Big Green Teams
Dartmouth Eleven Battles Navy to Scoreless Tie In First Major Test of the 1939 Season
CHECK OFF ONE major team that was unable to defeat Dartmouth's inexperienced eleven in the year 1939, and score an assist on the play for some too-often-overlooked Big Green athletic spirit.
Speaking of such things as blocking, tackling, finesse on a co-ordinated offense, and brilliance of individuals, the Big Green was just about as expected against the Midshipmen. It was thought that it would be a young Dartmouth eleven that would make mistakes, look bad at times, good at others, and inferior to Navy in size and numbers. All these things lived up to advance notices.
However, the Dartmouth team was licked because it showed as much plain ordinary guts and coolness under fire as any gridiron aggregation we have ever seen.
Navy pushed Dartmouth around when Navy was in its own territory or at midfield. Navy looked better than Dartmouth when there was little danger of Navy's scoring. But when Dartmouth's goal line was threatened and Dartmouth's record was at stake, the Big Green seemed to draw in its collective belt three notches, take an added deep breath and hold off the challengers time after time. And when the Navy had spent itself hammering at a foe that refused to wilt, it was Dartmouth that forced the issue, Dartmouth that threatened to score, and Dartmouth that finished the game in the last quarter carrying the battle to the favored Navy.
Actually one doesn't expect an inexperienced team to have poise when it is in trouble, and specifically it was not the newcomers who showed this poise, although none of the men who joined the ranks this fall for the first time displayed any inclination to fold when in trouble. However it was the veterans, Captain Whit Miller, Lou Young Jr., George (Rookie) Sommers and Bill Hutchinson, who really seemed to carry the load when their team was on the thin edge. Miller, Sommers and Young were all over the field making tackles, especially when Navy started one of its frequent marches into Dartmouth territory. Hutchinson made one tackle from his safety position that saved the game. With no other Dartmouth players between him and the goal line a Navy back matched his wits and speed with Hutchinson in a duel that was vital. Hutchinson won. With a coolness that a senior gathers through years of playing, Hutch measured the ball carrier, kept his balance, spaced his legs in the proper stance and delivered a tackle that could be heard clear up into the press box. Hutchinson also contributed some punting that was so masterful few people in the grandstands had ever seen its equal.
11l the first quarter with the wind against him, Hurricane Bill stepped back into punt formation, and cracked out a boot that travelled 60 yards. How he was able to collect the power, we'll never know. Again in the second period, this time with the wind at his back, Hutch quick-kicked almost the length of the field out of bounds on the Navy's 5-yard line. That the officials called out on the 15 didn't matter much, for even Navy partisans protested against the loss of the ten yards. But 5-yard or 15-yard line it was a magnificent display, and this kind of kicking is going to mean a great deal to the Indians this fall.
More than anything else, though, the fighting spirit of the team, its ambition, its determination, is going to take it much further than it deserves to go considering such factors as material, ability, and resources.
Let me say right now that this business of calling the 1939 eleven a fighting group is not anything that I have manufactured for something to write about in the absence of more usual items.
Dartmouth's entire student body recognizes this year's team in a manner that shows that it has taken the current eleven to its heart, and before the Dartmouth students did this, I'm sure they saw a fighting quality that they could admire and respect. It is natural for us all to root heartily for the underdog, but it is more than this.
Allow me to quote from The Dartmouth of Monday morning, Oct. 16.
"Despite the near-freezing weather and the early morning hour, an enthusiastic gathering of some 200 students turned out at 7.30 yesterday morning to welcome the Dartmouth football team as it returned from Baltimore and the Navy game.
"The rally was sponsored by Palaeopitus, with the Vigilantes and fraternities aiding the senior society. The meeting was the first in ten years to welcome home a Dartmouth team that had not won.
"The rally began at 7.10 when the bells in Rollins Chapel started to ring and the band gathered at Bartlett. Sleepy-eyed and shivering, the members of the band, increasing in number as they marched, paraded down Fraternity Row and then returned to the Inn Corner by way of Tuck Drive and Massachusetts Row dormitories.
