Crawfordsville Playing 105th Season
- Aug 23, 2017
- 2 min read
I saved Crawfordsville for last in my series on the football history of our three county programs.
Last Friday Crawfordsville opened its 105th football season. That also marked the 934th game played by the Athenian program. In the 105 seasons of football Crawfordsville has compiled a record of 433-473-28.
The first game documented for Crawfordsville came on 1901 when it lost to Waynetown (by an unknown score) on Oct. 12. The Athenians went 1-4 that first season and the lone victory came against Waveland 6-0.
The team went 4-1 in 1902 to record the school’s first winning season.
Out of the 104 completed seasons, the Athenians have had just three undefeated season. The first came in 1906 when it went 2-0. During that season the team beat Lafayette and Oakwood (West Lafayette).
In 1909, Coach Dave Glascock led the Athenians to an impressive 8-0 record. During that season Crawfordsville outscored the opposition 187-5.
The only other undefeated team for Crawfordsville was 59 years later in 1968. That year Coach Glenn Knecht has his team go 8-0-1. The tie came against second game of the season as Central Catholic tied the Athenians 13-13. That came a week after a Crawfordsville beats Lafayette Jeff 21-20 in the opener.
Just how tough was this team? Following the tie the Athenians allowed just 13 points in the last seven games. The Athenians’ offense posted 181 points over that same stretch.
While no other Crawfordsville team has ended undefeated perhaps the best team ever fielded by the school may have been the 1989 team set a record for wins in a season as the team went 12-1, losing to Hammond Noll in the state semi-final 32-20 in a blizzard. That team allowed just 83 points (6.3 points per game). Offensively, the Athenians averaged 34.5 points a game.
That season capped the most successful decade in the history of the storied CHS history. Crawfordsville went 68-41 in the 1980s which just beat out the 1970s when the school went 64-35-2.
So which three-year stretch of teams has the best record? In terms of fewest losses the 1930-31-32 team combined for a 20-5-1 record which is just a bit above three other teams which went 19-5-2 (1906-8, 1907-9 and 1931-33). In terms of wins, the team from 1989-91 own that mark as they went 26-7, just edging out the group from 1977-79 which went 24-7. The 1966-68 group complied a 20-7-2 record.
Since the 1980s Crawfordsville has had some lean years going just 77-195. Just twice since 1995 has Crawfordsville had a winning season — both 7-4 seasons in 2005 and 2007 under head coach Rex Ryker.
(This column was published in the Aug. 23, 2017 edition of the Journal Review).
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