Dear Old Cathedral, here's to you…

 

September 4, 2022


 

Dear Old Cathedral, here's to you…

My visit to Indiana continued the day after I attended the Purdue vs. Penn State football game with a trip to see another football contest involving my alma mater, this time however it was my high school rather than college who was competing. I headed to witness the Friday Night Lights in Northeastern Indiana to the town of Mishiwaka where the Cathedral Fighting Irish football team was taking on perennial state power, the Penn High School Kingsmen.

On my way to the game, I had some time to kill so I stopped at the Potawatomi Zoo in nearby South Bend, Indiana to take a look at a smaller Indiana zoo that I had never been to before. In fact I have never spent much time at all in Northeastern Indiana other than a few visits to Notre Dame a long time ago. I wanted to see something relatively quick and easy to access, so I selected the zoo.

The Potawatomi Zoo is a 23-acre zoological park located in Potawatomi Park between the St. Joseph River and the Grand Trunk railroad in the east side neighborhood of River Park. Founded in 1921, it is Indiana's second-oldest Zoo. It features over 400 animals and is accredited by the AZA and it has over 200,000 visitors each year.

It is a great little zoo, home to approximately 400 animals. Rare Australian animals, large cats and primates are some of the distinctive features of the zoo. The rare and celebrated Edzoocation is the Education Department of the Zoo that offers an array of informative programs and classes for children.

The zoo is in the midst of some substantial upgrades and improvements, yet none of these really impact the experience of visiting the zoo. I really enjoyed the slow pace, small crowd as well as the activity of the animals who were mostly out and enjoying a beautiful early fall day with about perfect weather. The place manages to feel at once nostalgic with its carousel and small train ride, but the exhibits are all up to modern zoo standards with plenty of room for the animals. The staff was especially impressive, first off, unlike many places experiencing staffing shortages, the zoo had an abundance of staff taking care of the animals as well as available to answer questions. I think the number of staff was greater than the number of visitors on the day I attended.

My next stop was at Penn high school for the game. Penn has a rich tradition as a football powerhouse but they have not done well in recent years against my former high school, Cathedral.  My high school has been a major player in high school football in Indiana for 100 years. They have multiple state championships over the years and are currently the two-time defending 5A state champions in Indiana.

They seem to have lost a bit to graduation and moved up to the top level (6A) this year due to their success, so things get a bit tougher. They had already lost a rare regular season game to Brownsburg and were ranked fourth in the state coming in to this game. 

After drubbing Penn the last two years, Cathedral may have been caught off-guard early on as Penn rolled out to a 13-0 lead before the Irish really new what hit them. Cathedral rebounded in the second quarter, scoring a touchdown on a long drive then following it up as time expired on the first half with a hail mary pass that gave them a 14-13 lead at halftime.

The second half was dominated by the Irish who scored a quick 21 points to take a 35-13 advantage before the third string gave up a late Kingsman touchdown for a final score of CHS 35 Penn 21. It was another beautiful night and a lot of fun, mostly because I ran into two of my classmates who each have sons on the current Irish team, so it was cool to catch up.

https://www.potawatomizoo.org/