From football field to fillings: Peters Township star joins South Fayette dental practice
Tyler Porco has joined DiBartola Dental as an associate dentist.
Dr. Wayne J. DiBartola Jr., left, and Dr. Tyler Porco discuss dentistry while working on a patient.
Maraelee Harrison and Alyssa Morgele helps Dr. Tyler Porco sedate Dr. Wayne J. DiBartola during a dental procedure.
Dr. Tyler Porco has joined Dr. Wayne J. DiBartola in the practice of denistry.
Dr. Tyler Porco performs a procedure on Dr. Wayne J. DiBartola Jr.
Tyler Porco never had a cavity. And at age 25, he still has some of his baby teeth.
Yet the Peters Township native never considered dentistry as a career until he met Wayne “The Train” DiBartola Jr.
Because of their common interest in football, they bonded. Today, they have formed a partnership, as Dr. Porco joined Dr. DiBartola’s dental practice, located in Portman’s Country Commons at 3249 Washington Road, South Fayette Township.
“Back in seventh grade,” Porco began, “I had no idea that I wanted to be a dentist. I just knew that I wanted to do something medical. I didn’t know much about dentistry, other than my coach was a dentist.”
Back then, that was all Porco knew about DiBartola, who also happened to be an All-American at the University of Pittsburgh and helped the Panthers win the Sugar Bowl in 1982. Porco said that when he met DiBartola, whom he still calls “coach,” he didn’t know what to expect.
“I was playing quarterback, and I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. But (DiBartola) really made me feel comfortable when he came in. He made it easy. He was an easy person to play for, and he was a good coach.”
As Porco developed into the all-time leading passer at Peters Township High School, with 4,054 career yards, the player-coach relationship blossomed into a friendship that featured DiBartolo’s mentoring skills. He guided Porco through the pitfalls and challenges of collegiate sports. Porco quarterbacked and captained Johns Hopkins University to three conference championships while pursuing an academic tract that would allow him admission to medical school.
After two consecutive summers of working at DiBartola’s dental office, Porco switched gears. He eventual applied to dental school instead.
“If it wasn’t for me knowing him, I wouldn’t have gone down this road at all,” said Porco. “Coach – I mean Dr. DiBartola – let me come in during the summer and work and get a feel for things. It ended up being something that I really enjoyed.
“After my freshman year at Hopkins, I made the decision to actually go the dental route. I went to school wanting to do something medical but after my summers here, I decided this is the way I wanted to go.”
During those long, hot summer days, DiBartola said he and Porco talked a lot about surgery.
“It’s interesting,” said DiBartola, who completed dental school in 1985, “because when I went to dental school, I thought that I wanted to be a surgeon, and when I got out, I realized that I didn’t want to be a surgeon. And Dr. Porco wanted to be a surgeon. And as we talked, I said, ‘You know, Tyler, you can do as much dental surgery as you like and still not have to go on and be a surgeon.’
“Taking teeth out is considered surgery. I think that helped him maked the decision that dentistry would be a good field to pursue and still follow his dreams of doing surgeries.”
Wildest dreams
Never in DiBartola’s or Porco’s wildest dreams did they think a friendship could develop between former high school rivals. DiBartola earned all-state honors in football and also excelled in wrestling and track at Baldwin High School before earning a scholarship to Pitt. Porco’s father, David, played at Canon-McMillan, a rival of the Highlanders.
“He was an exceptional player,” DiBartola said of the elder Porco. “We laugh about our competitions.”
The onetime adversaries became acquainted when DiBartola moved to Peters Township 25 years ago. They coached Tyler during junior high days. Mr. Porco served as the defensive coach and DiBartola was the offensive coordinator.
“That was a fun camaraderie,” said DiBartola. “I’d say, ‘Yeah, we beat you guys,’ but we had a lot of fun.”
DiBartola recalls meeting Tyler Porco for the first time. Shortly after he had been given the job to coach the seventh-grade football team, he was watching his daughter Danielle playing T-ball, and he noticed a boy throwing footballs with his dad. At the time, DiBartola said that he didn’t even know one kid in the township who was going to play for him.
“So I walked over and said, ‘Son, I hope that you are going to be in seventh grade.'”
On cue, Tyler replied, “Yeah, I am.”
DiBartola said that he instructed Porco to bring some of his buddies o the field so that he could get to know them. Before the summer was over, DiBartola had a full squad practicing, and by the time the team had its first game, “We were so well-prepared because of the relationship that we had built,” DiBartola recalled.
The team never lost a game with DiBartola as coach.
“It was good times and we had great bonds,” he said. DiBartola “delighted” in coaching Porco and his teammates because they were a great group of kids. He noted how Porco’s class produced graduates who are doctors, chiropractors and managers of companies.
“It really was a good group that excelled on and off the field,” DiBartola said, “a special group of kids that really revived my love for sports because they were so good.”
Porco was the best of the best. Not only was he a record-setter on the field, but he graduated as valedictorian.
“If you ask people in Peters why Tyler worked so hard, they will tell you that his father pushed him,” DiBartola said. “That’s not true. Tyler pushed his father.
“I heard the same thing. As a kid, I worked out really hard and people in my community (Baldwin) would say, ‘Oh, his dad pushes him too hard.’ But I never once had my dad say, ‘Go work out.’ I would say, ‘Dad, can you come up and help me?’
“Tyler was the same way. He was driving the boat. He wanted to excel.”
Porco concurred:
“I wanted to be the best I could be. The only way to do that was to keep working.”
Because he worked hard in high school, Porco was prepared for college. He and DiBartola agreed the hardest part of becoming a dentist is getting through the academics.
