| Reynolds basketball had its roots in Fredonia basketball. FHS had a basketball team for many years; they were called the Vocats, as Fredonia was a Vocational & Agricultural school. The school colors were Orange and Blue. Fredonia had a history of winning basketball. They won the State Class C championships in 1951 (the first time there was a State Class C Championship, prior to that there were only Class A & B in the state of PA) and 1955. Before that time the farthest they could go was to the Western Finals. In 1957-58 Fredonia was changed to Class B and advanced to the Western Finals where they lost to Wampum who went onto win the State Championship. Fredonia was coached for many years by Mr. Ebbert. His assistant coach was Bob Hogg. |
| Mr. Garrett’s first year of teaching was at Fredonia in 1957-58 where he became the assistant coach under Ebbert for two years. Garrett had attended West Middlesex HS. With the retirement of Coach Ebbert, Garrett became the head coach at Fredonia in the 1959-60 season. Harry Wasser was Garrett’s assistant coach. |
| When the Reynolds school started in the 1960-61 school year Fredonia HS was closed and Garrett became the first head basketball coach at Reynolds with Harry Wasser as his assistant. Ebbert (Chemistry Teacher), Wasser (Biology Teacher), Garrett (Social Studies Teacher) all were part of Reynolds High School’s first teaching staff. |
| The starters at Fredonia; Ed Small - #34 (the only Senior), Tom Harpst - #40, Chris Musgrove - #24, Larry Jones - #30, Gary Kuhn - #22, and Ray Eastlick - #50 during its last year of basketball were the top players at Reynolds along with John Bresnan who came from St. Michaels. |
| Basketball was popular in Mercer County back in the early days of Reynolds with a number of good teams in the area including; Jamestown, Commodore Perry, Mercer and Hickory. |
| Reynolds first uniforms were generic with white pants and sleeveless tops (white for home & blue for away) with a number. The warm-ups were a white pull-over shirt. |
| In the second year they received new jerseys with blue shorts with an R on the sides and a white home jersey & blue away jersey with a number and two thin lines above and below the number. For warm-ups they had long sleeve blue jackets and also had calf leggings with blue with gray rings. |
| The following year the home uniforms were white shorts with an R on the sides and the white sleeveless jersey they had the year before and white calf leggings with blue rings. The away uniforms were blue shorts with an R on the sides and the blue sleeveless jersey they had the year before and blue calf leggings with gray rings. They also had new warm-ups with a short sleeve blue and gray jacket with Reynolds Raiders and the school's logo on the back and long blue and gray pants. |
| In the 1961-62 season an elementary basketball program was started. There were four teams; Transfer Elementary coached by Ron Kreider in 1961-62 and by Frank Amato in 1962-1963, Fredonia Elementary coached by Dick Sherwood. The other two teams were West Salem Elementary and St. Paul’s Elementary. |
| Then in the 1963-64 season an intramural program was started along with a Junior High team which was coached by Mr. Speigle. |
| Varsity assistants in the early years were; Harry Wasser - 1960-64, Dick Sherwood - 1965-66 and Denny Driscoll - 1967-69. |
| Notes: |
| Larry Jones scored the last two points of Fredonia basketball and scored the first two points in Reynolds |
| During the 1962-63 season the elementary teams got to play at halftime of the one of the home varsity games. |
| in 1966 Reynolds had a ball with the spiral design on it with blue and gray |
| The Pep band played Sweet Georgia Brown during warm-ups. |
| The 1966-67 season had a blue & gray painted spiral basketball to warm-up with. |
| In 1962 Reynolds played Mercer at Westminster College in the D10 Semifinals and lost 48 to 45 I believe that they played at Westminster Charlie Kuhn, one of Reynolds starter broke his ankle 2 or 3 days before the game. |
In 1964 Reynolds played Mercer at Allegany College. in the D10 Semifinals and lost 42 to 40
Reynolds missed the front end of 6 One & One foul shots during the game. |
