Football at Dartmouth Since the War
Article Two, The Hawley Regime
COACH Hawley's first season, that of 1923, started like an automobile engine on a January morning.
Norwich furnished stubborn opposition, yielding only two touchdowns; Maine held the score to 6-0, and folks began to worry. Then an unusually good Boston University team, captained by "Mickey" Cochrane, was beaten 24-0, and hopes rose again. Vermont was defeated 27-2, but the team was not impressive, and went "on to the Stadium," still an unknown quantity. The result was a delightful and decisive 16-0 victory, the first since 1907. The Hawley system, with its insistence on accuracy and proper timing, had begun to function. The whole team played well. Haws, a halfback who "found himself," under Hawley's intelligent guidance, in this, his last year, stood out especially. The Harvard team and coaches, though undoubtedly surprised and disappointed, were generous in their praises of the Dartmouth team. Indeed our experiences with Harvard in all these games marks them as most sportsmanlike in either victory or defeat.
On the next week-end the Memorial Field was dedicated; and the hundreds of Dartmouth alumni who returned will prefer to remember the beautiful ceremony of Friday evening, rather than the game against Cornell. Kaw had gone, but Pfann, Ramsey and Cassidy still carried on. Pfann, always a wonderful back, was unstoppable that day. Cornell won 32 to 7, and deserved to do so. The Dartmouth team, whether from stagefright or over-confidence, had lost all the snap and precision of the week before, and made enough mistakes to lose twenty games.
The team rallied sufficiently to nose out Brown 16-14, in one of those "heart-disease" games which have characterized this series, and then went on to defeat Colby and Columbia. The eleven was rated about fourth in the East, and the coach had every reason to be satisfied with his first season.
Nineteen twenty-four opened more confidently with big scores against Norwich, McGill and Vermont. Then the team went down to New Haven to play Yale for the first time since 1900. The result was a tie, 14-14. To all but a very few disappointments in sport one eventually becomes reconciled. There are two Dartmouth football games in history which do not easily fall into that category. One is the famous "bounding drop-kick" game against Princeton which goes down in the records as a Princeton 3-0 victory. The other is this Yale game. Yale's two touchdowns were the direct result of Dartmouth errors, one a fumble by Oberlander while dazed after a strenuous play; Dartmouth lost a third touchdown and victory, by the margin of inches, when held four times without appreciable gain inside Yale's twoyard line. When all due credit is given to the Yale team for that characteristic bull-dog stand, the fact still remains that the attack at this point was disappointing. Next week at Cambridge, another victory was registered over Harvard by the score of 6-0. It was a nerve-racking game between two equally matched teams. The day was saved for Dartmouth by the spectacular defensive work of Dooley, who made tackle after tackle in the backfield.
One such tackle where he broke through a screen of three interferers to get his man, Hammond, was the best single piece of defensive play the writer has ever seen.
TWO GREAT SEASONS
Brown was beaten at Hanover 10-3, and, despite the close score, Dartmouth always looked the winner. An easy game against B. U. was followed by a spectacular win over Cornell, 27-14, in what let us hope was the last game that Dartmouth will ever play in a base-ball park. It was the rapier against the broadsword, and this day the rapier won. Captain Bjorkman played his last and most brilliant game of a fine football career. The score was 14 all at the end of the third period and Dartmouth looked like a probable loser; but an audacious campaign of forward-passing in the last quarter resulted in two more Green touchdowns. It was this game which opened the eyes of many to the tremendous possibilities of the pass as a part of the scheme of offense rather than a measure of desperation. So the year closed without a defeat.
Despite the loss of such stars as Leavitt, Hall and Bjorkman, hopes were high for 1925, and for once realization exceeded anticipation. Four early games were won by big scores, and then the team rose to great heights by defeating Harvard 32-9, Brown 14-0, Cornell 62-13, and Chicago 33-7, on four successive Saturdays. And none of these teams were weaklings. The secret of the success lay in these factors: the men were of the physical and mental type to master the Hawley scheme of play; they acquired early that ability to work as a unit which many otherwise good teams never get; and consequently they reached a position of calm confidence in their ability which is as great an asset as over- confidence is a liability. Probably the game against Cornell was as nearly a perfect one technically as a Dartmouth team ever played.
