💡 Interesting Facts
Weston Dressler of the Saskatchewan Roughriders set 19 school records in football at the University of North Dakota.William E. "Bud" Davis, who had a successful career as president at four universities, originally wanted "to be the world's greatest football coach" before he went 2-8 in 1962 and never coached again.Wyoming Seminary, a private school in Kingston, Pennsylvania, participated in the first nighttime American football game in 1892.yards from scrimmage, total offense, all-purpose yardage, and return yards are all American and Canadian football statistics to measure advancement of the football."Moose" Englehorn, who played for Washington State and Dartmouth College, was the oldest living All-American football player when he died in 1993 at age 103.Wally Weber, football player, coach and broadcaster at Michigan for 45 years, was renowned for his "polysyllabic fluency" and sounding like an "an educated foghorn".Sid Wagner led Michigan State to their first consecutive football wins over the Michigan Wolverines and was the first player selected by the Detroit Lions in the first NFL Draft.Spec Keene's Willamette University football team was stranded in Honolulu for two weeks following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.Stanfield Wells was the first of more than ten All-American football players from Washington High School in Massillon, Ohio.Wally Teninga played football for Michigan's undefeated 1947 and 1948 championship teams and later became vice chairman and chief financial officer of Kmart Corporation.All-American Beaton Squires wrote an editorial in 1905 against turning football into a "parlor game" after Harvard's president criticized its violent nature.actor Don Collier, who co-starred on NBC's western series Outlaws and The High Chaparral, played football for the Brigham Young Cougars.by the time American football player Nat Moore retired in 1986, he had broken almost every receiving record of the Miami Dolphins.current Wesleyan football coach Mike Whalen led the Williams College "Ephs" to four consecutive Little Three football championships and a undefeated record against Wesleyan.despite not playing as a high school junior in 1999, American football cornerback Brock Williams still led Notre Dame defenders in playing time in 2000.despite playing the position of wide receiver in American college football, LaShaun Ward was the third leading rusher for the University of California Golden Bears in 2001.before the 2008 International Bowl, American football linebacker Jamaal Westerman was asked questions about the weather in Toronto, because he had lived there.at the same time Francis "Mother" Dunn was coaching Dickinson College's football team, he was also playing professional football for the Canton Bulldogs under Jim Thorpe.after being named to the All–Western Athletic Conference team before the 2008 season, American football tight end Rob Myers suffered a turf toe injury that forced him to miss the entire season.after leading Illinois to "the greatest football upset of all time," Bart Macomber left school for the Orpheum vaudeville circuit.although Paul W. Bryant High School in Tuscaloosa, Alabama is named for football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant, a court order prevented the school from using "Bears" as its mascot.at Washington State University from 1948 to 1950, Bob Gambold was the quarterback of the school's football team and the starting forward for its basketball team during all three of those years.Scott Shafer, hired in January 2008 as the Michigan Wolverines defensive coordinator, started in football as a high school and college quarterback in Ohio.Roger Sherman (pictured in 1890) was accused of offering a football player $600 to play for Michigan and later served as president of the Chicago and Illinois State Bar Associations.Frim Frimodig played high school football with The Gipper and held Michigan State's single-game basketball scoring record for 35 years.Martin Wheelock, football player for the Carlisle Indian School in the 1890s, was inducted into the American Indian Athletic Hall of Fame in 1980.Matt Patanelli was the first University of Michigan football player selected in an National Football League Draft.Michael Bates was an Olympic bronze medalist sprinter and a Pro Bowl American football player.Louis Jordan was the first University of Texas All-American football player and the first Texas officer killed in action in World War I.Louis Merrilat played football with Dwight Eisenhower at West Point, trained Iran's Persian Guard, and served as a soldier of fortune in China and with the French Foreign Legion.John Messmer was captain of the University of Wisconsin's football and swim