The success of the 1997 Lakeland football team was the product of a prolific, record-setting offense and a punishing defense. And so much more.
 
Talent, experience, sacrifice, a family-like atmosphere and a locked-in focus on the task all were characteristics of the 1997 Muskies on the gridiron. All came together to produce one of the greatest seasons in school history.
 
The Muskies finished a perfect 10-0 in 1997. It was the program's second-ever undefeated season and the first since the 1950 team finished 6-0. The squad also set a school record for victories in a season, and by its end had won 18 straight games dating back to the third game of 1996.
 
Lakeland was dominant on both sides of the ball. The Muskies outscored their opponents a whopping 428-116 for the season, averaging nearly 43 points per game and allowing less than 12. Seven times they scored at least 40 points, and seven times they held opponents to 14 points or less.
 

Randy Awrey was the architect. In a five-season run as Lakeland's head coach from 1994-98, Awrey posted a 35-14-1 record, and his .710 winning percentage is the best for any coach in the program history. Awrey coordinated the defense, while Bill Unsworth served as offensive coordinator in 1996-97, and the two led the way on a special run.
 
"Probably the number one thing that I go back to, and it always is, is the people," said Awrey. "Coach 'Uns' and I, when he came, wanted to have an open-style of offense, put points on the board. And, when you have a great coach, the best thing you can do is stay out of his way.
 
"He did an awesome job implementing a whole new system in '96, and then just rolling from there…he did an awesome job with the kids, understood where they needed to be, and who to put where, and get them in the right place."
 
Awrey was a head coach for 23 years at the collegiate level and won 134 games at four different schools, including five years recently at current Lakeland rival Concordia Chicago. He currently is head football coach and dean of students at Perquimans Country High School in Hertford, N.C. At all his stops, Awrey has guided teams by what he called the only rule on any team he has ever coached.
 
"Faith, family, education, team, self, that was the five," recited Mark Novara, the record-setting quarterback for four of Awrey's five years at Lakeland and like Awrey a native of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. "And he was always right, and when you look back at it, when we heard those things, and he said, 'When one of those things is out of order, your life's messed up,' it was definitely true to the fact and I held that to this day. When things in my life aren't right, I look at those five, what's messed up here, and it goes back in order and you're all set."
 
It was the era of the run-and-shoot offense at Lakeland, and the Muskies put up huge offensive numbers, especially passing. Unsworth was a longtime product of the run-and-shoot who as offensive coordinator had led Gardner-Webb (N.C.) to the NAIA Division I title game in 1992. He came to the Muskies as offensive coordinator in 1996 and with quarterback Novara at the trigger engineered an offense that moved the ball seemingly at will.
 
Novara came to Lakeland as a transfer from NCAA Division II Northern Michigan University. The native of Kingsford, Mich., would rewrite much of the school's record book with mind-boggling numbers throughout his four-year career from 1994-97, and especially in his final two years.
 
Novara passed for 11,295 yards in his career, nearly three times more than any Muskies QB before him at that time and still a school record. He also still holds school marks for completions (894), attempts (1,629), passing touchdowns (101) and yards of total offense (10,975), and he held six NCAA records at the end of his time as a collegian.
 
Novara had a massive season in 1996, throwing for still-standing school records of 3,405 yards and 40 touchdowns as Lakeland led NCAA Division III in passing. He was named a second team Division III All-American by Don Hansen's Football Gazette, a foremost publication covering small colleges then.
 
His main target was Brandon Lawson, who also was a second team D-III All-American for Don Hansen in 1996. Lawson still holds the school's single-season receiving yardage record (1,143) set that year.
 
The numbers for both actually were down some in 1997, in good part because the starters didn't even play in the second half of a number of games that year because the Muskies had built such a big lead by halftime. No receiver caught more than 56 passes or had more than 607 yards receiving, but nine different players caught at least 10 passes and eleven had at least 100 yards receiving.

"I think it's probably every quarterback's dream to play in something like that," said Novara, now a fifth-grade math teacher as well as the head football coach at his alma mater Kingsford High School. "(But) it wasn't like we didn't run the ball. We always had really good running backs, who (also) blocked tremendously. It wasn't like we were just one-dimensional.
 
"Those games were incredible, just understanding where people were. For one instance, Ripon, our first game of the year our last year. We ran a play called Guards East (and) there's one wrinkle off of it, if we got blitzed off the short edge, we just threw an automatic slant, and my first touchdown pass that year was to Brandon on that very instance. We're running Guards East, and here comes that edge pressure. I threw it, I didn't even see Brandon, I just knew where he was going to be. I had no idea where he was at, I just threw it to the spot where he was supposed to be and he was there."
 
As much of a juggernaut as the offense was, the defense was also stout and frequently even intimidating. With Awrey serving as defensive coordinator, Lakeland shut down almost every team it played. The Muskies shut out opponents three times, allowed two others to score only a touchdown, and only two teams scored more than 17 points.
 
