Football From the Inside Out

A PLAYER'S REVIEW OF THE PAST SUCCESSFUL SEASON WITHITS TRIALS, TRIBULATIONS, AND TRIUMPHS

FOOTBALL MAY sound a little out of place at this date. But if you don't believe it's a year-'round sport at Dartmouth today, just take a quick look up toward these hills and watch the aspirants of next year's varsity squad sweating and groaning under the critical eyes of Earl Blaik & Co. Yes, the freshmen have been working out in the indoor cage since March 7th—they'll soon be joined by the upperclassmen and they'll be catching hell's fire from then until the second week in May.

I've been asked to write something about last year's squad and so if you will bear with me, we'll take a brief summary of what happened to the Indians from the inside out during the '36 season, from the spring practice of last year through the 21st of November, when the season came to its close at Palmer Stadium.

EARLY SEASON PROSPECTS

On the 4th of September about fifty men returned for early practice (plus Roily Bevan). Things had looked rather promising until late the previous spring. But Joe Handrahan had left College at the beginning of the spring term via the scholastic route and was working towards something in the construction line. Larry Hull went on probation in June. He had been sick in the spring and wasn't quite able to catch up (and they don't give makeup exams in Sept. in Hanover—funny thing); Latta McCray was all through as a football player due to the spleen injury he had received skiing; and to sew up the bag, Mutt Ray came down at the end of the baseball season with an infection which settled in the base of his spine which necessitated a rather delicate operation plus two months of absolute inactivity to follow. And so it looked as though Dartmouth was to be without the services of three pivotmen seniors in the center of the line, plus a sophomore end who already had shown himself to be one of the best ends to be seen at Dartmouth for some years. To clinch matters, Fullback Joe Kiernan came down with pneumonia late in the spring and the doctors said he would play no more football. And so that was the rosy outlook Earl Blaik had to face last spring—and from the line that had lost only El Camp through graduation. Two tackles remained out of a six-man line of veterans. Talk about your tougher cross word puzzles- this one took the cold turkey hands down.

Well, during the spring practice the following changes took place. Johnny Merrill was the legitimate man to take over Camp's duties. A letter man of two seasons, Donchess counted on Johnny to step into the wing post. Camerer was to be at left tackle. Still more or less of an unknown quantity, it was hoped that he'd come around to play some real ball. Bill Cole who had understudied McCray was moved up into the right guard slot. Not a heavy man but a wiry and rugged one, Harry Ellinger was counting on Bill to take care of the running guard assignments on both sides of the line which went to make this position about the "poopingest" assignment in football last season. I asked Harry how he expected Cole to do all that running and still be able to take care of his slot on the defense. "Oh, don't worry about Cole—he'll run like hell and he'll play it up to the hilt on the defense."—He did and to the Nth power.

VETERANS BACK IN LINE

Mutt Ray would be back at center, flanked on his left by Jack Williams, who had been converted from a fullback into a center, into a tackle, into a guard. Thats a lot of metamorphosing to take place in one guy, but it took place in Jack, and with a vengeance. He was to play what is known as the "dead guard," that is, he blocks straight ahead on the offence instead of pulling out Of the line and running interference—not quite fast enough for that, but he would take over the left guard slot on the defense, a place where much heavy blasting is directed. You TAKE IT at this spot. At right tackle, Capt. Bennett was expected to play the same brand of ball he had shown during his previous two years on the first team- no questions asked at this position. And finally on the right wing, it looked as though Stinky Davis would have to step into the shoes of his classmate Hull. "Plenty strong but shy on game experience; quick enough to learn but much to be learned"—that's about the shot as far as Donchess's attitude towards "Stinky" went.

In the backfield it was learned that Pop Nairne had seen enough of college and so would not be back in the fall. And so that left Johnny Handrahan as the sole starter in the backfield. Whitaker was to take over the quarterbacking responsibility.

A pretty green team you say? A pretty green team it was. And then when Mutt's spine began acting up this summer it looked as though either Gibson or Mudge, both sophomores, would have to take over that spot.

They worked us hard last spring, very hard. We scrimmaged two and three times a week and the temperature of a Hanover spring rose nicely as it does, when you're out there in full pads. We worked for six weeks, tackling, blocking, learning new plays that had to be mastered before fall, scrimmaging, and in general—getting a very thorough going over. But the "to be" sophomores showed that they were in earnest and worked like dogs.

