Moree High School to celebrate its 1973 triumph with a reunion

By BILL POULOS

The Moree community is gearing up for a major 50-year reunion of league players, officials and supporters in August to celebrate one of the town’s most cherished sports achievements.

On August 18, back in 1973, a game of junior rugby league made headlines around the country when Moree High School’s open-weight football team beat Forbes High School in the coveted University Shield grand final.

This group of mates who became lifelong brothers were catapulted to the top of schoolboy rugby league’s food chain when, amid unparalleled pomp and pageantry, the prized University Shield was brought home to Moree for the first time.

Moree High School was one of 184 schools competing in an elite knock-out competition steeped in tradition.

Captained by the late Terry Quinn, who in later years would become CEO of NSW Country Rugby League, the Moree High School open-weight squad challenged all-comers and soundly defeated them.

The team – ranging in ages from 15 to 18 – defied the odds and united a town as the quest for schoolboy rugby league’s holy grail edged closer.

Moree delivered hidings to Warialda (48-6), Tenterfield (59-2), Armidale (20-6), Tamworth (14-2) Maitland (27-5), Lismore (44-10) and Newcastle (26-10) to set up a date with Forbes High School on the Central Coast.

The University Shield grand-final at Gosford’s Graham Park on August 18, 1973, was the day of the underdog, and a defining moment in Moree’s sporting and civic pride.

An 8000-strong crowd filed through the turnstiles to watch the game, at the time a record for the venue.

Moree High came from behind to snatch a 13-12 victory and cement a permanent place in the NSW rugby league history books.

Fifty years later, surviving members of the school’s University Shield squad as well as players who wore the Moree jersey with pride at different levels of competition during the 1970s – long regarded as a golden age of rugby league in Moree – will scrum down on August 18, 19 and 20 to reunite and remember.

Organiser Mike Hadfield expects hundreds of people to roll into town for the 50-year reunion.

Former Moree residents wishing to return for the three-day reunion can contact Mike on 0417 482359 or email ([email protected]).