The Muskies were an experienced unit, with a core of many who had played extensively for three and four years. Tesfa Smith was a two-time first team all-Illini-Badger Conference selection and twice named the league's top linebacker. Brian Wesoloski was named first team all-conference in 1996 and 1997 and was twice the IBC's top defensive lineman. Derrick Smith was a two-time all-league cornerback. In all, ten different Muskies on defense received all-conference honors in 1997.
 

 "I remember my first year in '94, we probably started all freshmen at some point on our defense, and we weren't very good, we got pushed around," said Smith, now an assistant coach at NCAA Division II Ferris State in Michigan and a native of south Florida who found his way to Lakeland by following his brother there. "But that same core guys by the time we were seniors, you had guys who had logged a lot of snaps going into '97, so I think the game for most of us was just incredibly slow.
 
"I played next to Brian Thiry (three-time all-league performer) for three years, he was the guy next to me for three years, so we knew each other, we played off each other. Wesoloski played defensive end for us, and he was a stud, he controlled that 'C' gap and made it harder to penetrate. We had Carl (McMillan) who was a stud defensive lineman for us. We had a good core of guys, so that if you brought in anyone else, that group of core guys was able to help those other guys to fall into place."

With so many players who had played together for three and four years, it also was a close team, with the offense appreciative of the defense's work and vice versa.

"Very close team," said Novara. "We all came in together, so we all lived together, we always hung out together, we always did things together. Really in practice, though, we weren't really allowed to go against our first team defense very often, every once in a while a little 10-play snippet, and it was all or nothing, it was awesome.
 
"But those guys were fun to watch, just flying around…I think that helped us a lot too. To play against those type of guys in practice, you had to be pretty good, because kids like Derrick Smith, a lockdown corner, if you weren't getting open, he wasn't going to let you, and then he was going to let you know it too. Always those type of things, that helped us make us better."
 
Awrey credits the talent on the team. "It goes back to you've got to have good personnel," he said. "X's and O's, you don't win with X's and O's. As coaches, I know Coach Uns hasn't scored a touchdown in a lot of years, and I haven't made a tackle or scored in a lot of years. You have to rely a lot on your players."

As much as the talent, though, was the leadership on the team, on the field and off.

"I can't say enough about (players like) Mark & Tesfa, and the leadership they brought off the field," said Awrey. "They had it on the field-football is huge to those guys-but they took it another step by going off the field, and they were demanding things from the other guys on the team, and the other guys on the team bought into what they were saying.

"The pleasure of being able to work with people like that, we were able to rally a whole bunch of young men, and to get them to feel that family atmosphere. They're the kind of guys you want on your sideline, they're the kind of guys you want in the trenches with you, and they'd go to war with you."
 
"The combination is that 'it' factor, that you see in, say, a Super Bowl champion team, or you see in a college champion team," continued Awrey. "But how you get it, it's a miracle, because if you could box it up and send it I'd be a millionaire. So the reality is, that 'it' factor is the people, and the relationships with those people.
 
"Now don't get me wrong now, these guys were talented, they were very talented. But they pulled it together to make it a family, so it wasn't about them, it was about us. And I think that was the key factor of that football team.  And what everybody goes back to is, 'Hey, we're all brothers in this thing,' and that was awesome. That was really an awesome feeling, every time we had practice or games, you know everybody is giving their best."
 
Family was ingrained in the program, right down to Awrey's wife Connie also serving as the cheerleading coach. Coach Awrey even told the story of how her chocolate chip cookies were a favorite of Unsworth. In fact, Connie Awrey made a deal with Unsworth that if his offense scored a set number of points offensively in a game-a number that by the end was raised all the way to 60-that she would make him cookies.
 
"If he didn't get to that number, he'd tell me 'we're getting to that number, I want those cookies,'" said Coach Awrey.
 
"He (Awrey) made it a family affair," said Unsworth. "After games, after home games, lot of nights, Saturday nights, we'd go over to where he lived down by the farm, and we'd have a bonfire, and turn on the old transistor radio…we just had the whole staff out there with their kids and their families. It was fun, it was a family affair."

Lakeland brought a steam train full of momentum into 1997. The Muskies had finished 8-2 the year before without a single senior in the starting lineup, winning their final eight games and going 5-0 in the Illini-Badger Conference for their first title in ten years.
 
Extending that winning streak in Sept. 1997 may have looked like a daunting task, though, with an opening game against Ripon. The Red Hawks had dealt the Muskies a 28-10 defeat in the 1996 opener, and in fact had beaten Lakeland each of the seven previous seasons.
 
The Muskies put an end to that futility in emphatic fashion, winning 48-0 on the road for their first win over Ripon since 1988.
 
"Before the game, one of our coaches was in the press box," said Unsworth. "He was listening to their radio announcers, and they were talking, 'Well, Lakeland is improved, it'll probably be close for the first half, and then Ripon will come out there in the second half and just cruise away.' Obviously that didn't happen. That really gave me a lot of satisfaction."
 
"That was a big one, just for me, just to get that one off my back," said Novara. "Seriously, because I had never really performed well against them at all."
 
The Muskies rolled past Maranatha Baptist in their second game to avenge their other loss in 1996, and then rallied for another road win at Carthage. Lakeland then rolled through its next two games against Franklin (Ind.) and Greenville (Ill.) by a combined score of 99-13 to move to 5-0 heading into a matchup with IBC rival Concordia Wisconsin.
 
