The Minneapolis journal., 1901-12-07

conspicuous work has been with his foot
ball teams. the first of which was put in
the field in 1892, Stagg himself having
a place in the lineup Without thought
OF protest on the part of teams against
' which his men played. So liberal were
| foot ballists in those days that in the
Thanksgiving Day game of a 1892 between
| Chicago and Illinois U, Stagg refereed
| the game. He did not win it for his
men, however. Illinois won by score of
| % to 10, though Chicago had won a game
! from Illinois ten days before by score
| of 10 to A.
| Stages troubles had begun and they
have continued almost ever since, though
they have been overcome with varying de-
grees of success from year to year by
| Stages resolute way of meeting obsta-
| cles His chief trouble of 1892 and the
! way in which he met it are shown by his
| remarks on the situation at the time, as
! follows:
Our team cannot hope to win at football
with as little practice as it has, and while
some Of the players conduct themselves as
they do. Several of the fellows pay little
attention to the rules of training. They smoke
and drink and carouse. They come out for
practice only when it suits them. No man
can play good football who does these things.
| He must quit smoking, quit drinking, and
work to keep himself in shape, and that is
what the members of the Chicago team will
do next year If stay in my present position
The Christian athlete went on ''saw-
/ ing wood" working his material, good,
| bad and Indifferent into shape each year;
but always doing a little better than he
had done the year before, until in 1899 he
put into the field a team that swept every
thing before it and easily won the cham
! pionship of the west. Since then Stagg
has known almost unbroken defeat.
Was 1t the Pounding Mimi. Gave :
Chicago university folk are still in
doubt as to how to account for the slump.
| In the minds of many the awful pounding
! given the Chicago men by the Minnesota
! team early in the season of last year
is to blame. That put the Chicago boys
out of the running and they haven't yet
been able to get back. 1t was the result
| Of the work of Stages friend and rival,
Harry" Williams, in developing a team of
giant gophers.
The quiet little Chicagoan has, no doubt,
felt keenly the successive defeats his men
have suffered but the stoicism with which
he has gone through the past two seasons
shows that he is more than mere foot
ball coach, that he regards football as in
cidental-only a means in the greater
work of developing manhood and char
acter, though an end in the sport it af-
fords.
Minnesota Gets DIR. Williams.
1t was not long after Stages arrival at
Chicago before other western institutions
began to look to the east for coaches for
their football teams, and football as
played in the west began to compare ia
vorably with that of the east. Minnesota
began to take an interest in the great
sport and of course, began to think Of
the matter of coaching. At the close of
the unsuccessful season of 1889, DR.. H. L..
Williams. who had charge of athletics at
the Penn Charter school of Philadelphia,
was named for the place at the head of
athletic affairs at the university. He
was secured and in the fall of 1900 entered
upon his duties. The record of the uni
versity team of 1900 is too clear in the
minds OF Minnesotans to need repetition
here. 1t convinced the public that Min
nesota had great football coach at the
least. 1t was not until the season, was
over and the annual banquet was given
the team, however, that the public gem
orally learned just what was Dr. Williams
attitude toward athletics just what were
his ideals. At that banquet DR.. Will
liams made speech on Athletic IDEALS 2
in which he said:
Athletic Ideals.
The subject of athletic Ideals is one
that is very to the hearts of us ALL 1t
needs no argument for me to convince you
that athletic sports have come to occupy a
place of great prominence in our American
educational institutions that they exercise
a far-reaching influence upon the characters
of thousands of students at the most plastic
and formative periods of their lives, and that
they offer to the educator an instrument
whose training value no wise man will
neglect
To win important games means much to
the university and to every man On the
team; but how we win, gentlemen means far
more.
Our ideals in athletics need no elaborate
presentation. That each man shall unselfshly