Even though Porco was a good student, DiBartola said, “It’s a different world” in college while “juggling” school and playing football. He said that while Porco was outstanding scholastically in high school, “He goes to JHU and he’s very average.
“Not that you are ever average,” he said to Porco, then added, “Tyler is very intelligent.”
Porco said he graduated Johns Hopkins with a 3.3 QPA.
“But it was hard-fought,” he said. “Personally, I didn’t care that I wasn’t No. 1. But I did go there expecting to have good grades. Just not a 4.0, because I was playing football. It took a lot more work to earn the grades there than it did in high school. So it wasn’t about being No. 1. It was about having good enough grades to take the next step.”
The next step
The next step was dental school, and Johns Hopkins had prepared Porco. His contacts also helped pave his way to Temple University. After graduating in May, he recently passed his dental boards.
Porco said playing organized sports prepared him for the future. He was ready for adversity, and he would not give up on his ambitions.
“Being able to say I was a captain at Hopkins helped with the résumé and interview process. They see that not only did you play a sport, but that you also were a leader in your respective sport,” he explained. “Participation in sports helped not just with personal growth, but when they see that on a résumé, that helps because it takes up a big chunk of your time to balance things.”
Porco added that he is aware that he would not have gotten into Johns Hopkins were it not for football and that he would not have gotten into Temple without the help of another ally, Mark Mortland, who runs a physical therapy business in the heart of Peters Township. Mortland also served as an athletic trainer for the high school, as well as the Pittsburg Penguins.
Through injuries and rehab, Porco had gotten to know Mortland well. Porco admitted that getting into dental school was a tough process, including the interviews.
“Mr. Mortland actually helped me out because he worked with the Penguins,” Porco said. “He knew the team’s dentist, who was on the staff at the same time.” That dentist turned out to be Dr. David Donatelli, who also worked at Temple. So Mortland made a call.
“He put in a good word for me,” Porco said. “I have Mark to thank a lot for helping me get into dental school there.”
Praise for practice
Today, Porco’s praise goes to DiBartola. He said that working with his former coach on a professional level has prepared him for success. He noted how DiBartolo allowed him to shadow him and help out with little things where he could. After his undergraduate studies were completed, Porco again worked at the practice.
“We talked actual dentistry,” Porco said. DiBartola dispensed a wealth of knowledge to his protégé. He gave advice such as how to prepare for school, classes and clinic.
“Just from his own experiences from dental school, he let me know things: things I should watch out for, things like take advantage of the time I had there because, for those four years, there is always someone supervising you, so take on hard cases, see what you can get yourself into, exposed to, so you get used to it.”
Even with little things, DiBartola took Porco under his wing. When he was about to start clinic and his first rotation in oral surgery, DiBartola invited Porco to his home, and they sutured a piece of chicken.
“That way, when I went in, I had a feel for what was going on before anyone else did,” Porco said. “He just did little things like that to help me, and so I would know what to expect and what to prepare for.”
Today, Porco is prepared for most anything. The practice does implants, extractions and root canals, as well as treats gum disease. Plus DiBartola specializes in sedation dentistry.
“It’s become more popular since I started doing it in 2007,” DiBartolo said of the procedure, which he is licensed to perform. “It’s important because a lot of other dentist have to call in an outside anesthesia provider.”
Because DiBartola has a restricted (anesthesia) permit, Porco can perform the dentistry while he does the sedation.
“Believe it or not,” DiBartola noted, “we have patients who are so afraid of going to the dentist, that we have to sedate them to clean their teeth. People’s fear of dentistry is real.”
That surprised Porco. He had no idea people were afraid to go to the dentist until he witnessed it.
“Usually, it is somebody who has had a bad experience as a child,” Porco explained.
DiBartola laughed and said, “Tyler has no experiences” in that regard.
Flashing his Pepsodent smile, Porco noted that he had no experiences on which to draw, so it was important to witness what transpires at the practice.
“Thanks to Dr. DiBartola, I was able to get a feel for what dentistry was like, because I never really knew about it other than going and getting my teeth cleaned. I had never seen work done in an office. Just cleanings,” he said.
DiBartolo reminded him Porco that he did a little bit of work on him. Because some of his permanent teeth did not come in, Porco kept the baby ones.
“It happens,” DiBartola explained. So DiBartola built up those molars. Because he had his wisdom teeth extracted, Porco said he a normal mouthful of incisors.
“Twenty-eight,” he said.
“Thirty,” interrupted DiBartola. Then he corrected himself. “Dr. Porco is right,” he said with a laugh.
“Just like when I used to call plays,” DiBartolo added. “When Tyler was young, I would go in the huddle, and I would call the play. And he would go, ‘Coach, it’s this,’ and I’d have to say, ‘Oh yeah. That’s right, Tyler.’ Now he has to help me remember how many teeth there are.”
But Porco will always remember who gave him his first break, both athletically and professionally.
“Because of his mentoring me, I have a job,” explained Porco. “After all those years, building that relationship, it’s been well worth it, and I don’t ever want to forget about the people who helped me. I’ve ended up in a nice situation.”
As long as things are going well at the practice, the plan is for Porco to take over once DiBartola is ready to “slow down.” In addition, DiBartola and Porco have discussed possibly opening a second location.
But in the interim, Porco is anxious to pay it forward. He plans to mentor DiBartola’s children should they wish to follow in his footsteps. Danielle DiBartola is in her freshman year of college at Kent State. She is studying exercise science.
“Obviously, (DiBartola) mentored me and I hope to be able to do the same for her if that is what she decides to do,” Porco said. “While his sons are too young to know what they want to do, the door is always open for anything as far as that goes. I want to keep on this route. It has worked out well so far.”