teams, set a U.S. high school record in the discus and was the first Badger to win nine varsity letters in major sports.Keith Piper successfully perpetuated the single-wing, "the formation-of-choice during football's leather-helmet era," for decades after it had been discarded by other teams.Lester Belding was the first Iowa Hawkeyes football player to be named an All-American.Lloyd Brazil, once called "the ideal football player," averaged more than eight yards per carry and gained 5,861 yards in three years at the University of Detroit.Michael Taylor led Michigan to consecutive Big Ten football championships and became the school's all-time leader in passing efficiency.Mike Gary played American football at Minnesota with Bronko Nagurski and coached Western Michigan for 13 years, including undefeated seasons in 1932 and 1941.Pete Overfield won a professional American football championship in 1901 and was later nominated by U.S. President William Howard Taft as a federal judge in Alaska.Peter "Papa Bear" Mazzaferro was removed as head football coach at Bridgewater after 19 years, sued for age discrimination, and coached another 17 years there after being reinstated.Red Kellett, former President and General Manager of the Baltimore Colts, was never a professional football player, but an infielder for the Boston Red Sox baseball club in his playing days.Duke Dunne, an Olympic pentathlete and Michigan football captain, later presided over the sale of the Chicago White Sox to Bill Veeck and the Kansas City Athletics to Charlie Finley.Paul Posluszny, a linebacker for Penn State's football team, was recently named college football's best defensive player of the year.Norm Daniels, Frank Hauser and Bill MacDermott achieved the most wins among the football coaches in Wesleyan history, and Daniels led the team to four consecutive undefeated seasons.Mike Milligan was a Division I head coach for football and basketball at two different institutions.Mike Stock's only job as a head coach came near the middle of his 44-year American football coaching career.Mysterious Walker, who played for or coached more than 30 baseball, basketball and football teams, earned his nickname pitching for the San Francisco Seals under a pseudonym and wearing a mask.during Jake Gaither's tenure as head football coach at Florida A&M University, his teams won twenty-two Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championships and six Black College National Championships.during the 1990 New York Giants season, the NFL American football team set a league record for fewest turnovers in a season.the 2006 Boise State University football team returned more starters from 2005 than any other team in NCAA Division I-A football.the Baylor University began its organized football team in 1899, but adopted a mascot only after the completion of the 1914 season.the Bristol Packers American football team won every game in its debut season, but failed to win any in its final year.the Cambridgeshire Cats American football team were briefly known as the "Cambridge Crunchers" following a sponsorship deal with a Seattle-based apple export company.the 2001 Gator Bowl was the final collegiate game of American football star Michael Vick.the 1st and Ten System creates the yellow line seen on American football telecasts which shows where a team will earn a first down.the U.S. Supreme Court case Radovich v. National Football League, which held professional football subject to antitrust law, began with a brief drafted on the back of a napkin.the 1895 Michigan football team (player pictured) outscored its opponents 266 to 14 and clinched a claim to the Western championship of American football.the 1950 Salad Bowl in Phoenix, Arizona, drew nearly 20,000 fans, setting a new statewide attendance record for football.the 1972 Rose Bowl was the last football game that Stanford University played using "Indians" as their nickname.the Carnegie Library of Homestead in Munhall, Pennsylvania, trained four Olympic swimmers and sponsored both one of the 1890s' best football clubs and a baseball team with Hall of Famer Rube Waddell.the Centre College Praying Colonels participated in the first game of American football played south of the Ohio River in 1880.when American football center Rod Payne broke his right wrist during a Michigan Wolverines football game, he started snapping the ball with his left hand.when Minnesota Duluth coach Jim Malosky retired in 1998 he was the winningest football coach in Division II history and ranked 11th in wins among all college football coaches.while training for World War I, American athlete Brooke Brewer played for the "Usaacs", a football team composed of soldiers from the U.S. Army's ambulance service.with 203 