This column originally ran Oct. 23 in The Mercury.

BUCKTOWN -- Some teams have their way with others. It just doesn’t seem to matter who’s better, or who’s good and who’s not so good, and forget about the won-loss column.

Fortunately, time erases most trends. And, as new players come and go, so do the memories (the best as well as the worst of times, that is).

But there are a few fellas, coaches in this instance, who may want to weave a little bit of that history into the ol’ pre-game preachings tonight.

No one more, perhaps, than St. Pius X head coach George Parkinson.

Yes, the Lions are 3-2 in the Pioneer Athletic Conference and 5-2 overall. Yes, they’ve already won more league games than the five teams before them did. Yes, those five overall wins are the most by any Lions team in seven years. And, yes, they’re about a first down or two behind Calvary Christian – actually a mere 1.2 points behind – in the District 1/12-Class A playoff points standings.

But as good as it’s been for the Lions so far this season, they’re fully aware they can ill-afford another loss if they hope to retain a lane in both those PAC-10 and postseason races.

And there’s no bigger challenge, at least for now, than Owen J. Roberts … the same Owen J. Roberts that has more than once in the past defied the odds (and logic) in match-ups with Pius.

The Wildcats (4-1, 6-1 overall) are just a game behind unbeaten Pottsgrove in the PAC-10 and situated right smack in the middle of the District 1-Class AAA playoff points standings themselves. In other

words, they’re pretty darn good themselves. And their track record against the Lions is, well, rather impressive – or disheartening to the Pius faithful.

For one, the Wildcats have not lost to Pius since getting blanked 27-0 back in 1995. That’s 13 straight wins, if you’re counting. Moreover, they’ve won 18 of the last 21 meetings since joining the league back in 1988. And if you care to go back to when they started playing one another in the Ches-Mont League, OJR has had the upper-hand in 26 of the 32 games (with one ending in a tie).

Former St. Pius head coach Dave Bodolus was almost speechless after a couple of upset losses to OJR, as was Ray Gionta following his one and only game against OJR.

Bodolus had a difficult time explaining what happened in 1999 after his heavily favored Lions were thumped 38-14 by OJR, the lone blemish in their PAC-10 championship season. He had an equally difficult time explaining what happened two years later when the heavily favored Lions came up short in a 32-29 thriller with the Wildcats before regrouping and playing their way to the PIAA-Class AA state semifinals. And Gionta wasn’t exactly a chatty one in 2002 after a 19-14 setback to the Wildcats with a team that would make its way into the postseason as well.

Obviously, Parkinson and his Lions would like nothing more than a win tonight to end the mystique – or whatever they call it – and hit the breaks on their 13-game skid.

They’re all still working on the respect factor. Some critics are quick to point out their five wins have come against teams who are a combined 7-28, and the only two teams with winning records on their schedule thus far have beaten them.

That may be a bit unfair, especially if you chat with OJR head coach Tom Barr, who sat in on Pius’ win over Spring-Ford last Saturday and had nothing but very good things to say about the Lions.

And when made aware of OJR’s long rule over Pius … “I don’t want to hear about that,” Barr said.

Neither do the Lions, who’d like nothing more than to bring a little magic of their own to the field tonight.

ONE AT A TIME

Three other PAC-10 teams, as well as Daniel Boone up in the I-C League, cannot afford to look past this weekend’s games.

OJR cannot take Pius lightly, of course, not with what is on the line and not with longtime rival Boyertown up next. Depending on where your allegiance lies, the OJR-Boyertown series has been one of the best for more than 50 years, even back when it was North Coventry battlin’ the Bears.

Upper Perkiomen has to take Phoenixville very seriously and not look ahead to next Friday night’s visit to Pottsgrove. Yes, Phoenixville may have started 0-for-5, but both the training room and sick-bay are almost empty now and the Phantoms’ improved health has certainly showed the past two weeks with back-to-back shutouts.

Pottsgrove, like Upper Perkiomen, is at Methacton on Saturday. The Falcons stack up as the favorite in every imaginable category. But hunger, the hunger to end disappointment and reverse one’s woeful ways, is one incredible intangible that you can’t measure with those first-down chains. Plus this is Week Eight – and if you knew your PAC-10 history you’d know it’s the week that has produced more surprises and upsets than any other week of the league season.

Up in the I-C, Daniel Boone travels to Pottsville and hopes to make it four in a row over the Crimson Tide. The Blazers can then focus on Muhlenberg – who they have lost to 19 straight times – in a bid to tackle the Section One title.