RESULTS OF ICE CREAM AND SLEEP

The summer vacation found many of the men working on summer jobs, and so when the fourth of September rolled around (all too quickly) there were hard, soft and in between conditions—but all set to go. I was really surprised to see one man back and then again, I guess I wasn't. Latta McCray was back and itching to play some ball. He had regained nearly thirty pounds in thirty days, eating ice cream and sleeping, at a summer camp in Maine under the watchful eyes of Bennett. The day before he returned the doctors had given him a clean bill of health. A few months before it was declared that the kid would never play any strenuous game again, much less football. But Mac is the kind of guy that likes to play ball and that kind of a gent is tough to keep down. Mutt was back in spite of his tail bone which had not entirely healed and Joe Kiernan had pulled a complete recovery during the summer and was ready to go. So the morning of the fifth found a smiling bunch of lads, all imbued with the idea that we were going to have a pretty fair ball club after all. In fact we were having a fine time out there, funning around and whistling to ourselves and thinking about things back home and comparatively little about the season ahead —that was just one of those things that Would automatically take care of itself. Of course we were going to have a good club- why the hell not. It was a senior line with the exception of Davis, and with Handrahan and Whitaker, calling signals, in the backfield and two other good backs plus a remuda of young, fast buckers, passers and runners, why there wasn't a reason in God's world why this shouldn't be a comfortable season, with the exception of one, or two games at the most.

The plays soon came back to us as so much second nature work, and we began to click in dummy practice. The backs were picking their "holes" and the three and four man interference was cleaning out the imaginary opposition in signal drills. The coaches began to worry a little about the too joyful attitude of the outfit. It's all right for the seniors to get a little of it but it's bad if it catches to the juniors and sophomores.

The contact work began after the first week and from there on we went into the offensive and defensive scrimmages. And that was where things began to bog down. We were good, sure we were, we had to be good after three years of this hammering, but the point was that our plays were not breaking against the scrubs. And on the defense, with the exception of one or two, we were not whirlwinds in any sense of the word. I felt more like a vacuum in much of the contact; especially in the bull pen work. This lethargic work on the part of the first two teams continued until the 19th of September which has been noted in the annals of time as a big day in the history of Dartmouth football. We were to scrimmage with the junior varsity that afternoon. The first team vs. the JV's,—and they ran through us, between us and over us to the tune of three touchdowns. And to make matters worse, we couldn't gain a yard against them. After a half hour of this dismal exhibition on our part, Mr. Blaik called it an afternoon, thanked the JV's for their showing and asked them to go in and take their showers. Then he herded us into a little group—just the first eleven men, and after boring each of us with his knowing eyes said,

THE SCRUBS DID IT

"You know this is the first time so far this fall that I've been happy, truly happy, and you know why? Because it took a gang of scrubs to show you something that I've been trying to tell you for the past two weeks: namely that you've become fatheaded. You've been swimming along under the crazy supposition that you have a team and those kids go to work and show you that you have nothing of the sort. Now what are you going to do about it? As far as I'm concerned that's the outfit that will be starting the season next Saturday, yes, and they'll be starting the game three weeks from now against an outfit that calls itself Holy Cross. Now what are you going to do about it? It's all up to you whether you want a lame duck outfit or a team that's going to town."

And with that Mr. Blaik turned on his heel and headed for the field house with the rest of the coaches. We remained in that little circle for some minutes. Benny had his say, and we all followed suit with our own little says. But add, subtract, multiply or divide; it all added up to one rank answer. We stunk and it had taken a bunch of scrubs to point it out to us. But we decided that we were going to do something about it.

The next two weeks were spent primarily in live tackling and live blocking which took up an hour and a half every afternoon. It wasn't so much fun at first, but after the first two or three days, we discovered that we were destined to be an outfit that should be able to "rock and sock" if nothing else. Of course over an hour each day was given over to signals, the running of plays and looking over the T formation from which Holy Cross worked. Definitely we had lost all semblance of fatheadedness and group smug complacency—two factors which will break a team quicker than anything else. The linemen, especially, had everything but the concrete stands thrown at them. Yes, we were beginning to be conscious of the fact that we had hands and that they were to be used for something besides greeting pumps.

