FROM KEITH GROLLER
While Easton-P'burg is considered the biggest and best Thanksgiving football matchup in the area, state and maybe the entire country, the Catasauqua-Northampton game has been much more significant in my life.
No, I didn't attend either school, but my grandmother attended Northampton (class of 1934) and I had a great uncle who had a store on Race Street in Catasauqua. So when I was a kid and attended family Thanksgving dinners, the Catty-Northampton game was always being discussed, sometimes rather heatedly.
There were years when family members attended the game at Muhlenberg and replayed it while the turkey was being carved and the filling and corn was being passed around the dinner table.
I can't remember attending a Catty-Northampton game myself because with my father having played in Allentown-Bethlehem Thanksgiving Day rivalry in the late 1950s, we saw the Canaries and Hurricanes play while that tradition continued for a while in the 1960s when I was real little. Then for a brief time Allen and Dieruff played each other on Thanksgiving and we were always at that one.
But certainly I've made up for lost time during my Morning Call career. I've covered a Thanksgiving Day game for 32 straight years and 21 of them haven been the Catty-Northampton game. Over the past 20 years, I've only missed the Roughies and the K-Kids once -- in 2006 when Easton and P'burg had their 100th anniversary game. (Below right, Catty quarterback Zack Bradley throws a pass in last year's game.
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Back in the spring I heard about the potential return of the Catty-Northampton game to Muhlenberg College, where it was played from 1930 to 1968. The move was being considered for one year only because this is Northampton's year to host and the whole campus near the stadium is a mess because of middle school construction.
I heartily endorsed the idea, but thought there might be too much red tape involved to overcome. I thought the game wound wind up in Nazareth where all of the other K-Kids home games are being played. Or maybe, I thought, they'd let Catasauqua host again.
However, the return of the Thanksgiving game to Muhlenberg College became official at the Northampton School Board meeting on Monday nigh and to me, it was good news.
I am sure there will be complaints. Aren't there always when you decide to do something out of the box?
But I do like the idea and not just because it's a much shorter drive for me to Muhlenberg than Nazareth should I happen to be assigned to the game again this Thanksgiving.
I think taking this game to a new, out-of-the-normal venue is exciting. It will add pizzazz.
I do worry a little about the parking and I am sure the people in that west Allentown neighborhood may not be thrilled, but I like the idea of bringing back something from the past and rekinding some memories and nostalgia.
My guess is that there will be as many people there from Allentown, Emmaus, Whitehall, the Parkland School District etc. as there will be from Catty and Northampton because there are no Turkey Day games in those communities and they, too, can get to Muhlenberg much easier than Nazareth.
I also give credit to Muhlenberg for waiving the site fee.
High school fans often ask me why college venues are no longer being used to host basketball and football playoff games and one of the main reasons is the cost of renting the facility. College facilities don't come cheap.
The other reason colleges are no longer used is because the District 11 committee likes to keep events at its own high school facilities and give them an opportunity to host and make some extra money. That's why the basketball games are now always in high school gyms.
My guess is that I attended at least 30 high school basketball playoff games at Muhlenberg as a kid and even a Dieruff student back in the 1960s and 70s. And that place was special when packed to the top row. Fans would line up hours before the doors opened.
But now you have Parkland, Easton and Freedom joining Liberty as spacious basketball venues. Even Catasauqua has become a regular host. So, there hasn't been a need to use Muhlenberg or another college venue for playoff games, although I still think it would be cool to have them back at Stabler Arena where they were held in the 1980s.
With this move by the Northampton school board, I am glad that we're getting at least one tradition restored, if only for one year.
My guess is that there will be a big crowd at Muhlenberg on Nov. 28, especially if Catty has the year that's expected and Northampton is much improved.
My one regret is that Nazareth, which was looking forward to having a Thanksgiving game in its communithy for the first time in many years, won't be hosting now.
But if the Catty-Northampton game is going back to Muhlenberg, who says the Nazareth-Wilson football rivalry can't be restored one day, too?
Here are the scores from the last 20 years of Catty-Northampton games:
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