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The Hill School sure can’t look ahead to next week’s game with defending Mid-Atlantic Prep League champion Blair Academy. The Rams take a long bus ride to Wyoming Seminary on Saturday, and a win could put them in a very enviable spot to avenge last year’s lone MAPL setback (to Blair) and run off with a championship. And with quarterback Jack Detmar a “probable” return to the lineup, the Rams will have a considerably better passing threat to go with their productive run game.

OH O.C.

When Abdul Smith graduated a year ago and went off to Rutgers, a lot of people thought Perkiomen School’s program would switch off. Not so.

One big reason has been the play of O.C Hightower, who has run for three touchdowns, pulled in five touchdown passes, and scored five other times – an area-high – on kickoff or punt returns and off defensive turnovers.

The 5-foot-9, 165-pound Hightower, who along with teammate Bruce Brittingham give the Indians as good as one-two punch as any other in the Philadelphia region’s private school sector, have Perkiomen on pace for its winningest season in 31 years.

ONE MORE TIME

Tireless Jim Algeo and his Lansdale Catholic football teams pulled off a few big wins and big upsets during their 22 years in the Pioneer Athletic Conference. All of them may pale in comparison to last Monday afternoon’s 36-27 victory over Bishop McDevitt.

The Crusaders were winless in six games this season, thanks in part to a young and inexperienced lineup, and were ailing a bit with a few starters either less than a 100 percent or out of the lineup entirely. Bishop McDevitt, on the other hand, was undefeated.

Surprise, surprise … and what a great gift for Algeo, who celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary two days earlier.

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Algeo’s son, Dan Algeo – the head coach at Cardinal O’Hara – may want to steal one of those upset formulas from dad. His Lions are 7-0, but will meet Philadelphia Catholic League Class AAAA power St. Joseph’s Prep (5-1) on Saturday night. The Hawks’ lone loss this season was to North Penn back on Sept. 19.

Jim Mich had a lot to think about when he sat behind the wheel of the family car and took off from his parents’ home in Easton for the long drive to Pottstown, a town he had never been to before, and over to St. Pius X, a high school he had never heard of before.

It was a rollercoaster-like ride of emotions that morning back in June of 1959.

It wasn’t easy balancing the pain of his father’s recent death with the joy of graduating on time from then East Stroudsburg State Teachers College just a few weeks earlier. It wasn’t any easier suppressing the excitement and settling the nerves on the way to his first job interview, either.

So imagine, if at all possible, how Mich reacted when the priest told him he was Pius’ new football coach after he had thought he was only applying for a spot on the staff as an assistant. Or what may have been racing through the 21-year-old’s mind after strolling out of the principal’s office and seeing a group of men building a football stadium adjacent to the school – a particular project the Archdiocese of Philadelphia did not permit.

“What a day that was,” Mich recalled.

It was a day very few of the St. Pius X faithful are likely to forget.

The Lions kicked off their program a year earlier under Marion Zarenkiewicz, but most graduates – especially those who put on the pads and cleats – feel 1959, with Jim Mich and that brand new stadium, was the birth of Pius football.

Sadly, this season – which marks the 50th anniversary of Mich’s arrival and the Lions’ first roar in that new stadium – will be its last.

Next year, St. Pius will team up with Kennedy-Kenrick and move into the new Pope John Paul II High School in Upper Providence Township.

The Lions will play their final game on the field – fittingly known as Mich Stadium since being renamed in his honor in 1976 – on Thanksgiving morning against longtime rival Pottsgrove.

* * *

When summer practices began in 1959, it was a toss-up as to who was louder – the energized Mich hooting and hollering at his players during practices in the high school parking lot, or the men hammering away while putting the finishing touches on the nearby football stadium.

“I just remember feeling great that we were going to have our own place to play,” Mich said. “Having our own field meant something to us. We were going to have our own locker rooms, our own showers, our own coaches room.

“Back then the Archdiocese (of Philadelphia) didn’t allow stadiums to be built on school property. But our athletic association financed the whole thing, and they didn’t care what the archdiocese allowed or didn’t allow. They were amazing.”

The Pius A.A. didn’t just find the money, but the manpower, too. Some of the movers and shakers in the organization were Bob “Chuz” Calvario and Elmer “Chump” Pollock, and a handful of others – Des Coffey, Joe Psota, Harry Schaeffer, Jim Smale and Tony Veach – all of whom have since passed but have never been forgotten.

Calvario, a trainer for the Lions from the beginning and a local businessman, was very instrumental in fundraising for all of Pius’ athletic programs and arguably one of the school’s most vocal supporters before, during and after his sons were standout athletes. And much the same could be said for Pollock, who was the public address announcer for Pottstown High School football games for more than 50 years – and for Pius’ first season of home games when they were played on the Trojans’ field.

