FOOTBALL IN JUNIOR YEAR.
After college closed Frank Armstrong and Jimmy Turner joined a party
of engineers and their assistants, whose work it was to survey a new
railroad through the heart of New Brunswick, one of the Maritime
provinces of Canada, and for two months they enjoyed the life of
veritable savages in the open air. Following the pointing finger
of the compass they burrowed through the tangled forests, sleeping
sometimes rolled in blankets with a bunch of fragrant hemlock
boughs for a pillow, and, only when the weather was bad, under the
protecting service tents, several of which had been brought along
for bad weather. Many nights, however, the tents were never set up
at all, and the whole party of young men slept with only the stars
for their roof. Frank made himself invaluable at river crossings,
of which there were many, for bridges were few and far between. It
was his duty to swim the barring river with the engineers' "chains"
which he did with such success that he was nicknamed "the torpedo."
Later he was followed by other members of the party on homemade
catamarans.
The life agreed with both the boys, and when the party finished
its work and took train at the little station of Harcourt on the
Intercolonial railroad, with clothing ragged from the rough caress of
the tangled woods and shoes guiltless of blacking, they might well
have been mistaken for young lumbermen instead of college students.
Ten days later they were in football clothes on Yale field, obeying
the call for early fall practice before college opened. Frank had
put on ten pounds during the summer, and for the first time felt
himself strong enough to withstand the punishing work of the game. He
was hard as nails, in perfect condition and eager for any work the
coach might set him at. Again he was placed at end in practice by
Coach Hanley, and made such good progress that in the middle of the
first game he was called in to play the position, where he acquitted
himself with such credit that he earned a word of praise from Captain
Baldwin.
Through the long, hard grueling work of the fall he fought for
his place, alternating between the 'Varsity and the second eleven,
learning something every day under the tuition of this or that coach
for the purpose of helping Yale turn out a winning team. Turner was
firmly established at right halfback, and gave promise of becoming a
great player. His irresistible smashes earned many yards for Yale in
the minor games of the season, and it was a common prediction that
he would be first choice for the place in the championship games. He
succeeded not by any great speed but by his instinct for the opening
his linemen made and his almost uncanny ability to keep his feet and
burrow for a gain through the worst tangle of human bodies. It was
Turner who was always given the ball down near the goal line to carry
it across, and he rarely failed to accomplish his end.
The uncertainty regarding who was to play right end was banished
in the Brown game which preceded the Princeton game by one week.
The game was a hard one, and neither side could score a touchdown.
Frank was called in at right end to replace Saunders, and on the
second line-up took a well delivered forward pass and scored with
practically a free field. Twice again before the game was over he
proved his ability in this particular play. His baseball helped him
in the handling of the football, and his speed and elusiveness in
an open field added to his chances. It was therefore no surprise to
anyone in the college when he was slated to go in the first line-up
against Princeton.
"I'm putting you in, Armstrong," said Coach Hanley, "in spite of
the fact that Saunders has had more experience. In other words, I'm
taking a chance with you. Don't fall down. This Princeton team has
a strong line and we've got to fox them with the forward pass. Keep
cool, and use your head all the time."
The instructions sounded easy enough, but when Frank took his place
at right end on the day of the game, under the eyes of thirty
thousand people, to say that he was nervous expressed only a small
part of his feelings. While the big Yale center placed the ball at
midfield for the kick-off he lived, like other high-strung players
before him, what seemed a whole year of his lifetime. He was almost
overcome by the sudden fear that he might not be able to do what was
expected of him, and the barking cheers from the Yale side of the
field added to his nervousness instead of encouraging him. Twice
Biddle, the center, placed the ball, and twice the stiff breeze
topped it over. Frank's heart was pounding, and he felt weak and
ineffective, but at the shrill scream of the whistle, and as the ball
rose in the air and soared off in the direction of Princeton's goal,
his mind cleared like a flash. He regained his grip on himself, and
sped off down the field like the wind, feeling a moment later the
grim joy of shock and strain as his arms closed around the legs of
the man with the ball, who came sweeping up the field, behind what
seemed like a wall of interference. How he reached the runner, he
never knew, but the fact that he had reached him seemed to give him
the strength of ten men.
Twice the Princeton backs were shot at his end. Once he got the
runner, and the second time he spilled the interference, leaving
Turner to take the man with the ball, which he did with a jolting
tackle that jarred the Princeton man's very being.
