TOMMY MAKES A PREDICTION
Bert went to the training table with the more important members of the
squad on Wednesday, and, contrary to expectation, Mr. McFadden, Second
Team coach, gathered his charges together on Friday and started to whip
them into shape. While Bert had not actually feared being released to
the Scrub, he nevertheless experienced some relief when Mr. McFadden
began operations without him. The removal of the Scrub players from
the big squad made quite a difference about the First Team gridiron
and practice on Friday seemed more methodical. Bert had a long try-out
at half-back during the scrimmage and managed to show speed and clean
handling of the ball. But the plays used against the first-string
fellows were not of the sort calculated to advantage a light back, no
matter how fast, and Bert had small success when carrying the ball.
Fitz Savell, who played inside half, did much better, and after work
was over Bert tried in vain to believe that he had made an impression
on Coach Cade.
Saturday Banning High School came and presented a light but snappy
opposition. In the first half the ball was seldom far out of Alton
territory, for Banning had developed a clever passing game last
season, by which she had scored twice on the Gray-and-Gold, and hadn’t
forgotten how to use it this fall. She had, too, a punter who managed
to get some five yards more than Nip Storer, who did the kicking in
the first half, and as a result of punts and passes Alton was placed
on the defensive early and kept there most of the time. Banning failed
to score, however, although a difference of a few inches would have
converted a failure into a field-goal in the second period.
When the last half began Coach Cade used his second-string players
extensively; Kruger and Thomas and Wick at the left of center, Tifton
in Captain Lowe’s place, Lovell at quarter, Savell and Keys in the
half-back positions. Since the first-string men hadn’t been able to
more than hold the enemy in the first half, there were those among the
audience who censured the coach’s move. But Johnny had his own notions,
and he seldom bothered about what the School thought of his methods.
Here was an enemy strong enough to offer real opposition and yet of
slight importance as a rival. Usually the early season opponents were
unable to provide more than good practice for Alton; were, of course,
selected for that reason. But Banning, partly because of having held
over some seven or eight of last fall’s players, was well advanced,
while Alton, for some reason not so easily determined, was fully a
week behind normal development, and what had been looked on as an easy
contest had assumed the aspects of a real struggle.
Coach Cade might have worked his best players through three periods and
made victory more probable, but he chose to risk defeat in order to
give the substitutes a taste of real battle. Since all the first-choice
men had played through to the whistle in the first half, they could
not be counted on for later aid, and Johnny must needs place full
dependence on his lesser heroes. When the third period started he still
had Patten at center, Haines at right tackle, Chick Burton at right
end, Ted Ball at quarter and Galvin at full-back, all members of the
Old Guard, but one by one they retired until by the time the second
half was five minutes along second- and third-string players held all
the positions. Since Banning was still using or could call on every man
who had begun the battle, the odds looked heavily in her favor. But
the Alton substitutes were old hands at the game and were not to be
dismayed by a high school team, especially a team against which several
of them had played last year and defeated, and Bus Lovell, who had
taken Ted Ball’s place, set about his task with fire and enthusiasm.
After Banning had kicked off and Larry Keys had run the ball back
nearly twelve yards, Bus began sending Couch back to punting position
and running his plays from that formation. Savell and Keys made good
gains outside the tackles and twice Couch tore off fair yardage on wide
runs. He was a heavy chap and hard to stop, and usually added two or
three strides to his progress after he was tackled. Alton reached the
middle of the field without yielding the ball, crossing the center-line
finally on a forward pass from Couch to Dutch Kruger that was good for
nine yards.
The stand cheered incessantly, wrought to quite a pitch of excitement,
and demanded a score. But Keys fumbled a pass and Banning fell on the
ball on her forty-seven and the tide of battle flowed the other way
until Alton was back on her twenty-eight. There she twice stopped
Banning’s punches at the line and knocked down a forward-pass. Banning
sent her place-kicker back to the thirty-nine yards and, with what
breeze there was blowing straight from behind her, looked suddenly
dangerous. However, one fumble leads to another, and the ball was
never kicked. Whether the fault was the Banning center’s or the
quarter-back’s is immaterial. The pigskin struck the ground before the
holder could get his hands on it. After that it was juggled just long
enough for Gus Thomas to upset his opponent and arrive on the scene.
Thereupon the quarter-back did the sensible thing. He laid himself flat
and snuggled the ball to him fondly.
Thirty seconds later Lovell caught a punt on his five-yard line and the
Gray-and-Gold started once more toward the distant goal.
