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Wittenberg players and coaches from the 1973 NCAA
Football Championship team are honored on the field at halftime of
the Sept. 27 home football game.
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SPRINGFIELD, Ohio - Thirty years ago, the Wittenberg
University football team set a new standard for all other small
colleges to follow. The Tigers won the first NCAA Division III
Playoff championship by defeating Juniata 41-0 in Phenix City,
Ala., site of the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl.
The 1973 edition of the football Tigers posted the best
record in school history (12-0) and remains the last Wittenberg
football team to finish the regular season and NCAA Division III
Playoffs undefeated. This weekend, Sept. 26-27, the first football
team in NCAA Division III history to win a national championship
decided not by votes cast in a poll, but by outstanding performance
on the field, will reunite on campus.
More than 30 coaches and players from that team, including
Head Coach Dave Maurer, Assistant Coaches Ron Murphy and Dick
Fahrney and Sports Information Director Don Perkins, are expected
to attend the weekend's festivities. Randy DeMont, the 1973 Hank
Critchfield Award winner as the top defensive back in the Ohio
Athletic Conference, and Steve Drongowski, the 1973 Mike Gregory
Award winner as the most valuable offensive lineman in the OAC,
have organized the event.
"It's a very special time for us," said DeMont, who now lives
in Colorado. "When you look at our team 30 years ago, we were
coming off back-to-back 5-4 seasons. That 1973 team came together
in a very special way.
"We weren't necessarily the best athletes, but we were the
best team. It was enhanced by the fact that the NCAA created the
Division III playoffs. It was a special time in our lives, and the
fact that there has been such a positive response to this reunion
is a testament to that fact."
The weekend's events, which coincide with Parents Weekend at
Wittenberg, begins with storytelling and dinner at 105 Shouvlin
Center on Friday. On Saturday, a special pre-game "tailgate" party
for friends and families is scheduled to take place in the
Hollenbeck Hall Atrium and Ness Auditorium. During halftime of the
Wittenberg-Thomas More football game at Edwards-Maurer Field,
university officials will recognize the 1973 team in a special
ceremony.
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