There were thrills enough in the game against Chicago to last a lifetime. Dartmouth scored more points in this contest than all Chicago's seven other opponents had been able to make. "How can you stop a bunch that throws touchdowns?" inquired a Chicago player after the game.
A Chicago tailor had advertised a suit of clothes to the player making the first touchdown. "I certainly did hate to throw Tully that suit," was Jim Oberlander's first comment.
The team was with practical unanimity accorded the mythical "Championship" title; Oberlander was on every "All-American" list; and Diehl, Tully, Sage and Captain Parker were only a step behind. In three years, Hawley had reached the pinnacle that every coach dreams of; and reached it by a path to which none could take exception.
In this season the class of 1926 made a most remarkable record. Twelve of their number won the D; and they could have put an entire team in the field with only one man playing out of his regular position, and this a guard changed into a center. So far as known, this record has never been approached at Dartmouth, and as it has never been commented on before, the names of the players and their positions are given here: Center, Champion; guards, Diehl, and Smith; tackles, Parker and Allen; ends, Tully, Sage and Straight; quarterback, Marshall; halfbacks, Oberlander and Robinson; fullbacks, Loomis and Starrett.
Probably the reaction from all this success was bound to come; but this one, as a friend of mine used to say, was "even worse than it proved to be." In 1926, the team lost all four of its major contests. The departure of that 1926 galaxy left a chasm in the ranks. Dooley returned to college, and was reinstated at quarterback, McPhail being transferred to halfback, where he had played before 1925. This shift did not work out well. Replacement material was scanty and inexperienced. Only two of the seven regular linemen of 1925 were available; and the line was an uncertain quantity all the year.
THE HARD-LUCK YEAR
Let the painful record be told quickly. The losses were to Yale 7-14; Harvard 12-16; Brown 0-10; Cornell 23-24.
And yet, despite this showing, the team narrowly missed "clicking." Every one of those losses could have been turned into a win by a very slight shift in fortune. Yale played a better game than Dartmouth, but it was only the interception of a forward pass that brought them their second touchdown and victory. Against Harvard, Dartmouth led 12-10 with only three or four minutes to play, thanks largely to the skillful Dooley toe, which accounted for two field goals. Then the speedy French got away for a touchdown run. The famous Brown "Iron men" deserved their victory, but at that were all but scored on in the first few moments of play; and if they had been—-? But the climax was in the Cornell game, in which Dartmouth led at the beginning of the fourth quarter by a score of 23-7, only to have a fighting Cornell eleven put across two touchdowns and a field goal in fifteen minutes and snatch what was from their point of view a splendid victory. If the loss of football games can ever properly be ascribed to luck, this was surely Dartmouth's hard-luck year. Hawley's difficulties were recognized; the results were accepted with equanimity; and attention was turned toward 1927.
The "odd year" again brought success. The line still had its weaknesses, as is shown by the fact that all except two opponents were able to score at least one touchdown, but a first-rate backfield, with McPhail again at quarter as in 1925, and good ends, were able to get the combined passing and running attack going for victory against all rivals except Yale.
Brown was beaten decisively, 19 to 7, and Harvard and Cornell were overwhelmed by scores of 30 to 6, and 53 to 7 respectively. Yale, however, clearly outplayed Dartmouth, though Marsters was the most brilliant individual on the field, and won by 19-0. In this season the backfield quartet of McPhail, Lane, Marsters and the lamented Hamm functioned brilliantly both on attack and defense; and the ends, Cole, Fusonie, McAvoy and Swarthout, were all reliable.
Phillips, Langdell and Armstrong did yeoman service on the frontier. The team played intelligent football, and just missed greatness.
It is doubtful if any coach ever had so many adverse circumstances to contend with as Hawley did in the season of 1928.
