, a junior, close behind with 546 yards
on 123 carries. Edmondson led the team in scoring with six TDs and five
PATs for 41 points and in a switch in order, Davinsizer was second with
five TDs and four extra points for 34 points.
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Bellwood-Antis defeated Central 37-13 on October 25, 1963
for their eighth straight win of the year and 15th of their last 16 going
back to the 1962 season.
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Central was able to do something no other 1963 Blue Devil rival had done.
The Scarlet Dragons scored twice and held the high-powered Bellwood-Antis
offense below 40 points for the first time in five contests.
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The touchdown tandem of Walter Rhoades and Bill Cherry combined for five
touchdowns, five extra points and 334 yards rushing between them.
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Cherry put B-A on the scoreboard at Roaring Spring Athletic Field, crashing
in for a two-yard score and Rhoades ran for the PAT. Central had stopped
the Blue Devils on a fourth down and six at the Dragons-14, but B-A got
new life on an unnecessary roughness penalty.
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Central ran the kickoff back 90 yards for their first score before the
B-A fans had a chance to stop cheering for the B-A touchdown.
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The Blue Devils of coach Chet Dillen, then promptly drove 80 yards down
the field for another score to take control. Rhoades motored the last
eight yards for the TD and Cherry added the PAT rush.
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Cherry notched his second TD gain blasting in from his fullback spot in
the Blue Devils’ Single-Wing formation from two yards out. A 22-yard
pass play from Rhoades to Warren Wilson was the key. Rhoades rushed for
the PAT and a 21-7 halftime advantage.
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In the third quarter, Central turned the ball over on a Bill Cherry interception,
which was returned six yards to the C-19. Rhoades covered the final nine
yards for the TD and Cherry rushed for the extra point.
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The Scarlet Dragons drove 54 yards in just three plays to become the first
opponent to score two TDs against the B-A defense.
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Bellwood-Antis capped the scoring with a 50-yard drive. Cherry, who totaled
144 yards on 23 carries, rushed for gains of 13 and 16 yards and Rhoades,
who carried 24 times for 190 yards, finished up with the 12-yard TD. Cherry
added the PAT.
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The Blue Devils were scheduled to play Lewistown on October 25, 1957,
but the game was canceled.
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Dwight Troutman, Bellwood-Antis High School principal, requested the cancellation,
saying that at midweek 240 students were out of school as an influenza
epidemic ravaged the area. Troutman said that the football team had been
hit especially hard. Nearly all the illness had been attributed to the
flu.
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A week earlier the game with Captain Jack Joint High School of Mount Union
had also been called off. That was at the request of the Captain Jack
principal. At the time, Troutman reported that the illness had not yet
affected the Bellwood-Antis district.
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There was a new head coach at B-A in 1957. Walter Galbreath, a graduate
of Altoona had immediately gone into the Army following his high school
graduation for two years before continuing his college education at Shippensburg
State Teachers College where he played for four years as a quarterback.
Then coach Galbreath became the first coach at Bald Eagle Area as the
Eagles started a football program. He coached at BEA from 1952-55 before
moving on to Coatesville as the head football coach there before coming
to Bellwood.
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Assistant coach Earl “Red” Henry had played football at Bellwood-Antis,
where he was one of the greatest centers in the history of Bellwood-Antis
football and then at Catawba. Henry coached at Morrison’s Cove in
1956 after serving four years in the Air Force. Henry was back at his
alma mater for the first year and was teaching history and geography.
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Also assisting in his 10th year on the staff was George Guyer. The 1936
Roaring Spring grad attended Penn State and graduated from Franklin and
Marshall in 1940. He began teaching and coaching at Bellwood-Antis in
1945. Since that time he had been the head track coach as well as assisting
the football team. In 1957, he was also guiding the new junior varsity,
which had a regular schedule for the first time separate from the varsity.
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During the 1941
football season, an infantile paralysis quarantine forced many area-wide
teams to cancel or postpone the early portion of their schedules.
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On October 25, Bellwood-Antis played Bedford at Bellwood where
the Blue Devils returned the favor with an 18-0 triumph over the Bisons.
Bedford had won the first game in the series, a year earlier with a 7-0
shutout in 1940.
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Bob
Killen was the head coach of the Blue Devils and Lew Myers and Tim Nolan
were his assistants. There were 45 boys on the roster. B-A opened the
season with a win over Bigler Township (21-0), now part of the Moshannon
Valley School District, but then lost four straight games to Tyrone (18-7),
Lock Haven (43-0) Saxton-Liberty (7-0) and Mount Union (6-0).
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Near the end of the first half, Dean Halbritter intercepted a Bedford
aerial and ran the pick back for a 45-yard touchdown.
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On the following kickoff, Bedford fumbled the ball at the Bisons’
own two-yard line where the Blue Devils Joe Garman scooped up the ball
and scored a fast TD practically before the B-A fans knew what was happening.
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After no score through nearly the entire first half, in two plays, Bellwood-Antis
had jumped out to a 12-0 lead.
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The final tally for the Blue Devils of head coach Bob Killen and assistants
Lew Myers and recently added Tim Nolan, a Lock Haven Teacher’s College
grad, came in the fourth quarter.
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With about two minutes left in the game, Blue Devil quarterback Charles
Rowan tossed a pass to speedster Steve Hatfield for a 30-yard touchdown
pass to cap the score.
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Bellwood-Antis had lost their previous three games by shutout and would
finish 5-5 in Killen’s last year at the helm. One year later, Duke
Burkholder would start what was to be the beginning of a legend at Bellwood-Antis.