total yards and four touchdowns, Wali Lundy was named the Most Valuable Player of the American football 2002 Continental Tire Bowl.twice named All-American football tackle Robert "Brick" Wahl later became CEO of a Fortune 500 irrigation equipment company.three-time All-American Eddie Mahan was named by Jim Thorpe as the greatest football player of all time.the 110th United States Congress freshman class contains members from diverse backgrounds, including a professional football player, a Navy vice admiral, several former teachers, and the first Buddhist and Muslim members.the Los Angeles Times wrote in 1914 that American football player Walter Rheinschild had been rated as "the highest salaried amateur athlete in the business".the short film Second Effort, starring former American football coach Vince Lombardi, has been called the best-selling training film of all time.three years after tying for its final Kentucky State Football championship, Flaget High School closed due to falling enrollment.the New York Giants, an NFL American football team, were founded in 1925 by a bookmaker with an investment of US$500, and their estimated value has increased to nearly $900 million.the All-American football player John Maulbetsch was known as the "Featherweight Fullback" because he weighed only 155 pounds (70 kg) and ate two pies a day for dinner during his playing career.four-time All-American football end and millionaire lumberman Tom Shevlin (pictured) died of pneumonia after contracting a cold while training the Yale football team.from his freshman year at Oak Park High School through his junior year at the University of Michigan, Herb Steger never lost a game of football.in 1899 Isaac Seneca became the first Native American to be named as an All-American football player while playing halfback for the Carlisle Indian School.in 1968 Eldridge Dickey was the first African-American quarterback to be drafted to a professional American football league in the first round.former Ohio State football coach Larry Catuzzi served on the Flight 93 Federal Advisory Commission after his daughter died on United Airlines Flight 93.former NCAA American football quarterback Wyatt Sexton's career for the Florida State University Seminoles ended when he did pushups in the street and proclaimed he was God.even though Michigan State football coach Muddy Waters got fired for his losing 10-23 record, his fans still carried him off the field after his final 24-18 loss to Iowa.former American football linebacker Craig Sauer has three brothers who have played professional ice hockey.former Miami University head football coach Arthur H. Parmelee later studied pediatric medicine with Dr. Clemens von Pirquet in Vienna, Austria.former Michigan running back Chuck Heater coached national championship football teams at Notre Dame and Florida.in 1976, Arkansas Republicans nominated for governor an unknown plumber, Leon Griffith of Pine Bluff, after a Minnesota Vikings football player declined the party's offer of support.in 1978, American football fullback Roland Harper rushed for 992 yards for the Chicago Bears, falling just 8 yards short of 1,000 in the same season teammate Walter Payton rushed for 1,395 yards.one of the shotguns used by the all-male pep squad RUF/NEKS of the University of Oklahoma during football games is displayed in the Smithsonian Institution.rapper Lil Jon, porn star Savanna Samson, football coach Mike Ditka, actor Antonio Banderas and US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (pictured) are among celebrities who own wineries and vineyards.retired American football player William Fuller is one of the few players in National Football League history to record 100 career quarterback sacks.the American football team the Cardinals has had 36 head coaches.newly named U.S. Naval Academy head football coach Ken Niumatalolo is believed to be the first Pacific Islander American to be head coach at a major college football program.medical doctor A.C. Steckle (pictured) gained fame coaching the University of Nevada, a school with only 80 students, to a victory over the University of California football team.in addition to being the captain of the 1904 University of Chicago football team, Fred Speik was a member of Chicago's water polo and track and field teams.in the 2000 offseason Matt Lytle, a former American football quarterback, played for the Rhein Fire of NFL Europe who won World Bowl VIII.less than six weeks after being fired from his 20-year career as the University of Wisconsin's football coach and athletic director, Ivy Williamson died from falling down a staircase.John Brennan, a 201-pound football player, was voted "queen" of the University of Michigan ice carnival after challenging