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150 years

Football Aaron Morse

150 Years of Bates Football Part IV: A Consistent Winner

The fourth of a five-part series about the history of Bates football, from 1875 to present day.

Part III: The Glass Bowl and the Maine State Series

The Class of 1969’s arrival on campus in fall 1965 kicked off a historic stretch for Bates football: four straight winning seasons for the first, and so far only, time in program history.

The 1965 season was transformative in multiple ways. It marked the return of two-platoon football to the NCAA, the start of the CBB Series — initially known as “the CBB Games” — and the arrival of the aforementioned Class of ’69. 

In 1965, “the Hatchmen” were a deep and experienced group, with 52 players coming out for the team, 15 more than Bowdoin and 20 more than Colby. They had 17 returning lettermen, but had a hole at the quarterback position. In a season preview, the Bangor Daily News noted that “promising freshman Jim Murphy” out of Portland High School, along with senior Paul Bales, gave the Bobcats some hope at QB. 

Bales and Murphy ended up sharing snaps most of the year. The star of the team was fullback Tom Carr ’66, an intimidating 225-pounder who had been making a name for himself from the moment he stepped on campus in 1962. 

A quiet man who enjoyed playing pool and poker, Carr’s 30 career rushing touchdowns set a program record that has only been matched, not broken. Carr’s 213 points are still the program standard.

“The freshmen were afraid to approach Tommy Carr,” recalls Tom Lopez ’69. “I remember I would bust my ass as a freshman in sprints, and Carr would basically be walking through them, because he could do what he wanted at that point. But come Saturday, there was no one you would rather give the ball to than him.”

Carr didn’t even like football until he became a Bobcat.

“I played high school football mainly because of peer pressure, but I developed a love for the game at Bates,” Carr said. “That was due to Bob Hatch. I returned to Maine a lot during my sales career, and I always made sure to visit coach Hatch when I was up there.” 

Carr was selected by the Boston Patriots in the 13th round of the 1966 AFL Draft, the only Bobcat ever to be drafted by a professional football team, but not before the Bates football program gave him the highest of honors at their end-of-year banquet. 

“The athletic director was at the podium, and I remember he was getting up to speak,” Carr recalled. “I see these cameras coming into the area, and I’m saying, ‘What the hell's going on?’

"I figured maybe they were going to give Bob Hatch a special presentation because we had a good year that year. I was completely shocked when they started talking about me and that they were retiring my number.” 

Carr’s No. 42 is one of just four to be retired in Bates football history. At the time, his jersey was the second to be retired, after Bob Martin’s. But just three years later, a third man earned the honor.

Jim Murphy ’69 got his feet wet at quarterback in 1965, as Bates went 6–2 behind the bulldozing Carr. The season ended on a down note with a surprising loss to Colby, but the Bobcats were able to split the inaugural CBB Series with their in-state rivals thanks to a 10–0 blanking of Bowdoin.

In 1966, “Murphy became the offensive leader that made us a great football team,” recalls center Jeff Sturgis ’69. “He was calm under pressure. I felt a personal responsibility to keep him on his feet, but if we missed a block and he got sacked, it didn’t bother him.”

In turn, the humble and classy Murphy went out of his way to credit his line. “I’m a drop back passer and I can’t run,” he told the Portland Evening Express in 1968. “That means the line has to hold their blocks longer. If they didn’t, I wouldn’t be nearly as effective.”

The Bobcats went 6–2 again in ’66, capturing the outright CBB title that year and successfully defending the crown in 1967, as Bates finished 5–3 for another winning season.

Every Bobcat learns early on that the Bowdoin and Colby games mean just a little bit more. And like all great rivalries, there were occasionally some…extracurricular activities. 

“My roommate and I went to the Bowdoin student union one year and stole the Polar Bear head off the wall,” recalls Mike Nolan ’69, a team captain his senior season. “Some guy asked what we were doing and we told him that it was going in for maintenance. Then we took it back to Bates and wore it around campus.” 

The Bobcats had a dynamite offense during this era, running the ball effectively with Associated Press Little All-America honorable mention Sandy Nesbitt ’70, who set a Bates record that still stands today with his 96-yard touchdown run against Middlebury in 1966. 

And when Murphy went to the air, he had Lopez and Bruce Winslow ’68. The latter seemed destined for a pro career until an injury caused him to miss most of his senior year. In fact, Winslow and Lopez remain tied for the school record for most touchdown catches in one season. Winslow tallied 10 touchdown catches in 1966 (including four against Bowdoin) and Lopez picked up the slack in 1967, catching 10 of his own. 

Lopez likes to joke that “my name is still in the record books because whenever we got inside the 10-yard line, Jim would always throw the ball to me no matter what Bob Hatch called. I was an adequate receiver because I had a great quarterback.”

