Togetherness. Family. Close-knit. Camaraderie. These are just a few ways Clarion football head coach Chris Weibel remembers the 1996 football team. Weibel was the star quarterback in 1996 when the Golden Eagles surprised everyone and took the PSAC by storm.  This year marks the 20th anniversary of the 1996 team's run to the semifinals of the Division II championship.
 
The Golden Eagles went 11-3 that year under head coach Malen Luke. Weibel noted that, coming together as a family and working hard was the mantra of the 1996 squad.
 
"It was actually in 1995 we started to click," Weibel said.  "We came in with a goal and knew that we needed to work hard in the offseason to achieve it."
 
The team came together in the 1996 season, bonding off the field as well as on it. After the last practice of training camp, the Saturday before the season started, Weibel and his teammates took an excursion to Cook's Forest.
 
"The majority of the team went up to Cook's Forest and tubed down the river," Weibel said.  "We had big 280-300-pound lineman on inner tubes floating down the Clarion River. It was pretty funny. We had a great time doing that."
 
Weibel also talked about a player only-golf outing that they had before the season. While none of these activities were football-related, they had a profound impact on the trajectory of the season.
 
 "It was the closeness of the team and not wanting to disappoint each other and holding each other accountable that were big factors," Weibel said.
 
The Golden Eagles weren't picked as the PSAC West favorites before the 1996 season, but they quickly proved that they weren't to be taken lightly.
 
 "From the beginning we knew how good we were," Weibel noted.  "We made minimal mistakes and we took care of the football."
 
Marquee wins for the Golden Eagles included victories over rivals Slippery Rock and IUP.
 
Clarion took care of business against Slippery Rock, demolishing them by a score of 54-28 on Slippery Rock's home field.
 
According to Weibel, "IUP was a bigger win because they were projected to beat up on everybody that year." The Golden Eagles were the ones beating up on IUP however, crushing them 49-15 at Memorial Stadium.
 
"We just crushed them," Weibel said.  "That was the game where we said okay, nobody can stop us now."
 
Weibel led an explosive offense that featured a strong running and aerial attack. He threw for 2,880 yards, 32 touchdowns and just 10 interceptions. His favorite target was All-American running back Steve Witte, who had 802 yards and six touchdowns that year.  Alvin Slaughter and Chris Skultety were also two big players at wide receiver. Mark Witte, Steve's brother, was another favorite target of Weibel. He accounted for 365 yards and 10 touchdowns through the air.
 
 
On the ground, Witte rushed for 1,382 yards and 16 touchdowns. Clarion utilized a variation of the Wing-T offense in 1996, and Steve Witte was joined in the backfield by fellow running back Ron DeJidas. He ran for 1,247 yards and tacked on seven touchdowns on the ground, and through the air added 373 yards and two touchdowns.
 
Weibel noted that the offense couldn't have been as successful as they were without the men in the trenches. "Derek MacKay, Chris Martin, Tim Sohyda, Mike Sipos and Chris Kiker got the job done up front," according to Weibel. That line led the way for two 1,000 yard rushers and protected a quarterback who threw for almost 3,000 yards.
 
 
Clarion's offense was explosive in 1996, but its defense was just as good. Defensive back Kim Niedbala was a driving force defensively. He led the team in tackles with 166 total, and also had 20 passes broken up. Niedbala also led the team in fumbles recovered with five, and forced two of his own.  Linebacker Thomas Williams was just behind Niedbala in total tackles, racking up "only" 165 on the year.
 
The Golden Eagle's hallmark on defense however was a strong defensive line that stopped its opponents in their tracks. Clarion only gave up 97.2 yards per game on the ground, with the leader of the line Joe Bzorek making 71 tackles that season along with eight sacks. The team leader in sacks was linebacker Mike Maguire, who tallied nine that season. 
 
Clarion started off its playoff run by defeating Bloomsburg 42-29 at home. "We played hard that game, and the defense really played a great game," Weibel said.
 
They took that momentum from the Bloomsburg victory and carried it into a victory over Ferris State the next round, defeating them 23-21. "The weather conditions were terrible," said Weibel. "It was the end of November in Michigan, it was all sorts of weather."
 
"It was a really tough game. They were really good and we pulled out a win there," said Weibel.
 
The victory over the Bulldogs placed the Golden Eagles on a collision course with Northern Colorado in the NCAA Semifinals, in a game to be played in less-than-ideal conditions at Memorial Stadium.
 
The weather making the field into a muddy mess that day. Weibel noted how they re-sodded the field a week before the game, and said "If you look back at pictures of the game, you can see clumps of sod everywhere on the field."
 
"Having the semifinal game at home was really huge," Weibel said. "The Northern Colorado game was a battle, we led the whole game until they scored a late touchdown."
 
Northern Colorado led 19-18 late in the fourth quarter, but Weibel and the Golden Eagles drove down the field in the waning moments to set up a chance at a score.
 
"We had the ball with a minute and a half to go and I ended up throwing a long pass to Steve Witte, and he landed out of bounds at the 13-yard line with six seconds left," said Weibel.
 
Clarion had its field goal attempt blocked as time expired and Northern Colorado squeaked out the 19-18 victory.  They went on to win the National Championship against Carson-Newman that year by a score of 23-14.
 
"It was a run that we will never forget, but it's also a playoff run where we knew we could have been national champions if we had two more points on the board," said Weibel.
 
On Feb. 12, 1997, the Golden Eagles were awarded the Lambert/Meadowlands Cup, given to the top team in the Division II Eastern Region at that time, in a ceremony held at the Meadowlands in East Rutherford, N.J.  Luke was named the American Football Coaches Association GTE Region 1 Coach of the Year.
 
Weibel is excited to see his former teammates during the homecoming game against Edinboro.
 
"We battled on the field, but we were best friends off the field," Weibel said.