the pulchritude of the school's co-eds.Joe Maddock (pictured) was one of the biggest ground gainers, and played four positions, for Michigan's 1903 "Point-a-Minute" football team.Florida A&M football coach Joe Taylor has a career record of 214–82–4 and won four Black College Championships at Hampton.Gerald Ford threatened to quit the Michigan football team when African-American player Willis Ward was kept out of a 1932 game in response to Georgia Tech's refusal to play an integrated team.German-American football center Adolph F. "Germany" Schulz is credited for developing the "roving center" technique, which became the basis for the linebacker position.Grantland Rice wrote that All-American football fullback Shep Homans, who played in every minute of all 22 games for Princeton in 1890 and 1891, "represented the football that used to be".Eastern Michigan football coach Fred Trosko suffered a 29-game winless streak after the school refused to follow a conference policy allowing athletic scholarships.Dartmouth football halfback Dave Morey was given the nickname "David the Giant Killer" by American sportswriter Grantland Rice.footballer Edward King was honored for heroism in the Philippines and tactical skill in France and later became Commandant of the Army Command and General Staff College.All-American footballer Merv Pregulman, the Green Bay Packers' first pick in the 1944 NFL Draft, nearly died in a kamikaze attack on his ship before ever playing a pro football game.All-American fullback John Baird was forced to withdraw from Princeton in 1898 after playing a football game on a wet field while recovering from tonsilitis.All-American Bump Elliott and his brother Pete Elliott played halfback and quarterback for the Michigan football team that beat the USC Trojans 49-0 in the Rose Bowl 60 years ago on 1 Jan. 1948.Harvard All-American Sam Felton averaged between 60 and 70 yards (55 to 64 meters) on football punts in 1912.Harvard All-American Bert Waters was accused of jabbing a finger into a Yale player's eye in the 1893 football game that became known as "The Bloodbath in Hampden Park".Michigan center "Bubbles" Paterson was the namesake of an award recognizing academic achievement by football players.Michigan's 1892/1893 captain George Dygert (pictured) played professional football for a Butte, Montana, team sponsored by mine owners that defeated teams from Denver and San Francisco.Northwestern's Max Morris was a consensus All-American in both basketball and football, played both sports professionally, and twice led the Big Ten in scoring.offensive tackle Rich Strenger told reporters that Michigan Wolverines football coach Bo Schembechler ran a more strenuous training camp at the college level than he experienced in the NFL with the Detroit Lions.Michigan sprinter Clayton Teetzel coached the BYU basketball team to an 11–1 season and later coached the Utah State football team to an undefeated season outscoring opponents 164 to 0.Michigan Wolverines center Alan Bovard coached the Michigan Tech football team to its first undefeated season in 1948.Harvard's All-American football quarterback Dudley Dean was cited by Theodore Roosevelt for bravery after the Rough Riders' charge of San Juan Hill (pictured).Irish-American banker Sam McBirney coached a football team from a college with 400 students to a 16–0 win that broke the Oklahoma Sooners' 18-game winning streak.John Beckett is the only American football player to have been the team captain for two different Rose Bowl teams: the University of Oregon in 1917 and Mare Island in 1918.Major League Baseball pitcher Stan Baumgartner was named to the All-Big Ten Conference teams for baseball, basketball, and football in 1914.football coach Jake High has both the highest winning percentage (.778) in the history of Wesleyan football and the lowest percentage (.000) in the history of NYU football.football coach Denny Douds, climbing the career wins list after decades at the same university, jumped with the U.S. Army Parachute Team in May 2010 at age 69.American football guard Justin Boren cited family values as the reason for transferring from the University of Michigan to its arch rival, The Ohio State University.American football halfback Franklin Morse (pictured) was the model for a drawing, prints of which reportedly "hung in most college rooms throughout the country" during the 1890s.American football head coach Dick Vermeil coached two NFC championship teams 19 years apart—the 1980 Philadelphia Eagles and the 1999 St. Louis Rams.American football tackle J.D. Maarleveld survived Hodgkin's lymphoma but was cut from the Notre Dame team anyway, transferred to Maryland, and became a consensus first-team All-American.American football guard