Murphy and the Class of 1969 wrapped up their collegiate careers with a 5-4 record in 1968, beating Colby and Bridgewater State in back-to-back games to secure their fourth straight winning season. When the dust cleared, Murphy had tallied 50 career touchdown passes, still the most in Bates history. His 17 touchdown passes in 1968 set a new program standard as well. 

Members of those teams, especially from the Class of ’69, became lifelong friends. Walter Jackson ’69, a tight end who caught 43 passes in 1968, earned a Ph.D. in counseling psychology and became an organizational psychologist. Winning all those games, Jackson said in 2008, was the product of positive forces at work. “We really liked each other. And we had confidence — we expected to win. When a group has positive expectations, good things tend to happen.”

The memory of Murphy’s leadership endures as well. Another of Murphy’s classmates, Steve Brown, recalled how the future Bates women's soccer and basketball coach would calmly call time out during a game to explain to the coaches that the play and formation given to the offense were mismatched. “That was the sharpest part of his game,” Brown says. “His intellectual leadership.”

Following his graduation from Bates, Murphy taught English for 24 years at Masconomet Regional High School in Topsfield, Mass., before returning to his alma mater in 1994 to coach women’s soccer and basketball, achieving great success as a two-sport coach before retiring in 2015.

Murphy is a member of the inaugural class of the newly formed Bates Athletics Hall of Fame. His football jersey No. 10 was retired immediately following his final season, but through it all, Murphy was always humble about his achievements.

“He never considered himself a big star, even though he clearly was,” recalled Hatch in 1997 to Bates Magazine

Bob Hatch and Jim Murphy
Bob Hatch (left) and his star quarterback Jim Murphy '69. Murphy became the third Bobcat football player to have his jersey number retired.

The End of an Era

Bob Hatch coached the Bobcats for 21 years and won 59 games, both Bates records. He stepped down following the 1972 season and was named director of athletics in 1974, advocating for and overseeing the creation of women’s varsity athletics at Bates. Hatch retired in 1991 after more than four decades as a Bobcat. 

“At a time when few schools were doing anything, he created opportunities for women athletes,” said his immediate successor, Suzanne Coffey, to the Sun Journal. “There was no bravado. He thought of it as just the right thing to do.”

In Hatch’s final year, 1972, “the Hatchmen” gave Bates fans one more chance to celebrate. 

American International College was generally considered the strongest opponent on the 1972 schedule. At that point, Bates had lost 25 consecutive games dating back to 1969. The Bobcats had also dropped five straight to AIC (even two Murphy-led teams lost to them), often by wide margins. 

So, not much was expected of Bates when AIC came to town on Oct. 21. 

“Incredible! Unbelievable! Tremendous! Overwhelming! Fantasy! Storybook! Pinch me! I don't believe it! The greatest game I ever saw! These were just some of the emotion-charged reactions to the sudden resurgence of Bates College football before a Parents Day gathering at Garcelon Field,” reported the Student under a headline that simply read: “We did it! 17-14!”

Ralph Bayek ’73 kicked the game-winning field goal from 22 yards out, snapping the losing streak in dramatic fashion. 

“The Hathorn Bell rang proudly and loudly as the Bates players and their fans gathered around,” wrote the Student. “Oct. 23, 1972. This was a Day to Remember.”

Co-captain Ira Waldman ’73 caught two touchdown passes in the win. He perhaps should have had a third TD reception, right before Bayek’s game-winning field goal. But “an out of position official” ruled a diving effort from Waldman incomplete.

“It was the first time we had played like a team in ages,” Waldman said to the Student after the win. “There wasn't a single person on that field: either first string, second string, third string, coaches, or anyone who expected to lose. It was that pride, that attitude, that morale that won the game for us.”

The Kick that Won the Game
The Bates Student rejoiced as the Bobcats stunned mighty AIC by a score of 17-14 in 1972.

A Harvard hero comes to Bates

Vic Gatto was the captain of the Harvard football team that famously “beat” Yale 29-29 (Yale can’t seem to avoid being on the “losing” end of ties) in 1968. In a battle of undefeated teams, Harvard rallied from a 22-0 deficit, scoring 16 points in the final 42 seconds to tie the Bulldogs. Gatto scored the final touchdown of that game, and finished his career as the Crimson’s all-time leading rusher and scorer.

He was head football coach for four seasons at Middlesex School in Concord, Mass., and in 1973 Bates surprised a lot of people, including Gatto, by hiring him to lead the football program at just 25 years of age. 

“Even in those days, a high school coach getting that kind of elevation (to the college ranks) just didn’t happen,” Gatto recalled in a Bates Bobcast interview. “But I had a lot of people on my side, particularly Carmen Cozza — weirdly, the head football coach at Yale. We had been rivals for four years, but Carm was the one who called me and said he was going to recommend me for the job at Bates.”

Gatto beat out more than 80 candidates for the job, and he credits a scheduling snafu during the interview process for putting him over the top. 

“Instead of going to lunch with the hiring committee, which was what I was supposed to do, I got 'stuck' having lunch with Hedley Reynolds, who was the president,” Gatto recalled. “And Hedley and I really hit it off. He was the one who ultimately made the decision to bring me to Bates.” 

