OHIO CHAMPIONS Poland's championship season simply perfect

The Bulldogs rallied to win their final three postseason games in 1999.
By BRIAN RICHESSON
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
POLAND -- It's time for a trivia question: Who was the first high school football team to win 15 games in a season?
Cleveland St. Ignatius? Newark Catholic? Cincinnati Moeller?
Wrong, wrong and wrong.
"You're not going to get a lot of people screaming Poland," coach Paul Hulea estimated.
True, but it's his team that holds the honor, which the Bulldogs earned in 1999 when they won the Division III state title.
"It's going to be much easier to win another state championship than to win 15 straight games," Hulea said. "To me, that's the most amazing thing about that group."
Classic sweep
Poland completed a remarkable sweep of the '99 season by defeating Columbus Bishop Watterson 20-13 in the state title game at Massillon's Paul Brown Tiger Stadium.
"It was an astonishing accomplishment," said Pete Perry, a junior running back on that team. "Being all 18-year-old kids and younger -- I was only 17 -- and to play that long and stay that healthy, you have to have luck on your side."
The Bulldogs accomplished their feat in the OHSAA's first year of its expanded playoff format. Sandusky Perkins matched Poland the next day in Div. IV.
"We thought we had a nice team," Hulea said. "If we stayed healthy and things went our way, we knew we had a chance of making the playoffs and even making a run [at the title]."
After rolling through the regular season, in which the Bulldogs recorded five shutouts, they began a roller-coaster ride through the postseason.
"The last three games in the playoffs, we were losing at halftime," Hulea said.
"We were down against Steubenville, Orrville and Bishop Watterson -- great programs with a tremendous amount of tradition -- and we came back against all of them."
Conference tests
Poland went into the playoffs after confidence-building wins over Howland and Struthers in the regular season's final three weeks, Hulea said.
The Bulldogs trailed Howland 14-0 before rallying in Week 8 and later defeated a Struthers team in Week 10 that had standouts Rick McFadden and Walter Reyes.
"The big thing with that group was their resolve," Hulea said of his team. "They realized sooner or later that something good was going to happen, and we were just going to rally around that."
Perry, an international marketing major at Youngstown State, labeled the '99 Bulldogs "a bunch of guys who enjoyed playing together."
"It really wasn't an individual thing," he said. "The offense was just a powerhouse, the defense had [six] shutouts and the special teams were flawless. It was all-inclusive."
Poland handled Rayland Buckeye Local (51-0) and Thornville Sheridan (17-6) in the first two rounds of the playoffs before three weeks of close calls.
In the end, the Bulldogs, who stayed healthy throughout the season, relied on their strengths.
"Our team speed defensively was amazing," Hulea said. "We ran so well and we had great experience. They were never surprised by anything."
Impact
The 1999 season will continue to be one of the community's greatest athletic highlights, and it only added to the rich tradition of the football program.
Even today, Perry hears compliments -- sometimes from people he doesn't even know. But they know him and his teammates.
"There's always been a lot of good football teams and players that have come out of Poland over the years," Hulea said. "That tradition has always been localized, with what they've done in the community.
"[The 1999 season] kind of moved Poland to where they can compete at a state level, and I think it's done that for the other programs in the school."
richesson@vindy.com