Dean Dingman was only the third true freshman to start on the Michigan Wolverines football offensive line.American football defensive tackle O'Brien Schofield, who completed his college career for Wisconsin in 2009, is a cousin of the National Football League veterans Vonnie Holliday and Bobby Engram.1954 Michigan football MVP Fred Baer and 1953 Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Lattner played in the same backfield for Fenwick High School in the Chicago Catholic League in 1949.Vanderbilt University's win in the 2008 Music City Bowl came 53 years to the day after the Commodores' last bowl game victory and gave them their first winning football season since 1982.All-American football player Art Walker played in 479 of 540 minutes in the Michigan Wolverines' 1954 season and later played seven years for the Edmonton Eskimos.American football center J. T. White played for NCAA national champions with both the 1947 Michigan Wolverines football team and the 1942 Ohio State Buckeyes football team.American football wide receiver Jaymar Johnson became the first player from Jackson State University to be drafted by the NFL since Sylvester Morris in 2000.American football coach Dick Anderson, who led Rutgers to its first victory over Penn State in 70 years, was a Penn State assistant coach before and after his time at Rutgers.American football player "Aqua" Allmendinger (pictured), once described as "a young giant in perfect physical condition," acquired his nickname after working as a waterboy for railroad building crews.American football player Mark Ortmann was a discus throw champion in high school.American football player Tom Hammond (pictured) always played without protective padding, saying "I want them to feel my bones".American football star Albie Booth became famous after he scored all of Yale’s points in a 1929 upset win over Army.American football player DeWayne Patmon appeared in a few movies after his National Football League career ended.American football player Captain Munnerlyn returned a kickoff for 84 yards and a blocked field goal for 81 yards in the same game.American football coach Wayne Howard retired from the University of Utah for "no real reason" after his team nearly won a conference title.American football head coach Skip Holtz is the son of the famed college football coach Lou Holtz.American football player Buddy Burris was the first Oklahoma Sooner to be named an All-American three times.Ohio State linebacker James Laurinaitis, the son of professional wrestler Road Warrior Animal, is the first Buckeyes scholarship football player from Minnesota since 1933.UCLA Bruins end Dick Wallen won the 1957 Voit Trophy as the outstanding football player on the Pacific Coast.George Malley, whose St. Ignatius High School football team was once compared to Notre Dame under Knute Rockne, resigned from the University of San Francisco with a losing record.Gordie Gillespie is the all-time winningest college baseball coach and was also selected as the head coach of the Chicago Tribune all-time Illinois high school football team.Gustave Ferbert quit his job as head football coach at the University of Michigan in 1900 to prospect for gold in the Klondike Gold Rush and returned home in 1909 as a millionaire.Hare Field was the first all-weather high school football field in Oregon.George Jewett was the first African-American to earn a varsity letter in football at both the University of Michigan and at Northwestern University.Gaylord Stinchcomb, one of the stars of Ohio State's first football victory over Michigan, also won the 1921 NCAA championship in the broad jump.Frank Girardi's Lycoming football team wore shoes borrowed from Joe Paterno in the 1990 NCAA football tournament.Frank Joranko was selected as the most valuable football player in the MIAA and later coached Albion College to nine MIAA baseball championships.Freeman Fitzgerald played football with Knute Rockne and once struck out 19 batters in a baseball game.Fritz Crisler developed the platoon system of American football in which separate squads play offense and defense and designed the winged football helmet used by the Michigan Wolverines.Harry Hawkins won the U.S. national collegiate hammer throw championship in 1926 and was rated by Fielding Yost as the best football lineman of 1925.Hootie Ingram tied the SEC record for interceptions, coached football at Clemson, and was the athletic director at Florida State and Alabama.James B. Craig, an All-American football halfback and quarterback, was the brother of Ralph Craig, a sprinter and gold medalist at the 1912 Summer Olympics.Jim "the Darp" Ostendarp, Amherst College football coach for 33 years, refused to allow ESPN to televise a game saying, "We're