Midway through the third quarter, it appeared the Muskies' 13-game winning streak was going up in smoke. The Falcons led 33-0, and with their grind-it-out rushing attack getting the best of Lakeland on this day, the outcome appeared inevitable.
 
What followed was one of the great comebacks in college football history. Lakeland scored 41 unanswered points, including 28 points in the fourth quarter for an improbable 41-33 victory. The 33-point comeback is still tied for the biggest deficit overcome to win a game in Division III history, and is the largest third quarter deficit ever overcome in a D-III game.
 

Novara noted how calm offensive coordinator Unsworth was even as the Muskies went into a deep, deep hole.
 
"We're down 33-0, and I'm losing my mind," said Novara, "and he said 'Don't worry about it, we'll be O.K.,' and I'm flipping out like crazy, and he's right there keeping everything on an even keel. Because at that time, that was it. Everything that we wanted was gone. The conference is gone, there's no chance of getting into the playoff-this is it. It was imploding right in front of us, and we couldn't stop it. And then we finally went and got it. It was incredible."
 
"Believe me, I wasn't that calm," said Unsworth. "I thought for a second, I think I told Jeff Hynes, our offensive line coach, I said 'Screw this, I'm going to throw on every down, if we're not going to win at least we're going to get some stats.' And then all of the sudden, things started falling into place and we ended up doing it."

The Muskies scored their 41 points on six touchdowns in just over a quarter's worth of game time. Novara's one-yard sneak for a touchdown-his third of the game-gave Lakeland the lead with 5:18 to play, and Smith returned an interception 45 yards for a touchdown less than a minute later for the final score.

"It just shows how mentally tough we were for all situations," said Smith. "I'll never forget that game, we were down 20-0 at halftime, and you'd think there would be a lot of yelling because at that point we had never really trailed. There was no yelling going on in the locker room, nothing."
 
Lakeland won its next four games, including a hard-earned 24-13 win over Eureka to clinch the IBC title and move to 9-0. It then wrapped up the season with a unique challenge on the road.
 
The Muskies took an 8 1/2 hour bus ride to face Kentucky Wesleyan, an NCAA Division II program and the place where Awrey had been head coach for four years before coming to Lakeland. Awrey scheduled the game to boost the Muskies' scheduling strength in hopes of impressing the Division III playoff committee, and perhaps for a little bit warmer weather too.
 
Lakeland routed the Division II Panthers 51-0, dominating in every way. The Muskies built a 30-0 lead by halftime, led 51-0 in the third quarter before easing off the throttle, and held Kentucky Wesleyan to minus-81 yards rushing. The win completed a perfect 10-0 regular season
 
Despite all its success, one goal went unmet that year. Even with an unblemished record and after making what appeared to be a convincing final argument, the Muskies were not selected for the then 16-team Division III playoffs. UW-Whitewater, Simpson (Iowa), Augsburg (Minn.) and Concordia-Moorhead (Minn.) were the four teams selected from the West Region. Two of those teams finished their regular seasons with a loss; one (Concordia) had two losses. It was a crushing blow to the team and will forever be a mystery how the Muskies would've performed on the national stage.
 
Still, the playoff snub could do nothing to detract from what the team accomplished, or what its members have accomplished since. In addition to pride in that season, Awrey said he is proud of seeing the people his players have become since moving on from college, and the players still draw on their lessons from Lakeland.

"That time in my life, with Coach Uns and Coach Awrey, I needed it more than they needed me," said Novara. "II had these both guys guiding me through my life at that time. Their word was gospel, and I just bought into what they were selling… my life changed because I went to school at Lakeland, because of Coach Awrey and Coach Uns."

"What Coach taught us went beyond football," said Smith. "I'm not sitting here as a family man and trying to be the best I can be without those experiences at Lakeland College in '97. All I have right now is because of those experiences and those relationships."

1997 Lakeland football season results
Sept. 6 at Ripon W 48-0
Sept. 13 Maranatha Baptist W 42-14
Sept. 20 at Carthage W 32-26
Sept. 27 Franklin (Ind.) W 40-6
Oct. 4 Greenville (Ill.)* W 59-7
Oct. 11 at Concordia (Wis.)* W 41-33
Oct. 18 at MacMurray (Ill.)* W 24-17
Oct. 25 Concordia (Ill.)* W 67-0
Nov. 1 at Eureka (Ill.)* W 24-13
Nov. 15 at Kentucky Wesleyan W 51-0
* - Illini-Badger Conference game


1997 Lakeland football team members Randy Awrey (head coach), Bill Unsworth (offensive coordinator), Mark Novara (quarterback) and Tesfa Smith (linebacker) joined us for a roundtable Zoom call talking about the season. Below are a few clips from a very enjoyable conversation and online get-together wth them:


Memories from the season and their time together



Recalling the dramatic comeback win over Concordia Wisconsin


The season-ending win over Kentucky Wesleyan, plus chocolate chip cookies as motivation for Coach Unsworth and his offense