Up and down the field surged the tide of battle, while the stands
under the urging of the cheer-leaders gave out on the one side or the
other an almost steady roar of cheers. In spite of their volume they
seemed strangely far away to the players whose energies were engaged
entirely with the matter in hand.
Once the new right end was drawn in, and a Princeton back slipped
around him for fifteen yards. The sharp reprimand from the captain
was not necessary for he was raging at himself, savage at being
tricked. A moment later he was tricked again: the back made a feint
at the end, went inside him and was stopped by Turner.
"That's the place," yelled a Princeton coach, "put it there again!"
It looked like a weak place indeed, and the Princeton quarter, after
making his distance on the other side of the line, again shot his
catapult at right end.
This time Frank went through the interference, and tackled so
viciously that there were hisses from a few in the Princeton stand.
He was fighting mad, crazy to hurt and to be hurt. Again and again he
hurled himself blindly against the Princeton onrush only to be borne
backwards.
Suddenly he realized what the matter was. The coach's words came to
him: "Keep cool, play your game and keep your head working." It was
like a dash of cold water, and he was immediately cool. He had a
grip on himself in a moment, and he now smiled back into the mocking
eyes of his opposing end where a moment before he had glared in hate.
He had obtained the mastery over himself.
Again the play swung around to his end, but this time he met it
coolly and deliberately, and checked it without the gain of a foot,
while the Yale stand announced its approval with a mighty and
spontaneous shout. Time after time the Princeton attack at the right
end was met and turned back, and Saunders, who had been told to get
ready to replace Armstrong, sat down again at the motion of Coach
Hanley, and wrapped his blankets around his shoulders. This much
Frank saw out of the corner of his eye, and a thrill of satisfaction
went through him. He had learned his lesson and was making good.
It is not our intention to tell the story of Frank's baptism of
fire, nor how the two evenly matched teams battled to a tie at the
end of four desperately fought periods. Frank played through three
of these periods, and although he played well and did all of his
duty, he never had a clear chance at a forward pass. The ball was
thrown either too far or not far enough on the half dozen tries at
the pass, or the attempt to throw was spoiled by the eager Princeton
forwards who crowded through the line. At the end of the third
quarter he was taken out weak and staggering from his exertions, and
Saunders went in.
But the coach's "All right, Armstrong," was music to his ears as he
came over to the side-line to be immediately wrapped in a big blanket
by the trainer.
That night, while the team was dressing in the Gymnasium, the coaches
gave the men the benefit of some advice. "You fellows forgot most of
the time," said Hanley, "that you were a team. You were playing every
man for himself. You should have licked that Princeton team, and the
only reason you didn't was that you were not a Yale team. We don't
want brilliant individual stuff. One must help the other. If you get
together before next Saturday we can beat Harvard. If you play as you
did to-day, Harvard will lick you out of your boots, because she has
a great team and it is together. You are just as good, but you are
not together." It was straight talk, and it sank deep.
Monday was a day of rest at the field, but on Tuesday the final
preparation for Harvard began. Behind locked gates under the urgings
of the half a score of coaches who had hurried to New Haven, the
previous practice and even the Princeton game were like child's play.
Armstrong was at right end, a position which he had fairly won, but
Saunders on the Second eleven fought tooth and nail to displace him.
It seemed to Frank that the Second eleven coaches had a particular
grudge at his end, for he was called upon to stop more than his share
of attacks. But he was able to do what was expected of him, backed
up as he was by the sturdy and omnipresent Turner who withstood
everything with a never-failing energy.
Wednesday's practice, fiercer than the day before, if that could be,
found Frank Armstrong still in possession of his place at right end,
but it was with a sigh of relief that he heard the welcome "That's
all," of Coach Hanley. He watched with interest the usual celebration
of the Second eleven which marks the end of the year's practice.
On Thursday the 'Varsity, with substitutes, a score of coaches and
heelers, took the afternoon train to the north, and were quartered
at a hotel just outside of Cambridge. A brief signal practice was
held in the towering Stadium on Soldiers Field Friday, where the last
instructions were given to the men. It would be too much to say, and
not the truth, that the night was a peaceful one for most of the
Yale eleven. Turner and Armstrong were quartered in separate beds in
the same room. The former slept like a log, apparently free from all
thoughts of the morrow. Frank, on the other hand, tossed and turned,
got up in the night and sat at the window while his companion snored
contentedly. In the early hours of the morning he finally dropped
into a sleep which was disturbed by dreams of the Harvard runners
slipping past just beyond his reach. How he got through the morning
he never knew, but he did get through somehow, and finally found
himself dressed for the fray and in the big 'bus with the rest of the
eleven, headed for the Stadium.
