Gallup Cathedral “Panthers” and the Jal “Panthers” Played For the New Mexico State Football Championship

November 19, 1960 — 61 Years Ago-The Gallup Cathedral “Panthers” and the Jal “Panthers” Played For the New Mexico State Football Championship In Gallup

1960 Jal Football Team in front of the El Rancho Hotel

By Ronnie Null #17 on the Jal Panther team and brother of Perry Null-Long-time resident of Gallup

Gallup’s El Rancho Hotel has hosted among others John Wayne and Ronald Reagan, but on November 18, 1960, 23 Jal Panther football players, two coaches, and 5 cheerleaders were guests. All week-long Jal football coaches Harold Wickersham and Ernie Shotton had “drilled” into our heads that the Cathedral Panthers were “HONEST TO GOD STUDS.” So, with the inevitable task of playing the “POWERFUL” Cathedral Panthers on Saturday afternoon, we were aware of the challenge facing us.

Jal’s Gary Martin remembers vividly that during the ‘first quarter the Cathedral players hit him so hard that they broke his face mask.” Things only got worse for Gary—in the second quarter, while wearing a borrowed helmet, once again he was smashed by tough Cathedral Panthers so “hard that his helmet split right in half.” Gary screamed in the huddle that “I have never in my life been hit so hard.” Gary credits Bill Garcia, Cathedral’s middle linebacker, along with several other “200 pound” Panthers for destroying his headgear. Later Bill and Gary were friends at New Mexico Highlands University.

Larry Leavell, a Jal Panthers lineman, recalls reading in the Albuquerque Journal that the Journal had picked the Gallup Cathedral Panthers to win the state championship game. By the time our coaches had “drilled” the “HONEST TO GOD STUDS” into our brains and the Albuquerque Journal had picked the Gallup Cathedral Panthers to win, we were “ALMOST INTIMATED BUT NOT QUITE.”

As the game ended, the Jal Panthers won the state championship game, but both “PANTHER TEAMS” earned the respect for one another. Sixty one years later, players on both teams remember the beautiful bright sunny day in Gallup when two “PANTHER TEAMS” PLAYED THEIR HEARTS OUT AND EARNED THE RESPECT OF GALLUP AND JAL FANS.

Gallup Cathedral had one of their players play football for the University of Texas El Paso.

The Jal Panthers had two players play for Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas.

The Panthers had one player play for the University of Tulsa, Oklahoma.