Sports
Athletic Teams for Boys and Girls:
State College sports teams continued to make their marks throughout the ‘60s. The cross-country team coached by Jackson Horner, set an enviable record with six state championship teams from 1963 to 1986.
In 1962, the football team won the Western Conference for the second time, with Bill Leonard as coach. In 1966, Dave Joyner was the state heavyweight champion in wrestling.
After several years of occasional games against other schools, several girls’ sports finally achieved true varsity status in 1967: basketball, tennis and field hockey. The field hockey team would go on to win district titles in 1979, 1980, 1993, and 1994.
In 1968, Tom Wright was a state champion in tennis. That year marked the beginning of a streak of 176 straight dual-meet wins, ending in 1979. USAToday recognized the record as one of the 12 longest winning streaks in high school sports.
Tennis
Mike Shapiro’s 1974 Central Counties tennis champions are one team in 15 consecutive years that helped to earn a mention in USA Today as one of the twelve longest high school sport winning streaks. From 1968 through ’79, State high boys’ tennis teams won 176 matches without a loss. p. 175
Basketball
The “69 J.V. basketball “dream team” was undefeated in 20 games.
State High’s 1969 basketball team went 20-2 in winning the Central State League championship, in a season seeing Barry Parkhill scoring 1,000 points and becoming the Little Lions” highest scoring player.
Soccer