"There go the Yaleses!" sang out an urchin.
"Dey won't look so nice as dat when de Harvards get through wit'
dem," shouted his companion.
Occasionally the 'bus passed Yale sympathizers, and then it got a
cheer or: "Go to it, Yale, you're the boys who can do it!"
From every direction throngs of people were heading toward the great
concrete structure whose huge gray bulk seemed to fill the horizon.
Already thousands swarmed in its arches, and even at this hour little
black specks of human beings were seen outlined on its upper heights
against the sky. Progress became slower as the 'bus neared the field,
and it finally took the combined efforts of a squad of police to
break the crowd sufficiently to let the Yale players through to the
Locker Building within the shadow of the Stadium walls.
The game was to be started at two o'clock, and at a quarter of that
hour it would have been difficult to find a vacant place in all those
towering tiers. Yale occupied the south and Harvard the north side
of the field. The cheer-leaders were tuning up, as it were. Back and
forth across the field were flung songs and cheers, and in this lull
before the battle each applauded the other's efforts.
Five minutes before the hour the Harvard captain, with his
red-jerseyed and red-stockinged warriors at his heels, dashed through
the gate at the northwest corner of the field. A great wave of
crimson seemed to sweep the Harvard stand from end to end as the
thirty thousand Harvard sympathizers rose to their feet, waving flags
and red bandannas. A crackling cheer like musketry rolled across
the field. While the Harvard cheer-leaders called for a cheer for
the team, the Yale stand sat motionless. A minute later, however,
it sprang into life as Captain Baldwin led his men onto the field
through the same gate at a loping run. The Yale crowd was smaller,
but what a noise it did make!
After a few minutes of signal practice, the two captains with the
officials met at the center of the field and tossed for choice of
sides. The coin which was flipped in the air by the referee fell
heads, which was the side Captain Randall of Harvard, had called, and
he indicated with a sweep of his hand that he would take the west
end of the field. What little wind was then blowing at his back was
the only advantage he had. Both elevens quickly dropped into their
places, the whistle shrilled and the game was on.
That was a game which went down in history as one of the fiercest and
hardest ever played between the two old rivals. It was clean and
free from bad feeling which sometimes marks close games, but intense
from the first line-up to the last. Harvard, after receiving the
ball on the kick-off, cut loose a smashing attack through the line,
reeling off the yards with terrible, tremendous force, a force that
Yale did not seem to be able to meet successfully.
Down over the white lines went the Harvard machine, plays timed to
perfection and gaining wherever they struck, not much, but enough in
three tries to carry them the necessary yards for a first down. A
perfect roar of cheers boiled up from the Harvard side of the field
while Yale seemed paralyzed. Only after the ball had been pushed well
into Yale territory did her cheer-leaders begin to get something like
a cheer of volume.
But Yale was learning, and before Harvard had progressed to the
danger zone the advance was stopped, and Yale took the ball, an act
that was approved by a mighty cheer.
Turner bored through for eight yards on the first play, and followed
it up with enough to make a first down, but there the advance
stopped. Porter, the Yale fullback, who was doing the punting,
was hurried by the rush of the Harvard forwards, and his kick
almost blocked. It traveled diagonally across the field for a bare
fifteen-yards gain, and was Harvard's ball.
"Now stop 'em right here! Take it away," commanded Captain Baldwin.
"You can do it!"
But Harvard was not to be stopped just then. Playing like red demons,
they fought their way foot by foot into Yale's territory, and
threatened the Yale goal. Turner and Armstrong were on the bottom of
every heap when the play came at their side, but the best they could
do was to keep the gains down. They could not entirely stop them. But
the gallant Yale line rallied less than ten yards from their goal,
and again checked the crimson attack. So determined were the Harvard
team to make a touchdown that they scorned to try a field goal, and
depended on a forward pass to make the necessary distance.
Armstrong, alert for just such a move, intercepted the ball and again
it was Yale's. Yale's rushing attack was stopped short and Porter was
sent back to punt.
"Block it! block it! block it!" yelled the Harvard partisans but
although the red line tried desperately to do this, Porter succeeded
in getting his kick off, but the ball went high, was held back by
the wind which at that moment was blowing a stiff breeze, and it
dropped into the Harvard quarter's hands a bare twenty yards back
of his line of scrimmage. A groan went up from the Yale hosts as
Harvard, for the third time, took up the march down the field.