Mel’s Sports History: Carthage’s perfect football season

CARTHAGE, New York (WWNY) - Dick Cole was a long-time head coach of Lowville football. Way before that time, he and his younger brother Donn played for the Carthage Comets.

During their varsity career, they were a part of an undefeated campaign in 1966, the only undefeated football team under the Carthage Central banner.

In Mel’s Sports History lesson, we take a look back at a team that time may have forgotten, the 1966 Carthage Comets.

Peter Liberatos was a junior on that 1966 team. He presented former Carthage head coach Sam Millich with a plaque commemorating that undefeated team, a team that was a special group.

The night that team was recognized on the scoreboard, the Comets hosted Central Valley, a team coached by Dick Cole’s son, Jon.

Ed Decker coached that 1966 team. Decker would later coach Cortland State, where he coached a player who would later coach at Carthage, Sam Millich, although at the time, Millich didn’t know Decker’s Carthage roots.

It’s a team that time almost forgot, back in the spotlight.

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