close

Chartiers-Houston’s Bucs beat ’em all in 1968

4 min read

The 1968 Chartiers-Houston High School football team was a talented one. The Buccaneers featured an outstanding running back in Jerry Patterson, a solid offensive line and stingy defense.

The defense held its 10 opponents to a total of 45 points. That included four shutouts and two points scored by Peters Township in the opening game of the regular season.

“We knew before the start of the season that we had the talent to win a lot of games,” said Joe Ciferno, the Bucs’ defensive coordinator.

“We had some kids like Jim Neuman, Pete Suwak and Tom Russell, they played both sides of the ball. Looking back, those guys played together in 1965 as members of the junior varsity and went unbeaten. We knew we may have something special down the road.”

Ciferno felt a lot of the team’s success came from the coaching ability of Don Clendaniel.

“He was always cool, always calm. I was a nutcase.” Ciferno said. “Coach always pressed the right buttons. We always seemed to get off to a good start in our games. We scored a lot of points. On a number of occasions, we would sit a lot of our starters in the second quarter. We didn’t want to run up the score.

“Our offense was very good, but our defense made life miserable for the opposing team. Jim Neuman led the way, playing inside tackle in the 4-4.”

Then there was Patterson, who was the first 4,000-yard career rusher in WPIAL history.

“He was great,” said teammate Joe Politan. “He was a gifted athlete. He had great vision … great balance. He didn’t get the headlines because down the road there was a great running back from Canon-McMillan, Doug Kotar.”

“We were an extremely talented team,” Patterson said. “We knew what it took to win games.”

Patterson admitted he wasn’t the best practice player but turned on it for games.

“Well, I was hard-headed,” he said. “The coaches were needed to light my fire.

“Mr. Clendaniel was one of the greatest men I’ve ever known. If it wasn’t for him, I would not have been a successful athlete and man. I loved the guy. He was my mentor.”

Clendaniel knew that when the lights came on, Patterson would perform.

“He hardly ever practiced,” Ciferno recalled. “Jerry would sit with the guys on the bench and play games. Coach Clendaniel reminded us (coaches) not to worry because on Game Day, Patterson could score four touchdowns. He was the fastest back I’ve ever seen. He was awesome.”

“We had another running back with exceptional speed, Charlie Edwards,” Politan said, “He was as fast as Jerry.”

The Bucs ended the season unbeaten and played Oakmont in the WPIAL Class B championship game at Gateway High School in Monroeville. Oaklmont entered the game with one loss but had five shutouts and allowed only 51 points all season.

“They were good, but we were much better,” Ciferno said.

“The field was in poor condition,” Politan recalled. “It was muddy and sloppy; we were the underdogs. But we just strapped it on and went after them.”

The result was a 31-0 win for Chartiers-Houston. Patterson rushed for 200 yards and scored on runs of 9, 3 and 2 yards, capping off a season in which he rushed for 1,555 yards and scored 23 touchdowns. The Bucs outscored their opponents, 330-46.

How good was this team?

“There were only a handful of teams in our section, so we played five Class A teams and beat them all,” Patterson said. “We crushed them.”

Bill DiFabio writes a bi-weekly Sunday column on local sports history for the Observer-Reporter.

CUSTOMER LOGIN

If you have an account and are registered for online access, sign in with your email address and password below.

NEW CUSTOMERS/UNREGISTERED ACCOUNTS

Never been a subscriber and want to subscribe, click the Subscribe button below.

Starting at $3.75/week.

Subscribe Today