But the athletic association was quite proud of their new stadium, which sat up to 1,400 fans on the concrete and steel home-side stands built high enough at its lowest point to provide a clear view of the playing field.

“I think we were all proud of what we had there,” Mich said.

Especially after winning their home debut – 6-0 over the Pennsylvania School for the Deaf – on Saturday, Oct. 3, 1959.

Located in Germantown, PSD was the third oldest school in the U.S. and well known for its football program for more than three decades at the time.

After a scoreless first half, the Lions got excellent field position when co-captain Mickey Sombers returned a PSD punt 24 yards to PSD’s 32-yard line. Art Hatmaker ran for 10 yards on first down, Skip Peterman took another handoff for six yards and, following an incomplete pass, Hatmaker bolted around the left side to the five-yard line. Peterman sneaked to the one, and that’s when co-captain David “Horse” Lees took it into the end zone for the game’s lone score.

The Pius defense that blanked PSD that afternoon featured Paul Bobinsky, Ed Chieffo, Dennis Dzuryachko, Tom Lapinski, Lees, Phil Maddaliano, Joe Narieka, Ted Pawlowski, Tom Rapchinski, Sombers and Joe Wambach. Lapinski went on to become the captain at the University of Delaware and was the head coach at Swarthmore College; Maddaliano played at Temple; Pawlowski played at South Carolina; Rapchinski would captain his team at Millersville; and Wambach became a radio personality in Cincinnati.

The Lions would finish their first season under Mich and in their new stadium with a 5-4 record.

“We really liked having that new stadium,” Mich said. “As a coach, you always wanted your own field, but not everyone had that back then. That was the way football was in those days.”

Knowing exactly “where” to play on it was important, too, as Mich explained.

“You always wanted a good playing surface, but I don’t think we ever had that,” he said before adding a laugh. “There was a lot of shale in the ground on our field, but again that was football in the day. I can always remember never wanting to run to the left side, because that’s where the field was always wet. We always ran right because it was like a rock on that side with all the shale in it.

“Sure, we got some complaints once in a while because the field wasn’t necessarily in as good as shape as lot of the other public school fields. But that’s what we had … and we were proud of what we had.”

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On April 24, 1976, Msgr. Joseph Murray – the principal at Pius – renamed the field Mich Stadium in honor of the young fella who was now 39 years old with a whole lot of wins under his belt … and an immeasurable amount of respect from Pius players and fans as well as coaches from around the Philadelphia Suburban Catholic and Ches-Mont leagues.

“I was embarrassed to some degree,” Mich admitted. “It was a nice honor, a wonderful honor, especially for someone my age. I had just hoped I was deserving of such an honor.”

Mich would continue plotting Pius’ game plans and strolling the sidelines through 1984. He won or shared three Philadelphia Suburban Catholic League championships; guided the Lions to a very impressive 72-32-1 record in 11 seasons as an independent; and was very instrumental in helping his school – despite two prior rejections – get into the Ches-Mont League in 1978. When he bid farewell to the program, and to Mich Stadium, he owned a 159-89-11 career mark.

Mich would later serve as an assistant coach for 10 years at Kutztown University.

But rarely – and usually when his schedule didn’t allow it – did he ever miss a St. Pius X football game on the home turf.

And there were plenty of memorable games, for Mich as well as for the coaches who have followed him – namely Bill Rogers, Dave Bodolus, Ray Gionta, Ed McCann, Madison Morton, Bob Wagner and, now going into his fourth and final season at Pius, George Parkinson.

“That was our field, and we took a lot of pride in playing and playing well on that field every time we went out there,” said Bodolus, a standout himself at Pius and now the head coach at Daniel Boone.

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Mich Stadium underwent renovations in 2005, thanks in part to Johnny Jones, part of the football program in the early 1980s, and Dave Psota, a longtime assistant under Mich. Among the improvements were new fencing, new seating, a new press box and a total reseeding of the playing surface.

“I guess we really needed some of those things for a long time,” Mich said. “But it was a football stadium, our football stadium … and we proud of it from the very beginning. It’s kind of sad right now, knowing the field and the school won’t be there when we move (to Pope John Paul II).

“It’s going to be tough for me, too, because all three of my children went there, and my one granddaughter will be graduating with the last class next spring. Heck, my whole adult life has been spent at Pius, and around that football field. I don’t think we’re ever going to have the same feeling for that new school like we did for Pius.”