If there was one man who stood out above the others in the ensuing
march it was Larry Keys, playing right half-back. Only once did he fail
to gain when the ball was given to him. He had weight and speed and a
nice discrimination in the matter of choosing his outlets. On a play
from kick formation in which two backs faked an attack on the right of
the line and Larry went outside tackle on the left, with right tackle
swinging out and going ahead as interference, he twice made advances of
more than ten yards and netted shorter distances until Banning solved
the play and stopped it. However, once inside the visitor’s forty
yards, Alton’s advance slowed and staggered, and when two slams at the
wings had failed and a forward-pass had grounded, Couch punted from the
forty-six.
By that time the fourth quarter was well along and Alton had the light
wind behind her. The Banning quarter misjudged the kick, touched the
ball without catching it and chased it back toward the goal-line,
closely pursued by Dutch Kruger. Pigskin, quarter-back and Dutch
arrived simultaneously at the last streak of lime, and when the whistle
had blown Alton had scored two points on a safety. The Gray-and-Gold
cohorts cheered and the game paused while the Banning captain made an
impassioned plea for a touchback. In the end he was persuaded that the
official’s verdict was just and the battle waged again. That incident,
however, while it gave Alton a score, resulted disastrously in the
end. Banning, it seemed, needed but that filip of hard-luck to start
her going with a new impetus. Three fresh players were hurried in and
Banning bounded away from her thirty-yard line like a runner from his
mark. She used one or two new plays that puzzled the adversary until
the middle of the field was reached. There a long forward-pass, almost
successful, led Alton to playing her backs deeper. Banning switched
promptly to short passes and gained her distance on two such, making
Alton’s thirty-eight yards. Another overhead attempt grounded and
Banning tried the left end and got four on a wide run. Inside the
thirty-five-yard line she tried a sweep to the left which, while it
centered the ball, lost about a yard. On fourth down she staged a
placement kick but didn’t carry it out. Full-back took the pass and
went through inside Hank Howard for all but a foot of the required
distance. After the gain had been measured Alton was awarded the
pigskin.
With something less than two minutes left, the stand breathed loudly
with relief and Coach Cade hustled an assortment of substitutes on.
Among these was an entire new backfield: Riding as quarter, Tyron and
Parkhurst as halfs and Franklin as full. Obeying instructions, Riding
shot Tyron at the Banning left tackle on first down and got two yards.
A second attempt, however, yielded nothing, and Riding dropped back to
his sixteen yards to punt. Thus far Alton’s line had held against all
assaults of the enemy during like operations, but this time Banning
had her eyes on that goal that loomed so close and put everything into
a desperate charge that tore a gaping hole in the right of the Alton
line. Riding received a pass that was a bit too low, straightened,
turned the ball and started his swing. After that there was much
confusion, a confusion of seething forms about a loose ball, for Riding
had kicked the pigskin squarely into the body of a charging enemy!
When the whistle blew a Banning player, the undermost of a pile of
several, had the ball, and a bare two inches of its scarred surface
overlapped Alton’s five-yard line. In the stand some four hundred
youths stood and frenziedly implored their warriors to “_Hold, Alton!_”
But Banning had tasted blood, had liked it and wanted more. Two new
linemen were sent galloping on, and then, with less than sixty seconds
of playing time remaining, Banning High School took revenge for several
years of drubbing at the hands of Alton Academy. It required the full
four downs to put that ball over, but over it went finally, while
the timekeeper’s watch ticked off the last few seconds, over on a
last frenzied surge at the very center of the Gray-and-Gold line from
the two yards, with the back who carried the pigskin hurtling his way
to victory over the shoulders of the defenders. Little cared Banning
that she missed the try-for-point. She had won, 6 to 2. That was glory
enough!
The School was disappointed and showed the fact. The applause that
almost invariably greeted the players as they sought their table in
dining hall was lacking this Saturday evening; or was so faint it
merely emphasized the absence of the customary demonstration. The game
caused a good deal of discussion, and the consensus of opinion was to
the effect that the defeat had been unnecessary and that Coach Cade
had, in the popular phraseology, pulled a boner. Of course there were
those who stood up for Johnny, and among them was Tommy Parish. As
always, Tommy’s views met opposition, and, as always, that fact merely
spurred him to more brazen assertions. Tommy had the misfortune--for so
it was considered at Alton--to sit at a table accommodating not only a
number of fellow students but a member of the Faculty, one Mr. Peghorn,
who instructed the Junior and Senior classes in physics. However, it
must be said that Tommy allowed “Peg’s” presence to “cramp his style”
very little, while--and this is a secret between us--Mr. Peghorn,
who had taught boys for so long that his enthusiasm was fast wearing
thin, seldom lifted his head from above his plate save when Tommy was
going well. Then he occasionally darted a frowning glance toward that
youth that might have silenced another but that left Tommy untroubled.