in education. We aren't in the entertainment business".Joe Allison is a former American football placekicker who won the inaugural Lou Groza Award, presented to the nation's top kicker.Lupe Joe Arenas, one of the first Mexican-American football stars, once held the NFL career record with 4,572 kick and punt return yards.Jack Siedlecki led Yale, Amherst and Worcester to conference championships in 21 years as a head football coach.Jack Blott, an All-American football center for the Michigan Wolverines, had a Major League Baseball career with the Cincinnati Reds lasting only two games.Howard Yerges began his football career with the Ohio State Buckeyes and finished it as the quarterback of Michigan's 1947 "Mad Magicians" national championship team.Irwin Uteritz (pictured), "one of the lightest 'big time' quarterbacks in American football history" at 140 pounds, led Michigan to two undefeated seasons and a national championship.J. A. "Daff" Gammons played professional baseball and football, coached the Brown University football team, founded a successful insurance agency, and was an accomplished amateur golfer.Dr. Edgar Fauver, a football and baseball player in the 1890s, became a pioneer in women's athletics coaching women's basketball and baseball at Barnard College in the 1900s.Duane Purvis's right arm made him a world-class javelin thrower and "without peer" as a long passer in football.Bennie Owen introduced the forward pass to the southwestern United States as head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners football team.Clarence L. "Biggie" Munn was Michigan State University's most successful football coach with a winning percentage of 85.7 over seven years, including a 28-game winning streak from October 14, 1950 through October 17, 1953.Bill Dague was the first consensus All-American football player from the United States Naval Academy.Blair Cherry was the first high-school football coach in Texas history to lead his team to three consecutive state championships.Bemus Pierce, a guard for the Carlisle Indians football team, ran back three kickoffs for touchdowns in an 1896 game against the University of Illinois.Albert Sharpe participated in football, basketball, baseball, gymnastics, rowing, and track and field, and was called "the greatest living all round athlete" in 1915.USC quarterback Gaius Shaver was the leading rusher in the American football competition at the 1932 Summer Olympic Games.University of Chicago football star Laurens "Spike" Shull died of wounds suffered rushing a machine gun nest at the Battle of Château-Thierry (pictured).University of Colorado football player Jordon Dizon, one of three finalists for the Dick Butkus Award as America's top collegiate linebacker, attended Waimea High School, the westernmost high school in the United States.Williams College football coach Joseph Brooks served in a machine gun battalion in World War I and survived a plane crash in 1931.Bo Molenda played professional football, baseball and basketball and was the "workhorse" for the Green Bay Packers teams that won three consecutive NFL championships from 1929 to 1931.Bob Valesente has coached football for the Kansas Jayhawks, Baltimore Colts, Pittsburgh Steelers, Green Bay Packers and Frankfurt Galaxy.David Moosman led his high school to the Illinois state championship in football and qualified for the state championships three times in wrestling.Dick Rifenburg was a Michigan high school state champion in basketball and track & field, but was drafted to play professional American football.Don Coleman was the first Michigan State football player to have his number retired, the Spartans' first African-American coach, and the first African-American teacher at Flint Central.Donald Russell from 1964 to 1970 accumulated the highest winning percentage (.661) of any Wesleyan football coach with more than two years as head coach.Damian Sims and Fred Reid spent a year out of football before being recommended to their current CFL teams.Cleo O'Donnell coached the 1914 Everett team that outscored opponents 600 to 0 and was rated by Sports Illustrated as the greatest high school football team of all time.Bruce Hilkene was captain of the 1947 Wolverines who were selected as the greatest Michigan football team of all time.Bruce Shorts, head football coach at Nevada and Oregon, was described in 1904 as "the best coach west of the Mississippi River".Charles de Saulles coached an undefeated football team of workers from a Kansas zinc smelting works that defeated the Carlisle Indians and was dubbed "the oddest football team in the country".5'5", 135 lb (1.65 m, 61 kg) Chris Limahelu set a USC Trojans football record with a 47-yard field goal at the 1974 Rose Bowl game.