PLENTY OF FAST BACKS

The first two games came and went, and as is always the case, proved nothing outside of the fact that we had a lot of backs that could run at a fair rate of speed carrying a football under one arm. But finally on the 9th of October, Holy Cross came to town with her glut of heavy and tremendous linemen plus a wealth of well knit backs. Most of the newspapers spotted us two and three touchdowns, in fact they were ready to spot almost any club in the country a few touchdowns coming up against such a three-deep squad of veterans as the Purple boasted. No doubt about it, Holy Cross was headed for big things and she had the power to get there. The morning of the tenth drizzled forth with much rain and hail, but by game time, the rain had nearly stopped and the afternoon was just dark and for boding, not unlike one of Shakespeare's "Macbeth," so fair and foul. Act 1, Scene 1 days.

CREDIT TO HOLY CROSS

I'll never forget the kickoff, and it might be worth describing if only to bring back the sensation which it must have imparted to every man on the team as he went down under it. Bill Cole and I had been instructed to race down a little ahead of the others and throw ourselves under the semi-wedge which Holy Cross uses on receiving the kickoff. The wedge formed quickly enough and we both took a long, low side block at the apex. I know I hit somebody, it might have been Cole, but at any rate there was much resounding whack of opposite forces, when out of the corner of my eye I saw Jablonski (I think it was) skirting out to his right—his interference was pretty well tangled up, and just as he was gaining top speed Johnny Merrill came up with one of the prettiest, hardest and most completely carried out tackles I have ever seen. It must have carried Jablonski a good three yards backwards. It was one of those up in the air and over the shoulder jobs and they are very satisfying to see and to feel. From that moment on Dartmouth had a grand fighting aggregation. We began pulling together and that sense of cohesion, which goes to make a team good, grew more and more apparent throughout the rest of the season. Holy Cross had the finest line from tackle to tackle I have ever seen—in that game at least. Their center, Mautner, played a beautiful 60 minutes at roving center, their guards, Luciano and Carr whipsawed, submarined, charged viciously, floated and diagnosed plays almost flawlessly, their tackles Moncewicz and Gavin floated (especially Moncewicz) and charged nicely while their ends did a fair job of covering up. And their backs were plucky and hard driving. But in spite of their play, which was hard and clean throughout, we gained 176 yards, and made 9 first downs as against their 70 yards and 4 first downs and 31 yards on passes to their o. And they won the ball game on a never-to-be-forgotten intercepted pass which made Osmanski one of the seasons brighter stars. That game made the Dartmouth team. I'm certain of this fact. It gave the less experienced members a confidence which they never lost and it showed the veterans that they could play rough and tough football for 60 minutes. In spite of the fact that we lost the ball game it was one of the finest games a Dartmouth team has ever played. From then on we knew we had a club that could stack up with the best of them. All questionable doubt as to individual abilities was erased.

The following week, as I remember, wasn't too tough. We came up against Brown the next Saturday, in a sea of mud, and after some fumbling around began to function and took them by a 34-0 score.

Harvard was next on the program, but they had taken a wholesome lacing at the hands of the Army on the previous Saturday, and consequently the old pre-game mashed potato feeling was more or less non-existent. That's bad for any outfit that meets a major opponent after said opponent has taken it on the lam the week-end before. And so for the first two quarters Johnny Harvard played some nice ball and the tribesmen from Hanover played a sloppy brand of ball. But after Mr. Blaik told each and every member of the starting eleven just what he and the rest of the staff thought of him during the half we immediately started to make up for lost time and gave our reverses, which are truly masterpieces of beauty and precision (when they go) their 1936 debut. As I remember, the score was 26-6.

WERE WE LUCKY?

There is no need of rehashing the game at New Haven, except to say that every body who played in that game as well as the rest of the squad and the Dartmouth stands, gave everything that it is possible to give. Yale showed that she had a potent and deceiving game through the air, but not a great deal via the overland route. Kelley, once again showed himself to be a beautiful pass receiver, a better than average offensive ball player, and a medium defensive end, with the accent on his exceptional use of hands in warding off the interference—a tough man to knock down. We had been drilled on the famous KF 79 play so that when it was pulled as the last play in the game, it was bottled up for a six yard loss. Many Elis still talk of that game in terms of, "Gosh but you werelucky to take that one. Looks as thoughthe Gods were sure with you that day." That gripes me just a little when I stop to consider that The Bulldog made exactly one first down rushing the ball as against our 11, and 36 yards rushing as against our paltry 256 yards—but then maybe I'm prejudiced.

