What a rush! Burney eyes Bell's record

By JOE SCALZO
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
YOUNGSTOWN -- More than 30 years after his last high school football game, Ted Bell drove from his home in Lansing, Mich., to attend a wedding last year in the Youngstown area.
And he took his teen-age daughter along.
"Everywhere we went, people kept saying, 'Look, that's Ted Bell's daughter,' " Bell said. "And my daughter, who doesn't know anything about my high school football career, kept asking, 'Why do they keep saying I'm your daughter?' And I said, 'Well, it's a long story.' "
But it's a good one.
Thirty-two years ago, Bell capped what many consider the greatest high school football career in Mahoning Valley history when he led Cardinal Mooney to its first state championship, beating Warren Western Reserve 14-3 in the Class AAA state final at the Akron Rubber Bowl.
Rare opportunity
Thirty-two years later, another Mooney senior running back, Nate Burney, is closing in on Bell's career-yardage record, hoping to do something that neither Bell, nor any other running back in the area's history, could do -- win back-to-back state titles.
"It's something we're constantly reminded of," said Burney, whose team will play Coldwater in the Division IV state championship game on Saturday in Canton. "We have a chance to do something no other [Mooney] team has done but we know we have a tough game ahead of us.
Burney, who enters the game with 4,222 career yards, needs 206 in Saturday's game to tie Bell's career mark.
With 2,262 yards in 14 games this season, Burney's already broken Bell's single season mark of 2,145 yards, set in 12 games in 1973.
"Ted Bell, he's a legend at Cardinal Mooney, so for me to do such a thing, I hold that high," Burney said. "It's an honor for me just to be mentioned in the same sentence with him.
"During the game, all I want to think about is winning state. If I break the record, that's fine. But if I don't, that's OK, too."
Burney (5-9, 180) was named Ohio's offensive co-player of the year in Div. IV earlier this week. He played sparingly as a sophomore, rushing for 123 yards, before last year's breakout season, when he carried 271 times for 1,837 yards (6.8 average) and 17 TDs.
Comparison
Bell, by comparison, played quite a bit as a sophomore, although that wasn't necessarily the plan.
"I was sort of in the right spot at the right time," said Bell, who was 6 foot 1 inches tall and weighed 190 pounds during his playing career. "At the start of [his sophomore season], I was third on the depth chart. But then the first guy got hurt and the second guy got hurt and I got an opportunity.
"I just sort of took it from there."
Bell rushed for 122 yards in his first game and finished with more than 1,000 that season.
He had his best season as a senior, rushing for single-game career-highs of 360 yards (against Austintown Fitch) and five TDs (against Campbell).
Mooney went 11-1, made the playoffs for the first time and won the first of five state titles.
"I guess he's sort of put up as the standard for running backs in our area, even more than Maurice [Clarett]," said Mooney athletic director Don Bucci, who coached the Cardinals for 31 years before retiring after the 1999 season. "Whenever a great running back comes around, they always say, 'This guy's as good as Ted Bell or this guy's better than Ted Bell.'
Still the standard
"For him to still be held as the standard when you consider how many good running backs there have been in the area, is a tribute to Ted," Bucci said. "Of course, winning a state championship probably helped."
Bell injured his knee with two minutes remaining in his final game with the Cardinals leading 7-3. Bell, driving for the game-clinching score, was stopped at Reserve's 5-yard line and came up hobbling.
He was never the same.
"My knee kind of wore out," said Bell, who had 27 100-yard games in his high school career and played briefly at Michigan State. "That happens when you get older."
Bell won a truckload of awards after his senior season, including being named to the Parade All-America team, and his legend has remained strong over the years. Before the season, The Vindicator ran a questionnaire asking readers to name the best high school football player in the Valley's history. Bell won by a large margin.
"Through the years, I've had coaches from around the state come up and ask me, 'Really, how good was that Ted Bell?' " Bucci said. "Or they'd say, 'I remember that Ted Bell. He was the finest back I ever saw.' "
Retired on disability
Bell's legend may be strong, but his knee isn't. Bell, who lives with his wife, Wynnette (a Campbell native), and two teen-age daughters (Jasmine and Angelica), retired from the Wholert Corporation on full disability this year at age 50. He plans to have knee surgery sometime in the next year.
"I'll probably end up doing something [work-wise]," he said, "but I'm gonna rest for a couple years."
Several players around the area have rushed for more yards in a season and a career, but until Burney came around, no one came close at Mooney.
Entering this season, Joe Croft (1974-76) was second on the career rushing list with 3,085 yards -- 1,343 yards behind Bell. (Burney was ninth with 1,960 yards.)
"I'm surprised it's held up all these years," Bucci said. "Especially with the offenses today that are so wide open. The offenses weren't as wide open back then."
Bucci, of course, was famous for running the stacked-I formation, utilizing a double tight end set and three running backs lined up directly behind the quarterback.
"It was Ted Bell left, Ted Bell right," Bell said, chuckling. "There weren't a lot of surprises."
Running Cardinals
The Cardinals still run the ball more than most teams -- they didn't attempt a pass in last Saturday's state semifinal -- but they're more likely to use a shotgun formation (with Burney lined up next to quarterback Derrell Johnson) or a two-back I-formation.
If Burney does break Bell's record -- a big if, considering the Cardinals are playing the state's top-ranked team -- it likely will come on a toss sweep or a shotgun draw.
And if it comes out of the stacked-I?
"That would be nice," Bucci said, chuckling. "I think that would be a tribute to Ted. But that's not [Coach P.J. Fecko's] basic offense and I don't think he'll go into the stacked-I just to break the record.
"But I'll tell you this. If [Burney] gets 200-some yards in this game, you'd have two happy people: Ted Bell and myself. Because if he can get 206 yards, I guarantee we'll win."
scalzo@vindy.com