Perhaps Tommy somehow knew that under that frown, or behind it, Mr.
Peghorn was secretly sympathetic. When one has listened to conventional
and uninspired table-talk for many years even a jarring note is a
relief.
“Trouble with you guys,” declared Tommy in that aggravating, assured
manner of his, “is that you can’t see beyond the end of your noses.
You get sore because Coach doesn’t win a game that he doesn’t care two
cents about.”
“A game’s a game,” said the freckle-faced boy across the table.
“And a slice of beef’s a slice of beef,” retorted Tommy, “but I noticed
you were mighty careful not to pick out a little one just now!”
“Just the same,” said another fellow above the chuckles rewarding
Tommy’s sally, “it doesn’t look very well, Tommy, to play two games,
as we’ve done, and not win either of them. I say it wouldn’t have hurt
Johnny to have kept his best men in and put the game on ice. Then he
could have tried out his subs if there was time.”
“Put the game on ice!” exclaimed Tommy. “_Comment?_ Those dumb-bells
couldn’t put anything on ice, Harry. They’re so dead on their feet
you could put lilies in their hands without waking ’em! Why, the only
chance Johnny had of winning to-day was to put in his third-string
players. If he had played his second-string all through he might have
tied, but it would have taken the third-string bunch to win!”
“Oh, don’t talk like a baked apple,” protested some one farther along.
“Do you mean to say that Banning could have pushed across for that
touchdown if the regulars had been in the line-up? If you do you’re
cuckoo!”
“_Tres bien, cher ivorie solide._ What happened in the first half when
those mighty heroes held forth? They pushed Banning all over the field,
_non_? And scored at will, did they not? Listen, you big boob; if the
first-string guys had played through the game the score would have been
something like twenty-five to a goose-egg. We wouldn’t have had even
those miserable _deux_ points!”
This heresy brought forth, a groan of derision. “Tommy, you’re a nut!”
proclaimed Harry. “You just like to hear yourself talk. I suppose
Lovell is a better quarter-back than Ted Ball and Tifton is a better
guard than Jonas Lowe! You’re all wet, son!”
“Well,” answered Tommy judicially, “Jonah Slow may still have a slight
edge on Tif, but Tif’s coming along pretty fast. As for Ted Ball, he’s
the best quarter we’ve had in three years, but you’ve got to have more
than a quarter-back to make a football team. Even without Ball the
backfield that played in the last half was far better than the first
combination. Look at Savell! There’s a clever lad for you. If he isn’t
on the ‘big time’ before I’m much older I’ll eat my hat.”
“I don’t believe you’ve got one,” said Harry. “Savell was all right,
but Storer’s a heap better. Say, if the second and third bunch are so
much better, why doesn’t Johnny scrap the first and put them in?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he did eventually,” answered Tommy, helping
himself to half of a neighbor’s biscuit. “After to-day’s game he’s
probably thinking of it more than ever. Of course he’s likely to keep
three or four of the first-string crowd. They aren’t all rotten. Ted
Ball and Billy Haines and Joe Tate and, of course, Captain Jonas, would
probably stick. Maybe another.”
“You’re a crazy coot, Tommy!”
“_Mille remerciements._ I may be crazy, but I’m not foolish. You
fellows don’t know a thing about football, and I do. That’s why you
find my remarks incomprehensible.”
“Where’d you get your football knowledge?” jeered one of his audience.
“Taking tickets?”
“That’s all right, you piece of cheese rind,” replied Tommy sweetly.
“Perhaps between the lot of you you can tell me who the lad is that’ll
be doing most of the scoring for us by the end of the season. Perhaps
you can, and then _encore_ perhaps you can’t!”
“Nip Storer.”
“Jim Galvin.”
“He doesn’t have to be on the first line-up just now,” said Tommy.
“He means Fitz Savell,” suggested one.
Tommy shook his head sadly. “I didn’t think you could,” he murmured.
“Well, who is he?” demanded Harry, with a wink for the table at large.
“Any one we’ve ever heard of?”
“I can’t say whether you’ve heard of him, Harry. His name’s Hollins.”
“Hollins! You mean Bert Hollins?”
“_Absolument._”
“Why, that fellow hasn’t--isn’t--”
“I never said he was,” answered Tommy, pushing back his chair and
rising superbly for one of his build. “I said he was going to be. Now
don’t chew the rag about it, pie-face, for it’s something you know
nothing of. Just remember what I’ve told you and wait for developments.
_Bon soir, vous pauvre noix!_”