In 1927, twenty-four men were awarded D's. Of these, 13 were not in college in 1928; of the remaining eleven, five, Captain Black, Breithut, Jeremiah, Marsters and Snider, all backs, were unavailable for the whole or greater part of the season on account of injuries. Of the remaining six, Armstrong and Cole at the tackles were the only men who did not have to spend a considerable amount of time on the sidelines. At the end of the season, the necessity for substitutions had been so great that 28 D's were awarded, 12 to backs and 6 to ends. Five or six of these D men were with the squad all through 1929 without seeing any action worth mentioning in any important game. When one considers what the Hawley system demands in the way of team play, precision and timing, it will be seen that in such a situation success would have been a miracle. The injury reports came out of Hanover in such alarming fashion that the sporting editors would not believe in their truth; but true they were. Moreover, the schedule was too hard and too long, calling for games against Columbia, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Cornell and Northwestern on successive Saturdays, only two of these games being played in Hanover. It is not surprising that only two of these contests, those against Columbia and one of the weakest Cornell teams in recent years, were victories.
After the first few games, the team possessed no offense worthy the name, scoring only two touchdowns in the four games against Harvard, Yale, Brown, and Northwestern.
It became a question of simply getting men into uniform who could go through the motions for sixty minutes, and hoping to keep opponent's scores within countable limits. It was the most unsatisfactory season a Dartmouth team has had for many years, and it was most unfortunate that the curtain had to fall on such a last act for Jess Hawley; for as is the way with humans, memory is short, and it is to be feared that this "drab" season blotted out in many minds recollection of the brilliant successes of 1924, 1925 and 1927.
HAWLEY'S INFLUENCE
The thousands of Dartmouth men who follow football with interest unquestionably appreciate the fine character and sterling ability which Jess Hawley brought to the service of Dartmouth athletics in 1923 and the efforts which he poured out in that cause for six years, during the prime of his own manhood. In his second season he carried on successfully though just up from a hospital bed, and subsisting during the entire fall on a semi-solid diet. In three years he had produced what Dartmouth men for years uncounted had been longing for; an undefeated, untied, championship team. Four of his six years were unqualifiedly successful from the victory standpoint. During his entire tenure of office there was no episode in Dartmouth football to make anyone who is solicitous for the good name of the college ashamed or even anxious. Never was a coach more reasonable in his demands or more ready to recognize the point of view of others. He was as popular with antagonists as he was at home, and thus exercised a great power in the betterment of our intercollegiate relations. He was a first-class teacher, and if he had chosen that for a profession he would have been eminently successful in it. Dartmouth will never have a finer and stronger personality connected with her athletics.
The season of 1929 is too recent to need comment here. Let it only be said that by carrying his team through an over-long and difficult schedule with the loss of only two games, though deprived in mid-season of the services of the unrivalled Marsters and the very necessary Clark, Cannell has shown that he is the right man in the right place; and during the season he has also demonstrated that he can be counted on to retain for the college the good repute which is more to be desired than scores of victories.
No account of the football of this era can be quite complete without a word of comment on the change in the undergraduate attitude toward all athletics, football especially, which has occurred. It can all be summed up by saying that sports are no longer taken so seriously as they used to be. There are no more rallies; when the team leaves town for a big game, the cheers come from a rather small crowd of dragooned freshmen; the occasional bon-fire is not due to spontaneous combustion; the cheering at "big" games has become pretty mechanical. Undergraduates go in great droves to Boston and the Bowl; but the by-products of those trips are regarded as more consequential than the game itself. It takes either an extraordinarily good or an extraordinarily poor team to really stir up the student body. Many of the results are healthy; as has been remarked, the students themselves are taking off the "overemphasis" on athletics. However, if this changed point of view should affect the players themselves in such ways as breaking down the observance of training rules, and affecting team spirit and morale, another and not so agreeable an aspect would be presented. Without desiring to over-stress this matter, it is simply pointed out as one of the many problems which those who deal with the youth of the species today find it sometimes hard to understand, but which must be understood, and solved in an understanding spirit.
THE GREAT TEAM OF 1925
A FAMOUS TACKLE THAT WON A GAME DOOLEY HOLDS THE SCORE AT DARTMOUTH 6 HARVARD 0 IN 1954 BY A FEROCIOUS DIVE THROUGH THREE INTERFERERS
OBERLANDER IN ACTION 1925 Dartmouth 62 Cornell 13
DARTMOUTH YALE 1927
