High school sport rivalries are becoming non-existent in West Haven.
It all started off with long-time football rival Hillhouse being taken off West Haven’s schedule. Those two teams used to fill up the Yale Bowl, in fact the top 5 most-attended games in Connecticut high school football history all belong to West Haven v. Hillhouse.
Nov. 25th, 1948 | 40,504
Nov. 27th, 1947 | 35,242
Nov 28th, 1946 | 32,494
Nov 24th, 1949 | 25,421
Nov 23rd, 1950 | 22,946
* stats via collinsvillepress.com
I know the 1940s were a long time ago, but the West Haven-Hillhouse football rivalry used to mean something.
Now, Hillhouse has had an uncompetitive football program for about the last decade, but that doesn’t mean a rivalry game should be taken off the schedule. So much for a Thanksgiving game.
Same goes with Wilbur Cross. A long-time rivalry GONE! And it was the same time as Hillhouse went.
Now add on the unofficial departure of Notre Dame-West Haven.
I remember being in high school, it was the biggest rivalry of the year no matter if it was football or hockey. You had virtually the entire school talking about it for the whole week. Not to mention the student sections, which really made it.
The ‘Devils Den’ and ‘Green Machine’ facing off could be argued that it was bigger than the game itself.
2024 was the first season without the West Haven-ND football rivalry, so I guess the Soderman Bowl will stay in Blue Devils possession for at least one more year.
The 2024-25 NDWH Hockey schedule does not include West Haven High School on it for the second-straight year.
So can someone please tell me how, just HOW could you not play your cross-town team in 2-out-of-3 of the major sports!?
If you ask me, I’d tell you it’s the cardinal sin of local sports.
You could blame the CIAC making everything as a strength of schedule when it comes to playoffs or the athletics department wanting a more evenly-matched schedule for more wins and a chance to be ranked.
I blame it on the love of the game that has been lost.
I don’t care that basketball still plays the rivalries. It doesn’t matter (at least not as much) when you have football and hockey pushed into the shadow realm.
It is sad, very sad.
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