1908 college football season

The 1908 College Football Season ran from Saturday, September 19, until November 28 [ "Football Season Offers Good Sport," "New York Times", Sept. 6, 1908, pB-3 ] . The Yale Bulldogs had been the only team to finish 2007 unbeaten (9-0-1) and were expected to do well again. Although there was no provision for a national championship, major teams played theiir regular schedules before facing their most difficult matches late in the season. "The real championship contests are ushered in with the month of November," the "New York Times" reported on September 6, "and on the seventh day of that month the final try-outs will be witnessed." The most eagerly anticipated game was Yale at Princeton (November 14). In addition, "intersectional games" were of special interest, with Cornell at Chicago, and Penn at Michigan. Other teams that were expected to do well in 1908 were Harvard, Carlisle, Navy (at that time referred to as "Annapolis"), and Army ("West Point"). [ Id. ]

Rules

"With the modernized plays that are being brought into the game," noted one writer, "football is, in its present state, the national game in the fall the same as baseball in the summer." [ "'Big Five' Football Teams Begin Practice Next Week," "The Atlanta Constitution", Sep. 14 '08, p7 ] . Rules for the forward pass, which had been legalized only two years earlier, were modified, and passing was still a risky play. "If the ball on the forward pass is touched and then freed, and is touched by another player on the passer's side, it will be given to the opponents at the point where the ball was illegally touched," and it was noted that the rule change was to stop the practice of a passer throwing the ball high "with the hopes that some one of his teammates would get the ball in the general scramble that followed," [ Id. ] . In addition, halftime was extended from ten minutes to fifteen [ Id. ]

The rules for American football in 1908 were significantly different than the ones of a century later, as many of the present rules (100 yard field, four downs to gain ten yards, 6-point touchdown and the 3-point field goal) were adopted in 1912.cite book |title=The History of American Football: Its Great Teams, Players, and Coaches |last=Danzig |first=Allison |authorlink= |coauthors= |year=1956 |publisher=Prentice-Hall |location=Englewood Cliffs, N.J. |isbn= |pages=70–71 ] The rules in 1908 were:

*Field 110 yards in length
*Kickoff made from midfield
*Three downs to gain ten yards
*Touchdown worth 5 points
*Field goal worth 4 points
*Forward pass legal, but subject to penalties:

eptember

On September 19, Brown defeated New Hampshire 34-0, and the Carlisle had a practice game against its prep school program, Conway Hall. Carlisle played its first college opponent on September 23, with a 39-0 win over Lebanon Valley on Wednesday afternoon. On September 26, in Philadephia, Pennsylvania defeated West Virginia 6-0 by completing two forward passes to score a touchdown with five minutes left in "oppressively warm" weather in Philadelphia [ "Pennsy Barely Wins First Game," "New York Times", Sep. 27, 1908 V:1; ] Carlisle beat Villanova 10-0; and Vanderbilt beat Southwestern Presbyterian 11-5.

September 30 In Wednesday afternoon games, Harvard struggled as it opened the season with a 5-0 win over Bowdoin, scoring on a touchdown in the second half. "Harvard tried the forward pass, line plunges and end runs, but showed poor team work," a dispatch from Cambridge noted. Dartmouth defeated Vermont, 11-0, Yale defeated Wesleyan 16-0, Brown beat Bates, 35-4, and Penn defeated Ursinus, 30-0. [ "The Football Season Opens With Good Games," "Daily Kennebec (Me.) Journal", Oct. 1, 1908, p4 ]

October

October 3, Harvard beat Maine, 16-0 and Penn defeated Bucknell by the same score. Yale was held to a touchdown by Syracuse, 6-0. Annapolis defeated Rutgers 18-0, while West Point beat Tufts 5-0. Cornell beat Hamilton College, 11-0. Princeton beat the Springfield Training School, 18-0, to raise its record to 2-0-1. Dartmouth defeated Massachusetts Agricultural, 28-0.

Further west, Carlisle and State University (later referred to as Penn State) met at Wilkes-Barre, PA, with Carlisle winning 12-5. Pittsburgh defeating little Mount Union College (now a Division III school, from Athens, Ohio), 34-4. Michigan beat Case, 16-6. Chicago beat Purdue, 39-0. Wooster College defeated Ohio State 8-0. In the South, Tennessee beat North Carolina, 12-0 and Auburn beat Howard College (not to be confused with Howard University), 18-0. Georgia Tech defeated Gordon College, 32-0. [ "Saturday Football Scores," "Trenton (N.J.) Evening Times", Oct. 5, 1908, p11 ]

At the end of the first Saturday in October, seven schools remained unbeaten, untied and unscored upon against college oppoinents: Harvard and Penn, both at 3-0-0; Yale, Annapolis (Navy) and Cornell, at 2-0-0; the University of Chicago, Auburn, and Tennessee.

October 10 Following a Wednesday (Oct. 7) afternoon win over Villanova (11-0), Penn beat State College (Penn State) 6-0. Harvard defeated Williams, 10-0. Annapolis won 22-0 over Dikinson. Cornell dropped from the ranks of the unscored upon, but defeated Oberlin, 23-10. Yale beat Holy Cross, 18-0.

Further west, Chicago was scored on in its 29-6 win over Indiana. In Buffalo, Carlisle defeated Syracuse, 12-0. Pittsburgh beat Marietta College 7-0. At East Lansing, Michigan and Michigan State played to a 0-0 tie, and Princeton and Lafayette played a scoreless draw as well. Wisconsin opened its season with a 35-0 win over Lawrence College., In the south, Auburn shut out Georgia's Gordon College 42-0. Tennessee beat Maryville College, 39-5. Vanderbilt defeated visiting Rose Polytechnic (later Rose-Hulman), 32-0. Unbeaten, untied and unscored upon were Harvard, Penn, Yale, Navy, Auburn, and Wisconsin.

References

External links

* [http://www.shrpsports.com/cf/stand.php?season=1906&conf=Ind&week=Wk%202 shrpsports college football historical records]
* [http://www.jhowell.net/cf/scores/ScoresIndex.htm James Howell Division I-A historical scores]