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Show j SPOR T LIGHT , Elevens Vary From Week to Week By GRANTLAND RICE ! have heard for many summers and many winters too, The advice you get from elders on the things that' you should do. They tell you of the early bird, who cops the worm so pat But suppose the worm slept longer did they ever think of that? Throw your bread upon the waters yes, I've heard that one Did you ever try to work it as you added up the score? You will find this answer waiting, if you ever tried to do it Throiv your bread upon the waters, and a carp will beat you to it. It Happens in Football PITTSBURGH'S PANTHER had beaten Penn State in her final game last faU. Walter Milli-gan's Milli-gan's alert squad had beaten Wil-liam Wil-liam and Mary, F1 fT ' Northwestern, West r-H Virginia and Miami tjSm this y e a r- Cap" M&ptoS tain Tom Hamil- I fl ton's outfit was 0 -a under way, full J8 steam. tXf I Indiana had 4 dropped 11 straight. P A, ...ii.Jj Here were some Grantland Rice reeent scores; Notre Dame 49, Indiana 6; Ohio State 6, Indiana 7; Iowa 35, Indiana 9. Then Indiana completely wrecked Pittsburgh, 48 Jto 14. SMU loses to Rice, 41 to 27. Rice loses to L.S.U. who had lost to Kentucky, 19 to 0. But SMU, minus Doak Walker, smashes Kentucky 20 to 7. Here was a variation of some 40 to 50 points. Minnesota was a far different team against Ohio State than it was against Michigan. And Michigan was a far different team against Minnesota Min-nesota than the Wolverine was against Army. The trouble is that from Saturday Satur-day to Saturday there is a big shift in the physical, mental and psychological set-ups. Let one team drop off and the other pick up and you get a shift of two, three or four touchdowns. Take two touchdowns touch-downs from one team and add two touchdowns in strength to a rival and you get a stew you never dreamed about. This is why the consistency of Notre Dame is so remarkable. remark-able. To move through 31 to 32 games, facing the best teams that will play you, not only week after week but year after year requires not only fine ma terial, fine coaching, but a blazing blaz-ing spirit that keeps burning. Considering the fine young material ma-terial Red Blaik has and the schedule sched-ule he faces through 1950 and 1951, makes it rather unlikely that his Army outfit will lose any particular partic-ular game' for another two years., Michigan may give him trouble next fall, but this will be a fine team for some time to come. Games against such opponents as Harvard and Columbia and V.M.I, do no good to anybody especially to Harvard, Columbia and V.M.I. Don't forget V.M.I, was beaten 54 to 6 by William and Mary. Unbreakable Barrier A well known eastern coach,' with a football team that hasn't been doing so well, was looking through indigo glasses recently. "We are down," he said, "and it will be quite a while before we ever get up again. Maybe years. This means even worse football and wider margins than we've had so often this year." "Why is this?" I asked him. "Is there no way to crawl out from under?" "Not a chance, for us," he said, "and several others I could name. The first reason is the scholarship situation. Most of the men we want and need and would like to come to us, can't get in our school. If they get in they can't stay in. The scholastic scholas-tic going is just too tough. But I see these stars or potential stars scatter out to other places and often come back to beat out our brains. "The second reason is that once you are down, the better football players are likely to pass you up. They want to be on winners. I guess you can't blame them for that. "We can't give an athletic scholarship schol-arship of any sort. It costs a lot of money to send a boy through our university now." "We have no soft courses, which are a big help. So we are stuck. We can't get working jobs any more largely because boys who play football and keep up in their studies can't honestly honest-ly handle a job that brings in the needed $100 a month. "If every college were the same, this would be fine. But in spite the sanity code the scramble for good football players is terrific. And some one is taking care of more than a few. Our alumni would also be willing to help, but they can't get them in. |