Going for 1,000
The University of Dayton football team will play the 1,000th game in program history Saturday at Valparaiso. A look at Flyers football by the numbers:
627
Victories, along with 345 losses and 27 ties.
38
NFL players produced by UD, including center and guard Bob DeMarco, who had a distinguished 15-year career from 1961-75 (the longest among any ex-Flyers).
5
Super Bowls won by UD alumni who became NFL coaches, Chuck Noll (4) and Jon Gruden (1).
2
Coaches in the College Football Hall of Fame, Harry Baujan and Mike Kelly.
Mike Kelly was on the sidelines for 348 football games for the University of Dayton during his Hall of Fame coaching career. And while 285 of those outings ended in wins, the game that sticks out most for Kelly was a crushing defeat.
It was a near-upset of Iowa State on the road in 1977 and included clutch field goals, appreciative applause for the Flyers from the Cyclones fans and a halftime tirade by opposing coach Earle Bruce, whose next career stop was Ohio State.
UD will be playing the 1,000th game in program history when it travels to Valparaiso on Saturday, and several former coaches and players shared their most memorable moments from their days with the Flyers.
Kelly: "It was our first year here as a new staff. I was an assistant. We got on the plane, picked up a newspaper, and Las Vegas had us 60-point underdogs. Harmut Strecker, a great kicker we had out of Cincinnati, kicked a field goal right before halftime and ... put us up three points.
“We got a standing ovation out of the Iowa State folks as we chugged into the locker room. There were thin walls in the locker rooms, and Earle Bruce went on a rampage. I’ll never forget it.
“It’s late in the fourth quarter. We had two outstanding linebackers, one of them happened to be coach (Rick) Chamberlin. They were deep into our territory. I thought they would kick the field goal to make it 13-13. But fourth-and-5, they went for it. We had some miscommunication. They throw to their little fullback, a thick kid who had not caught a pass all year. ... It was a little screen pass in the middle, and he works his way in for a touchdown. They ended up beating us, 17-13.”
Jim Currin, offense end, 1950-52: He was part of the only Flyers team to play in a postseason bowl. They lost, 26-21, to Houston in the 1952 Salad Bowl.
UD was facing a major expense for the trip to Phoenix, but the players lobbied university president Father Raymond Roesch and Athletic Director Harry Baujan to let them go.
“We said, ‘If you put a barrel of beer in each corner of a boxcar (on the train), that would be enough for us.’
“It was a great trip. Johnny Stanko was really good to us. He made the trip with us. He ran the Budweiser distributorship in town when we were in school. A lot of us worked for him. We got out there, and he gave us each $25, and $25 was a lot of money back then.”
Doug Zimmer, Hall of Fame safety, 1983-86. He chose a 22-21 win at Baldwin-Wallace in 1984. It propelled UD to the NCAA Division III playoffs, while B-W missed out on the postseason, despite going 9-1.
“That was my first time getting a lot of playing time as a safety. That quarterback they had was on fire. He was hitting everything. Toward the end of the game, their big tight end was running down the middle, and I gave him a shot one time and knocked the wind out of him.
“They went to the wide-outs, and then they came back to the big tight end at the end. Fortunately, I read it and played in front of him and intercepted it, and that sealed the win for us.”
Art Bok, halfback, 1946-49: "My junior year, Miami came into town, possibly unbeaten, and we beat them, 7-0. This was before superhighways and the Cincinnati Bengals. The fans didn't have anything else to do. Baujan Field had 14,000 people in a little 12,000-seat stadium. There were people sitting on the (grass) banks.
“The next day in the Dayton Daily News, the front page headline — the front page — was ‘Dayton beats Miami.’ Not the sports page, the front page.”
Tim Quinn, linebacker-defensive tackle, 1969-72: His most memorable victory was a 26-16 upset of Bowling Green on the final day of the 1971 season, ending a 0-12-1 skid against the Falcons over the previous 17 years.
But the one game he can’t shake occurred the next year against BG, when Matt Dahlinghaus suffered a neck injury, leaving him paralyzed and ultimately leading to his death.
“It was during the second half, and the game was so close (BG won, 5-0). The play that it happened on, I was the right defensive tackle, and Matt was the left.
“And it looked, for all practical purposes, like a normal tackle. But Matt couldn’t move. He was breathing, and I remember he looked at us — we were surrounding him — and he was laying on his back, and he said, ‘I can’t move anything.’
“Right at that point, we were like, ‘Oh, my gosh, what happened?’ You think it’s nothing serious, but they took about 45 minutes to get him off the field with a splint and everything. I think the team had a fairly good idea it was a serious injury.”
Billy Mayo, Hall of Fame running back, 1964-67: His favorite was a 34-14 win at Southern Illinois as a senior. "I had a huge game that day — not bragging — but I had 200 yards rushing and maybe more than that receiving. ... It was a helluva game. They really jumped on us. We didn't know what the hell happened. But we came back and jumped on them."
Taylor Harris, running back, 2008-present: "My most memorable game would probably have to be Drake last year. It was just something so special."
The Flyers prevailed on a 37-yard catch by Luke Bellman with one second left in the second-to-last game of the year. They clinched a Pioneer Football League title the next week.
“That was the big game we had to get through. Finishing on a Hail Mary play, and sending out the seniors — that class was an amazing group of guys — that way was really special.”
Rick Chamberlin, All-American linebacker, 1976-79: Taking over for Kelly in 2008, Chamberlin said his most memorable game as a head coach would be his first career win against Central State. As a player, it was a tie against Miami in 1978, the last time the two teams met.
The Flyers were in their first season in D-III, but still had scholarship players in their junior and senior classes.
“What stood out to me was us holding them defensively. They were driving and got to a fourth-down situation late in the game and needed a first down in our territory, inside the 30. We were able to stop them. There were like two minutes left in the game. We held on to the ball, and the game ended in a 10-10 tie.”
Larry Nickels, receiver, 1970-72: "The game I remember the most was East Carolina (a 24-22 loss). The coach finally believed in the pass. I caught 10 passes that game for 186 yards."
John McVay, the coach from 1965-72 who later helped build an NFL dynasty as general manager with the San Francisco 49ers, was known for his conservative ways. Nickels’ teammate, running back Gary Kosins, set the all-time UD record for most carries.
“I got a letter from the president of the university ... after my senior year,” Nickels said. “He congratulated me on a nice career at UD — even though they ran Kosins left and Kosins right.”
Mike Harsock, WHIO-TV. He's covered UD for more than three decades, and it's not an actual game that he recalls vividly, but what took place before the kickoff when a student from an Ithaca radio station approached him at the 1980 D-III national championship game.
“It’s loud. The music is playing. And he said, ‘Can I do an interview. What’s your name?’ I said, ‘Mike Hartsock.’ We walk over, and he starts the interview and goes: ‘Yeah, it’s Joe Frederick down here to do the pregame interview with Art Sock.’
“Back in Ithaca, N.Y., I was Art Sock. That’s my most memorable game.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2125 or dharris@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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