I feel that Clint Frank is about the best example of what a back should possess. He has everything—spirit, fight, and guts plus the natural instincts and complete knowledge of the situation at all times. Beyond a doubt he was the best back this club met all season. He says little but plays a lot of ball. And as for Larry Kelley—a damn fine gent with a sense of humor, it's true, but not the wisecracking, hot shot, irrepressible laughing Larry that the sports columnists have made of him. I've played against him on and off for four years and in that time he has never laid his teammates or opponents upon the greensward with his humor. No, he keeps his mouth shut for the most part and plays ball. Kelley, Frank and nine other guys were the Yale team last season. Yale was not the best example of a TEAM in the nation by a long shot but they could "rise" when they were in the mud and throwing caution to the winds would come forth with a hit or miss aerial attack that could and did raise plenty of havoc. And they were tough on their own doorstep.

YALE GAME PEAK

The Yale game was the second time during the season that we hit our peak—emotionally and physically. But once such a fine point is reached, the gradual descent immediately sets in. It can't be helped and there is nothing under the sky that can keep an outfit at the same zenith of physical and mental perfection for two weeks in a row. The two day layoff followed by three days of comparatively easy work will serve to prevent a squad from becoming stale and that certainly helps, but I've learned that a team will unconsciously "let down" just a bit following an all important game and that much desired peak must be built up again through the appeal to the emotions and hard work.

We knew a lot about the Columbia outfit, perhaps more than any other team. We were very familiar with the line play of their guards and tackles, a type of play that Lou Little seems to require above everything else—the low driving, straight ahead charge from an "on all fours" position. This type of play should bring forth a gushing display of mouse traps rather then straight ahead power. We had our assorted "mousetraps" and crosschecks—assignments that would take care of guards and tackles beautifully, if carried out properly and they did beyond the shadow of a doubt. We had slaughtered the Yale linemen with these blocks and made much yardage. As far as the Holy Cross game was concerned, they just didn't mousetrap because they were so adept at their floating game. It is next to impossible to whack a "floater" with the proper abandon. And blocks MUST be carried out with plenty of well aimed abandon, or the opponent will, if he's not asleep, recover and nail the play for a two or three yard gain, which incidentally is not bad line play.

SEVEN POINTS OVER COLUMBIA

The game was more or less of a grudge fight as far as we were concerned. The picture of the dismal exhibition that fifteen or sixteen disillusioned men had painted, down upon Baker Field the year before, was still extremely fresh on our receptive and collective minds. The boys had seen the movies of that game so many times that every time they'd think of that farce, they would become suddenly nauseated. It was that bad. As far as the coaches were concerned, I honestly feel that they lost much needed sleep because of the reoccurring delirium tremens of the Columbia nightmare. We all knew it was to be a "dog eat dog" afternoon and that our role had better be that of the top dog. It was, and completely, as far as the final statistics were concerned—13 first downs to 1 and 304 yards by rushing to their 43, but they scored on a penalty and a pass to give us a seven point margin of victory.

Cornell had a fine sophomore team and they played heads up and hard ball for three periods before they finally cracked much to the disappointment of a well soaked (Rain\—ED.) Cornell golden jubilee crowd. End sweeps, coming after unceasing power at the center of their line was what finally brought results. I thought the choice of plays was exceptional for that day. Hammering away at the center of a young line for three periods, drawing the defense in closer and closer, a defense that had played itself about off its feet as it was, and then to throw a sudden array of end sweeps and reverses, cracked and broke a keyed up Red team.