"With the temperature hovering around the 30 degree mark, a small group started to gather at 7.20, and grew quickly as the arrival as the team grew near. Jim McClelland, varsity cheerleader, led the gathering through several enthusiastic cheers, the unusual volume of which may have been caused by a malicious desire to awaken the inmates of the Inn and College Hall or by dire necessity to keep warm.
"Plans for greeting the team on the Inn Corner were dashed as the squad proceeded immediately to the training table. Not to be outdone, the cheering section followed the squad to Smalley's where the rally ended with Whit Miller's speech for the team."
In Tuesday morning's Vox Pop section Miller wrote the following note that one could comment on for days from every angle.
Wrote Whit: "I wish to take this means to thank all those students who gave us such a fine welcome last Sunday morning. Not in my three years in school have I seen such an enthusiastic reception for a home coming team. No, we didn't cheer and wave and laugh. It meant a lot more to us than that. When I said, We sure do appreciate it,' it came from the bottom of my heart. It was the feeling that every one of us wished we could express. For the first time this year we really feel that the student body is behind us, win or lose. It takes more than brains and brawn to make a winning team; it takes heart, too, I believe you have given it to us."
Capt. Whit Miller
It is necessary to explain that Miller referred to criticism in some instances that the Dartmouth players did not apparently react to the crowd, hence the reference 10 the lack of cheering, waving and recognition in Whit's communication. From the players I gather that the whole thing took them so much off guard, that most of them got a lump in their throats in appreciation. Then, too, it was my reaction in the locker room immediately after the Navy game, that the Dartmouth players were ashamed that they didn't win the contest. It's difficult to imagine why they weren't proud of the scoreless tie, especially since they had fought their hearts out getting it, but that is not the mental process that the Dartmouth players indulge in. Off hand, I'd say that nothing could be a healthier state of affairs, and it speaks well for future progress for the Dartmouth team.
Then, too, to go back to Miller's Vox Pop, I think Whit could have said that for the first time in three years the football team feels that the student body is behind it. This undoubtedly is too sweeping a condemnation of the "what the hell" attitude that was the reaction to the great teams of other years, but we always felt that there was gradually seeping into the Dartmouth fold a sophisticated indifference to everything and an attitude that any show of enthusiasm about anything was the sign of ignorance. As far as we're concerned, the rest of the colleges can take this attitude and make the best possible use out of it, but it never seemed to be Dartmouth as we know it, and apparently it isn't Dartmouth at all, just a smart aleck growing process that disappeared into thin air the first time a team came along that needed support and warmth from its fellow students.
If this season proves to be nothing else, we feel that it will show that the Dartmouth cheering section will drown out the opposition with the noise of an elephant sneezing in a hall closet, and that the team itself will react to this support in a manner to make every opponent reconsider Dartmouth as a foe to take seriously even though the situation from material and natural ability may not warrant fearing the Big Green as in past years.
So much for the spirit of things, which means more to us than all the other considerations of football put together.
However the Dartmouth coaches are never ones to be satisfied that the best of football teams couldn't be put together by hard work and skillful handling, and if you know the coaches you will agree that in their race against time they are doing nicely, thank you.
Coach Blaik and his staff are still experimenting. Still trying to put the best eleven men on the field. Still rushing experience into the ranks where little experience existed. In short, they have yet to take the attitude that Dartmouth should build for next year when this season is the one that has to be played. Dartmouth is thankful all the time that it has the best coaching staff in America, and even more thankful this fall than ever when a lesser staff would be at a complete loss as to what to do next in the multitude of problems that have been faced and will continue to be faced.
Slowly but surely each day finds the Green heading toward better football. Changes have been made here and there as the men have received their opportunity to prove themselves. Quietly the attack has been changed to meet the men who must use it. A pat on the back here to build up the confidence of a greenhorn, a word of advice there to urge a man who can play better than he has done, and Dartmouth plods ahead. The season may be all too short for Dartmouth to catch up to its foes, but no one can say that Dartmouth won't be a tougher foe to beat each Saturday, which is pure and simple coaching genius.
