Friday, June 24, 2016

How About That

Because That Certain Dartmouth '14 has moved from Yellowstone to Everglades to Yellowstone and will next be stationed who-knows-where (Everglades again?) with the National Park Service ,she hasn't changed her mailing address.

That means her Dartmouth Alumni Magazine comes here, and paging through the latest edition of the magazine last night I stumbled across interesting news about a onetime Dartmouth football standout . . . 

Former linebacker Marshall Hyzdu '00 was announced in December as the president of legendary football power Archbishop Moeller High School in the Cincinnati suburbs. (LINK)

A former Moeller football captain, Hyzdu posted 82 tackles with two sacks in his senior season with the Big Green. He went on to his MBA at Michigan and came to Moeller after serving as Vice President of Commercial Marketing at Bridgestone. He previously served as Global Marketing Director at Valvoline and before that as Senior Brand Manager at Kraft.

For those of a certain age Moeller once defined high school football excellence. 

Under Gerry Faust, who started the Crusader program, Moeller went 178-23-2 between 1962 and 1980, winning four mythical national championships, posting seven undefeated seasons and capturing five Ohio state championships over his final six seasons. Overall, Moeller has had five national championships and produced 38 All-Americans according to its extensive game notes.

After having a 53-game winning streak in 1978 snapped Moeller set off on a 71-game streak between 1978 and '85. A Sports Illustrated story about Faust after he was hired away from Moeller by Notre Dame said that he had 18 assistant coaches, 25 student managers and could call on seven team doctors at the Cincinnati prep powerhouse. The Moeller game program at the time ran some 150 pages and average attendance was about 18,000 – even though the school did not have a home field under Faust.

Moeller won its last state title in 2013, went 10-4 in 2014 and slipped to an uncharacteristic 5-5 last fall. 

If the name Hyzdu rings a bell with baseball fans it's because his brother Adam – a former Moeller quarterback – played seven years in the big leagues including four years with the Pittsburgh Pirates and two short stints with the Boston Red Sox.