He became the youngest head coach in college football, and over the course of five seasons Gatto slowly but surely got the Bobcats going in the right direction.

Highlights of his tenure included a 4–4 record in 1974, as Bates captured their first CBB Series title in seven years and the defense held opponents to just 84 rushing yards per game.

Then, during an otherwise down year in 1975, the Bobcats pulled off one of their greatest victories, upsetting C.W. Post, now LIU Post, 25–22 at Garcelon Field in “what may have been the finest football game in Bates College history,” according to the Student’s excited (some might say hyperbolic) lede that compared the win to Don Larson's World Series perfect game, Joe Namath in the 1969 Super Bowl, and Wilt Chamberlain scoring 100 points. 

C.W. Post entered the game undefeated at 5–0 and ranked second in the Lambert Bowl voting for the best Division III team in the East. They were a certified powerhouse, and The Boston Globe declared that “the Maine outfit has gone out of its class.”

On top of that, it was not exactly a soft landing for Bates sophomore Steve Olsen ’78, making his first career start at quarterback. Echoing campus sentiment, the Student said that Olsen “had been offered up as a human sacrifice.”

But Olsen’s performance was stellar. “Not only did Olsen pass for two touchdowns and score one himself, he also kept his cool and brought victory to his team which had trailed 14-0 early in the second quarter,” reported the Student.

Gatto ended his five-year tenure at Bates in 1977 on a high note, as the Bobcats posted their first winning season since the Jim Murphy era, going 4–3–1. 

Gatto had recruited a pair of quarterbacks who made a big difference for the Bobcats in the ensuing seasons. Hugo Colasante '78 and Chuck Laurie ’79 were separated by a year, but inseparable on the football field.

“We were very close and worked out together a lot, always rooting each other on,” Colasante said in a Bates Bobcast interview. “We still keep in touch. He was a heck of a quarterback, very strong arm, good athlete. So it was fun playing with him.” 

Colasante’s college choices came down to the Black Bears of Maine or the Bobcats. 

“A group of us from Boston College High School had gone up to visit UMaine on a recruiting trip for a couple of days,” Colasante recalled. “It was a fun time. On the way back, I remember our coach called from high school. He said, ‘Why don't you stop by Bates? Coach Gatto would like to talk to you.’” 

Colasante also spoke to Dean of Admissions Milt Lindholm ’35 and spent a few days on the Bates campus. He truly felt like he belonged, but still didn’t know which school he wanted to attend.

“I was going back and forth. Bates. Maine. Bates. Maine. When I get back to high school, my coach pulls me aside and goes, ‘You'd be an idiot not to go to Bates,’” recalls Colasante. “I go, ‘Well, I guess I'm going to Bates.’”

The chance to play right away at quarterback was appealing as well. Olsen’s performance against C.W. Post in 1975 temporarily made Colasante the second-string QB, as Gatto mixed and matched on offense. 

But by 1977, Colasante was once again the starter, and his statistics that season put him in the same breath as “Jim Murphy” in the annals of Bates football history.

During his outstanding senior year, Colasante set Bates records with 1,636 passing yards and an interception percentage of just 3.1 percent. He still ranks third in both categories, and his single-season passing yardage record stood for 44 years. 

Like Murphy a decade earlier, Colasante had a pair of excellent pass catchers he could go to with confidence. Tom Burhoe ’78 and the aforementioned Olsen, who was a team captain had switched to wide receiver by that point. They made for a dynamic duo, combining for more than 1,000 yards receiving. 

A giant 6-foot-6 tight end, Burhoe was a particularly inviting target. After missing most of his junior year due to injury, his play in 1977 caught the attention of the New England Patriots, who signed him as a free agent after graduation. 

The 1977 Bobcats came very close to having a truly historic season. Colasante ranked sixth in NCAA Division III in passing and eighth in total offense. Narrow losses to Trinity early on and Bowdoin later in the year forced them to settle for simply a winning record. 

“Unfortunately I remember the losses more than the wins,” Colasante says. “I still have nightmares over the Bowdoin game. We outgained them, time of possession, total yards. Just a couple of mistakes really buried us. That was the game that really hurt.”

Gatto’s coaching success caught the attention of a rival to the south. 

Under Gatto, Bates had gone 3–1 against the Tufts University Jumbos, including a 6–0 win in 1973 that marked the first time the Bobcats had beaten Tufts on the gridiron in their last 12 tries. The Bobcats beat the Jumbos once again in the 1977 season finale, and Tufts responded by hiring Gatto away from Bates less than a month before the beginning of the 1978 season. 

For Gatto, it was a chance to return to his home state. For Bates, it meant they had very little time to find their next head coach. Luckily, an alum who fit the bill was already on staff.

This is the fourth of a five-part series about the 150-year history of Bates football. A new article will be published the week of every home football game this fall.