And if there is a fighting chance in any of the games, the one bet to make is that Dartmouth will come through in a fashion that will make you proud of the team.
Perhaps the Dartmouth freshmen in their first game with Holy Cross '43 proved that they are no more given to losing hope than are their Big Green brothers. Trailing 20-0 at the end of the first period, the little Indians set sail for three periods, played like men inspired, and won the game 23-20 on a touchdown scored in the last 30 seconds of play. Of course there were those who stated that the Crusader freshmen had scrimmaged their varsity for three afternoons previous to the game on Thursday, but even if the fact that the opponents tired badly is granted, no one can take it away from our frosh that they refused to quit when 20 points behind.
As a matter of fact it is an interesting freshman team. It isn't a big team. It isn't composed of men who did great deeds in high school or prep school for the most part. In fact since the season's first call-to-arms, several youngsters from little one-horse towns that no body ever heard of ten miles from home have edged their way into the first eleven. One of these men I have special reference to, for John Conn, home town Ada, Ohio, put on a one man passing attack (he's a southpaw) that put the crump in crumple as far as Holy Cross was concerned.
Any freshman team with the courage to come from behind will be welcomed by the varsity coaches, and more so because in its ranks are men who aren't loaded down with clippings of their ability, but by men who are anxious to show ability in action, just as Little Joe Arico of last year's freshman team wanted to do when he was placed on the "B" squad at the outset. Arico today shows that quite often these men go further and do more than anybody else, and the records bear this out. Jack Orr started out as a "B" team player as a i'rosh. So did Ray Hall. None of these three men have stopped improving, although it is granted that they have their limits in capacity. Orr and Arico lack size. Hall lacks speed. They're making good because they want to play football, want to play football up front where the fighting is thick. So good wishes to the freshmen who are showing the same stuff, and watch for them, if not next year, the year after that. On other fronts Dartmouth's varsity
soccer team opened its season with a win over Mass. State, 6-1, continued its winningways against M. I. T., 3-1, and finally came a cropper against Wesleyan, 1-2. Coach Tommy Dent has Dartmouth's best soccer team of recent years, and the championship of the New England League is not beyond its reach.
The frosh soccer team started with a defeat from Exeter, 1-3, and bounced back with a win over Til ton, 5-1. Harry Hillman's cross country team showed ability in defeating Vermont 22-34, while the freshmen lost to Vermont, 30-25.
In regard to the broadcasting of games this fall, the Harvard-Dartmouth game will not be aired as far as we now know. The Yale game will be on stations WATR, WBRK, WEAN, WFEA, WHAI, WICC, WLLH, WLNH, WNAC, WNBH, WNLC, WOR, WSAR, WSPR, WTAG, WTIC.
The Princeton game will be broadcast by an N.B.C. chain. Which of the two networks will carry the contest is not as yet known. Cornell arrangements are now under way. No word on the Stanford game is available.
Which is all for this month.
KRIEGER OFF FOR A GAIN AGAINST THE MIDDIES The Dartmouth halfback from Minneapolis eludes a bevy of Navy tacklers as CharliePearson (64) rushes over to provide interference.
PUNTING STARBill Hutchinson, veteran backfield ace,whose kicking was a highlight of the encounter with Navy.
DYNAMITE FROM DULUTH George Sommers, senior tackle, whose 192-pound frame is carrying a heavy load ofthe crashing work required of the Indianforward wall.
FIXTURE AT GUARD Lou Young Jr., son of the former Penncoach, whose steady, dependable play atguard has made him a standout in theGreen line.
RUBBING ROOM SCENE IN DAVIS FIELD HOUSE Rollie Bevan, business-like trainer of the Big Green eleven, displays his bandaging arton Charlie Camp, 2oypound tackle from Springfield, Mass.
