2000 PACtion™ Game of the Year (Game of the Century?)
This is the second in a series of PAC GOTY posts - 25 in all - to lead us up to the start of the 2024 season. For a look back at last week's post, where Manchester toppled undefeated Tuslaw in Week 8 of 1999, please click
here.
OK ... Game of the Century might be a bit of hyperbole, but given that the year 2000 was the last year of the 20th century ... why not? For the second straight year, it came down to Tuslaw vs. Manchester in Week 8. The conference began play in 1989, and coming into Week 8 of the 2000 season, the Panthers were 67-2 in league games. The only blemishes: a 1993 road loss to Coventry and a 1995 loss on the road in Week 10 at Coventry. Losing at home? That just didn't happen. Not in conference games.
But Tuslaw had other ideas. They remembered getting punched in the mouth a year earlier. Coming into the game on Friday, October 13th - yes - Friday the 13th - they had yet to lose. And they had 18 starters back. Coming off back-to-back shutouts of Sandy Valley and Tusky Valley this was the year!
Except of course, it wasn't. Manchester had also recorded back-to-back shutouts of Fairless and Tuskey Valley. And at home? Somehow, someway, the Panthers always find a way. On this night, behind their suffocating defense and a well-timed fourth quarter burst out of the backfield, Manchester continued it's reign over the PAC.
Here is the
Akron Beacon Journal story that recounted the events of the evening. Both teams finished 9-1 in the regular season, but it was the Panthers who again reigned supreme and won their 11th PAC title in the first 12 years of the conference.
Were you there? Let us know what you remember about the Game of the Year (Century?) from Y2K.