It's one of those names that stays with you.
Apichella.
It's a bit of a legend here in Delco.
Tony Apichella coached football at Chichester High School for 30 years before he passed away in 1977. You can read about it in today's In The Community column by longtime Daily Times high school sports guru Harry Chaykun.
More than 100 players who went through Apichella's program gathered Saturday night to remember their old coach.
Among the kids who went through that Chi program was Billy "White Shoes" Johnson, who went on to star at Widener University and then the NFL.
There were lots of old players, family and friends on hand talking about their time under the tutelage of Coach A.
I have a slightly different memory.
If you've ever seen me - or met me - please don't laugh when I tell you this. Back in the day, I played high school football. Or at least something that vaguely resembled it.
Most days I had trouble breaking 100 pounds, and that would be soaking wet with all my equipment on.
Back in 1969, I put my blue ABVM tie from St. Mary's in West Grove away forever and for the first time in my life faced one of the great questions of life: What do you wear to high school.
Luckily, I got a head start on life as a public student.
My freshman year at Oxford Area High School turned out to be the same year the school started a football program.
Our coach, Fred Green, was a proud alum of Chichester High, and a product of Coach Apichella's program.
Our first year we basically just did some scrimmages since we did not yet have a varsity program.
One weekend the coach took us on a jaunt to see his old school play. I believe that was 'White Shoes' senior season. He was dazzling.
The next year, Coach Green decided to take his young charges back to his old stomping ground again.
Only this time, it was for a game, not as spectators.
It did not go well for the Chester County kids.
It was one of those broiling September mornings. Back then they played these games at 10:30, which meant a pretty early start from Oxford to make the trek up Route 1 to Delco.
We should have stayed in bed.
'White Shoes' was gone. But Chi had another running back by the name of Joe Miller. He took the opening kickoff back for a touchdown. I'm not sure anyone touched him. It was a scene that would be repeated several times that morning.
In all I believe Joe Miller scored five touchdowns that day.
The final score was 72-3. That's not a misprint. Chi scored 72 points. And that was with Coach Apichella trying desperately to hold down the score.
Believe me, it wasn't that close.
I can only imagine how embarrassed Coach Green was. He had gone back to his home town to challenge his mentor, only to be sent packing with a lopsided defeat.
Here's the "kicker" to the story, at least for me. It's my own personal piece of trivia.
I held the ball for that field goal we put on the board, kicked by one of the best high school athletes I ever had the fortune of seeing or playing with. That would be Chuck Peterson.
It gets better. We actually had a penalty on the play, and had to kick it again. Chuck was on the money.
I will always remember the look on Coach Green's face as he boarded the bus to take his bedraggled troops home.
"Let's get out of here," he told the driver.
I don't think he would have gotten any arguments from his young players.
A couple of years later, when I was a senior, I went into the season as the Hornets' starting quarterback. But that's only because our real starter moved away when his family relocated down south over the summer.
There was another member of that team you might have heard of. That would be Ed Herr. Yeah, that guy up there on the potato chip billboards was on those teams as well. My kids still don't believe I went to school with Ed.
The fact that I was the quarterback gives you a pretty fair idea how good we were.
Not very, to be polite.
My senior year we went 0-10. Hey, don't blame me. I was only responsible for the first four or five, before breaking my collar bone, matching the separated shoulder I suffered the year before.
I always tell people I learned as much from being on those football teams, and interacting with Coach Green, his assistants, and that group of guys, than anything I ever learned in a classroom.
That includes one very difficult Saturday morning at Chichester High School.
Coach Green probably should have known better. He wanted a showdown with his mentor.
I don't what we gave him was what he had in mind.
But it certainly left an indelible mark. Things don't always go the way you planned. And you don't always win.
I will always remember the way Coach Apichella and his kids acted. There was no gloating. No showboating. They didn't rub it in. They played the game the right way and simply dominated us.
It happens.
We all survived.
It was a great lesson in life.
One of thousands I am guessing Coach Apichella delivered in three decades of coaching football at Chichester High.
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