1891 Stanford football team
American college football season
1891 Stanford football | |
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Conference | Independent |
Record | 3–1 |
Head coach |
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Captain | John Whittemore |
Seasons
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Conf | Overall | |||||||||||
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Team | W | L | T | W | L | T | ||||||
Ohio Wesleyan | – | 4 | – | 0 | – | 0 | ||||||
Kansas | – | 7 | – | 0 | – | 1 | ||||||
Illinois | – | 5 | – | 1 | – | 0 | ||||||
Missouri | – | 3 | – | 1 | – | 0 | ||||||
Lake Forest | – | 6 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
Washington University | – | 4 | – | 1 | – | 1 | ||||||
Minnesota | – | 3 | – | 1 | – | 1 | ||||||
Wisconsin | – | 3 | – | 1 | – | 1 | ||||||
Cincinnati | – | 4 | – | 2 | – | 1 | ||||||
Iowa | – | 3 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
Doane | – | 2 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
Iowa College | – | 1 | – | 1 | – | 1 | ||||||
Miami (OH) | – | 1 | – | 1 | – | 0 | ||||||
Nebraska | – | 2 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
Northwestern | – | 2 | – | 2 | – | 3 | ||||||
Michigan | – | 4 | – | 5 | – | 0 | ||||||
Ohio State | – | 2 | – | 3 | – | 0 | ||||||
Case | – | 1 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
Buchtel | – | 1 | – | 3 | – | 0 | ||||||
Washburn | – | 1 | – | 5 | – | 0 | ||||||
Michigan State Normal | – | 0 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||
The 1891 Stanford football team represented Stanford University in the 1891 college football season . This was the inaugural year of both the University and the football team: the University opened in October 1891 and the four-game season was played in early 1892.
Origins
Soon after Stanford opened on October 1, 1891, students set out to form a football team. [1] One transfer student, John Whittemore, had played football at Washington University . He was chosen as captain and began to organize the team. [1]
Whittemore acted as de facto coach, drawing up plays and organizing practices. [1] The team won its first two games against Hopkins Academy and Berkeley Gym before losing to a team from San Francisco's Olympic Club . [2] In its final game of the first season, Stanford upset a more experienced team from the University of California, Berkeley , setting the stage for what would become the longstanding Big Game rivalry . [1] [3] [4]
Schedule
Date | Opponent | Site | Result |
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January 30, 1892 | vs. Hopkins Academy | Redwood City, CA | W 10–6 |
February 6, 1892 | vs. Berkeley Gym | Berkeley, CA | W 22–0 |
February 13, 1892 | Olympic Club | Stanford, CA | L 6–10 |
March 19, 1892 | California | W 14–10 |
Game summaries
California
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Soon after formation of Stanford's team, players at the University of California, Berkeley , which had been playing football for 10 years, contacted the team to set up a Thanksgiving Day game; as the Stanford team was still organizing, a spring game was eventually agreed to. [1] [4]
On March 19, 1892, the Stanford and California teams met to play at Haight Street Grounds in San Francisco. Stanford's team manager was future U.S. President Herbert Hoover ; Hoover had printed 10,000 tickets for the game, but soon an overflow crowd forced Hoover to collect cash payment for admission. [1] As the game was about to begin, both teams realized that no one had brought a ball. An owner of a sporting goods store who was in attendance was dispatched on horseback to retrieve a ball and the game eventually started an hour late. [1]
Stanford employed some trick plays and scored the first three touchdowns of the game (touchdowns were worth 4 points at that time) and held on to upset the more experienced California team 14–10. [1] [4]
Legacy
The next season, Whittemore wrote to legendary Yale coach Walter Camp asking him to recommend a coach for Stanford; to Whittemore's surprise, Camp agreed to coach the team himself, on the condition that he coach the season at Yale first. [1]
Whittemore's son, also named John Whittemore and also a Stanford student, lived to the age of 104 and was renowned as a masters track and field athlete . [5]
References
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Migdol, Gary (1997). Stanford: Home of Champions . Champaign, Illinois: Sports Publishing LLC. pp. 8–11. ISBN 1-57167-116-1 . Retrieved February 22, 2013 .
- ↑ "Stanford Game-by-Game Results; 1891 – 1894" . College Football Data Warehouse. Archived from the original on November 2, 2012 . Retrieved February 22, 2013 .
- ↑ Results from "Stanford Football Media Guide" (PDF) . p. 142. Archived from the original (PDF) on March 7, 2013 . Retrieved February 22, 2013 .
- 1 2 3 McCormick, Ginny (December 1997). "The Hundred Years' War" . Stanford Magazine . Retrieved February 22, 2013 .
- ↑ Porter, A. Spencer (December 1997). "Still a contender" . Stanford Magazine . Retrieved February 22, 2013 .
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