TRIBUTE TO TEAMWORK

Yes, and then came Princeton, the game we had been waiting and planning for since the Yale game. It was to be the farewell address of a dozen seniors who had been working and playing, laughing and crying for their club, spring and fall for three years. We wanted to make good in the worst way.—ln a way it was appropriate for a tie between two teams composed mainly of seniors to bring their playing days to a close. After the game, when the fellows were in the dressing rooms, going about their last roundup ritual of untaping and showering, there was a numbing feeling of remorse which permeated every senior in that room. It wasn't so much the fact that we hadn't won the game, but the fact that we were climbing out of those uniforms for the last time. We had represented Dartmouth on the gridiron for the last time and this was curtain, and it come down, quietly, quickly and irrevocably and in the space of two hours. We knew it would come that way but still, it was hard to realize the cold truth. I know Mr. Blaik, Harry Ellinger, Andy Gustafson, and Joe Donchess felt badly—l know we felt worse. We hadn't been a club studded with stars. But we had been a TEAM which was made up of eleven men playing together. We had tried to play our own respective positions primarily but instinctively we were a gang that "covered UP" for the man that was playing beside Us and that means a lot. There were no cliques on this team; just a case of every man being immersed with the spirit that has made for a fighting team wherever that team may be. We feel that we had a good team—but there will be others.

Many people have asked me what actually goes on in a big game between the players of the two teams. Actually, there is comparatively little. Of course there is the chatter that is supposed to be constant among your teammates when you're on the defense, but the longer a team plays together, the less apparent the chatter, "ginager" or whatever you want to call it. Probably the main reason for this is because the more a man plays the less need there is for bucking him up with verbal encouragement. And as each man becomes more "veteranized," the more he discovers that there are a lot of tricks in defensive football that he doesn't know and he'll be spending the greater part of his time out there thinking about what he is going to do on the next play to keep one jump ahead of his offensive man. When you're going along nicely on the defense and making your share of tackles or piling up the interference, you're content for the most part to keep your mouth shut and use your lungs to breathe through rather than wasting your ozone on smart dialogue, a good way for a lineman to poop himself out. Nine times out of ten, it's the sophomores who will be "mouthing it" and then it's for the release of nervous energy he has to get rid of in a hurry. I think that I yelled and screamed during the greater part of my junior year—just took me a little longer to settle down. Of course there are exceptions and thank God for that, else the team would seem like a bunch of deaf mutes. Mutt did plenty of tail slapping and jawing which helped to keep the lads on their toes. And then the secondary is in a better position to spot a play and warn and to give hell occasionally.

You make many friends from year to year through contact such as football gives in its own quaint way. You find yourself playing opposite one of your team mates of prep school days and you'll have a word or two with him just before you try to slap a block into him that will put him out of the game—you hope, unless he's easy and sure yardage. There are always grunters, groaners, cursers, threateners and bitchers (it's really fun to team up on the last named type). They spend more time squawking than playing their own game and usually come out fairly early. And they're usually the younger recruits.

KENNY VS. SANDBACH

Jack Kenny was a great one for giving vent to his feelings, and he spared nothing that happened to come into his head. I well remember one case when I wish he had been gagged. It was in the Princeton game of '35. Princeton had a fair team that year as I remember. Well the game started and after testing every man along our frontier, Sandbach decided that I was to be the lad through whom the Tigers would carve a lot of yards. Naturally I was sorry to see this, and after Constable and five or six other Princetons had buried me under or completely accounted for me in other potent mass formations, in every other play (so it seemed) I began to wish for three feet of snow for burrowing pur- poses, rather than a paltry three inches. Things were definitely looking sombre from my angle. But old Jack must have felt that all I needed was some encouragement and so the following soothing words blasted in mine ear. (I can still hear them):

"O. K. Sandbach, let's see you shoot oneat this tackle slot—you mugs won't gainanother yard through here all day. Comeon Sandbach shoot one this way!"—Kenny was backing me up.

And Sandbach, walking up and down before his huddle, hands on hips and looking like Napoleon's big brother, would stop, nod and "O. K. Kenny" and then would return to his huddle. I knew just what was coming, in fact the idea of the entire thing was making me a little sick to my stomach. And sure enough, WHAM and I was out of the play and Pauk or LeVan was off for twenty or thirty yards. Either the idea was becoming extremely monotonous to me or I was becoming on the "punchy" side or Captain Jack had gone completely out of his head. At any rate after two quarters of this I finally decided to let him know that as far as I was concerned he could call his parley with Sandbach to a close. The words wouldn't quite fit into this print.

Other things happen in games that seem terribly tragic at the time but take on a great glow of humor after the game. I suppose in later years the Fat Man's Club of Dartmouth '36 football team will have many more laughs and precious moments talking about the team "what was."

DAVID CAMERER '37 Author of the football feature in this issue,varsity tackle for three years. His home isin Hartsdale, N. Y.