Portage/FH

[WPIAL~Titan]

Doee anyone have all of the scores/years of the old Portage/FH Rivalry? When did the teams stop playing? I am assuming it was in the late 80s when FH joined the LHAC...

[El-Moldo]

I may be wrong but.......I think the last FH/Portage game was in 1992. It was the season opener, it was at FH and FH won. Justin Myers was the starting QB as a sophomore. The 2nd game that year was away at Central Cambria. Bailey surprised everybody by starting senior Tim Baumgardner at QB for that game. FH won something like 20-2. I remember how pathetic it was that Central Cambria actually set off their fireworks after the safety while losing 20-0. And I believe the safety was because FH intentionally ran out of the endzone on purpose late in the game. Don't remember the FH/Portage score that year.

[pudge]

From what I hear, That was Football!

[WPIAL~Titan]

Doesn't anyone have the results from all of the games? I am guessing Forest Hills became a district in the early to mid 1960s when the 3 smaller districts merged (At first, wasn't it called Triangle Area, or Triangle Tech, or something like that???) and that they played Portage every year until the early 90s...

Over the past few years, I would've loved to have seen the game played, and I am sure that the fans from both sides would like it too. With that said, FHills would have nothing to gain by playing the game.

[old school]

83/84 Portage 6 Forest Hills 0
82/83 Forest Hills won not sure of score
81/82 Forest Hills won not sure of score
80/81 Portage 6 Forest Hills 6

[El-Moldo]

FH came about from the merger of Adams-Summerhill High School AND Triangle Area High School. This happened in the summer of 1966. Triangle came about back in about 1961, from the merger of South Fork-Croyle, Beaverdale Area, and Wilmore. For years, Adams opened every season with Portage. Great rivalry. Not sure if Triangle played them, as Triangle lasted only 5 years.

[OC caddy]

Moldy, Portage always opened the season with South Fork-Croyle and after it (SFC)joined with Beaverdale-Wilmore it remained Portage's opener as Triangle Area. Adam's opener, I'm pretty sure, was Somerset. When Forest Hills came into existence in 1966 it basically took over Triangle"s schedule and added Somerset,Richland,and later Windber for a couple years because Triangle's schedule lost a few teams because of jointures at that time.

[Manfred]

Great history lessons, guys! Esp. for all us uninformed.

[OC caddy]

Another fact in the FH/Portage rivalry was that the Mustangs through the years saw a South Fork team, then PIAA rated Class "C" (now "A"), go to a basically small Class "B"(now "AA") opponent in Triangle Area and then the formation of FH which was even much larger and they held their own in these games. Back in those
days their were some great rivalries such as Portage/South Fork-Triangle-FH, Adams/Richland, and even Franklin/East Conemaugh when they let them play. Those two hated each other and when you crossed that bridge connecting the 2 towns you'd better have a hard hat on because of all the trouble. Also, the Penn Cambria jointure of Lilly-Cresson-Gallitzin was much the same way,you just didn't stray into "their" territory!
Back then you got to the games early because you really had ALOT of fans going to those small neighborhood games. If you lived in or near Johnstown you could see high school football games from Thursday thru Sat nights. East Conemaugh,Ferndale,Johnstown Catholic(McCort),and Johnstown high all played their games at the Point Stadium. Bring back those games!

[El-Moldo]

Came up with a few Portage/FH scores from the past:
1961 Adams won not sure of the score
1962 Adams 12, Portage 0
1963 Adams 7, Portage 0
1964 ?????
1965 Adams 19, Portage 0
1966 Portage 7, Forest Hills 0
1967 Portage 18, Forest Hills 7
The 1966 game was the FIRST ever game played by Forest Hills, since the jointure with Triangle occurred the summer before. FH chose to use Triangle's head coach as the schools first head football coach. Adams' great coach Smilin' Milan Buchan went on, I believe, to coach at Conemaugh Valley for awhile. At Adams, he was the head football coach, the head basketball coach, and the head baseball coach. And there were only 4 sports in those days: football, basketball, baseball and track.