Baltimore Sports History: The Dayton Triangles

November 12th, 2024 by The Professor

by Andrew Ciofalo, host of After The Whistle

This year marks the 104th season of NFL play and it’s lining up to be as exciting as ever. Here in Baltimore, the Ravens only have existed for the last 28 years of the NFL, when the franchise came from Cleveland in 1995 and played in its first season a year later. Many people in Baltimore still remember the Baltimore Colts and their beloved Johnny Unitas. Afterall, that’s where Baltimore’s football fandom began. But before they were the Colts, the franchise can trace its origins back to one of the charter teams of the NFL.

The Colts franchise that we see today in Indianapolis was once Baltimore’s team, playing in old Memorial Stadium from 1953 till 1983. Over that 40 year span the Colts won 3 NFL Championships prior to the merger of the AFL and NFL and won Superbowl V in the 1970 season. The Baltimore Colts history could be a whole other story, but that’s for another day. The even less known is the history of the franchise that came before, so let’s go all the way back to the start.

The year is 1913 in Dayton Ohio, the local St. Mary’s College’s basketball team had mostly just graduated. After college, they would go on to form a basketball team filled with grads, current students and other alum. They called themselves the St. Mary’s Cadets and played and won in a small basketball league. In the fall of 1913, the basketball playing St. Mary’s Cadets made their own football team and was coached by the head coach of their college’s team. The newly made football team would play in the Dayton City league and go undefeated in their first season and capped it off by winning the Dayton City Championship.

Fast forward to 1915, those St. Mary’s Cadets went through name changes and coaching changes yet still won 2 more Dayton City Championships. The following year brought even more change as the team was reorganized and consisted of 3 different factories’ workers. This is also when the name of the team was changed to the Dayton Triangles, named after their home field Triangle Park. In 1916 the Triangles won the Ohio League Championship and went 9-1 on the season. The Triangles were a very successful squad and their championship wins showed for it.

Up until this point the Cadets and now the Triangles had only played in city leagues as well as the Ohio league. However, this all changed for the better in 1920 when there was the first meeting between 4 football teams from Ohio met at a car dealership of all places to form the first version of the NFL that we see today. The four teams were the Canton Bulldogs, Akron Pros, Cleveland Indians, and the Dayton Triangles. A second meeting would occur with representatives from the aforementioned teams, as well as 6 more teams would come together to create the American Professional Football Association (APFA).

The APFA would play its inaugural season in 1920 and would include 14 teams, including the Decatur Staleys and the Chicago Cardinals. The Decatur Staleys became the Chicago Bears in 1922 and is the same Bears team we see today. The Chicago Cardinals moved to St. Louis and then again to their current home and play as the Arizona Cardinals. The only two franchises still remaining from the original NFPA. In 1922 the name of the league was changed to what we know and love today, the National Football League (NFL).

The Dayton Triangles fell behind the curve of the NFL in the early years and ultimately lead to their mediocrity. While the other teams looked to recent college graduates for players, the Dayton Triangles stuck with their guns in trying to stick with local talent for their team. This would be costly as they won only 5 games of 51 from 1923 to 1929. In 1930 the franchise was bought out by a group in Brooklyn and was moved to New York and played as the Brooklyn Dodgers. Between 1930 and 1951, the team had gone through merges, name changes, and anything else you could think of before becoming the New York Yanks. In 1952 the franchise would reach bankruptcy and would be sold to the NFL. The franchise would be awarded to a group in Texas.

The New York Yanks franchise would become the first major league sports team to be based in Texas. However this only lasted one season. The Dallas Texans ended their first and only season in the NFL 1-11. The horrible on field results lead to another sale of the team back to the league. It was soon purchased by a group in Baltimore and the team would keep its Texans colors and become the Baltimore Colts. From 1953 till now, the Colts have been an up and down team, but nonetheless, a lot more successful than their predecessors.

The path of the once St. Mary’s Cadets was a wild ride and still somewhat continues today in that of the Indianapolis Colts. Through the years of the Dayton Triangles to New York and Dallas, the franchise is storied and an original charter member of the NFL.