Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-11-16
END OF FOOT BALL
SEASON At HAND
Harvard Makes Wonderful
Brace Prospects Yale
Will Give Crimson a
Fight.
BY E. r. Bushnell.

The end of the 1908 foot ball season is
at hand. The playing of the Yale-F'rince-
ton, Pennsylvania Michigan. Chicago
Cornell and Harvard Dartmouth games
Saturday leaves but three games of inter-
collegiate importance still unplayed.
They are the Yale-Harvard battle to be
fought out on the Yale gridiron at New
Haven next Saturday, the Pennsylvania
Cornell game at Philadelphia Thanksgiv-
ing day and the Army-Navy game on the
same field the Saturday following. The
first two of these games will have vital
bearing on the ranking of the big college
teams Of the east. while the Army-Navy
struggle will attract a tremendous crowd
and arouse an interest all its own and not
duplicated at any other game of the sea-
son.
Harvard and Yale will be the target
for all eyes Saturday, when they meet IN
their twenty eighth annual struggle. Al
though Yale and Harvard first met In
1876. the same year that Yale began her
alliance with Princeton, the two teams
have played but twenty-seven games to
the thirty-two between Yale and Prince
and Yale have been unable to adjust their
differences to enable the game to be
played. These breaks were In 1877. 1880,
1883, 1895 and 1896. The last break was
the most serious Of all, and required two
years to be patched up. This was caused
by the famous Spr ngfield struggle, In
which one Harvard player was seriously
injured by his Yale opponent, and the
Crimson Immediately broke off all ath-
letic relations with the Blue. Since reia-
lions were resumed. in 1897, all has been
we'll in the two camps, except that Har-
ward has won but two victories to Yale's
eight, the other two being 90 games.
Harvard's Wonderful Brace.
In discussing the comparative strength
of Yale and Harvard 1t must be admitted
that last weeks games at Cambridge and
New Haven completely upset the calcula-
tions of the prophets and the critics. That
Harvard should have trounced the Car
Isle Indians 40, and that Yale, al
though escaping with tie at 1910 with
Brown. should have been actually out
played, were the reverse of what every
one had expected. At first thought one
would conclude that the result makes
Harvard the favorite over Yale and that
the Ellis will be lucky to escape defeat
A cold analysis of these scores does not
bear out this contention. and. in the opin-
ion of the writer Yale will be no worse
than an even choice, and possibly favor
lite. to trOunce Harvard. To reason other
wise would be to ignore foot ball history.
Possibly the Yale eleven has been over
rated: 1t may even go down to bitter de-
feat. but the fact remains that no Har-
ward team ever beat Yale under the
present regime unless the Crimson was
at least % per cent stronger than the
Blue. and on more than one occasion a
superior Harvard eleven has been beaten
by a physically inferior Yale combina-
ton.
If Harvard had been Inundated as
Yale was, though the Crimson had al
most as much trouble with Brown as
the Blue did. there would be reason
enough to. discount Harvard's chances
of victory. But it is never safe to elm
mate a Yale eleven. no matter how
poorly it has played There seems to
be something in the atmosphere at New
Haven which turns out fighters Yale's
chances of rallying after such slump
are 80 per cent better than chose of
Harvard under similar circumstances.
The Yale coaching staff cannot be du-
plicated anywhere, and any misguided
critic who thinks that Yale has no
chance with Harvard is likely to have
a rude awakening. If past experience
counts for anything it means that Yale
can recuperate from a setback much
quicker than Harvard can, and likewise
that she can fight to the last ditch bet
ter than Harvard.
At the same time it is not safe to over
look the unexpectedly fine showing that
Harvard made against the Indians. Even
HarvardS supporters looked for all In
dian victory. and no one was prepared
for the score Of II to 0. But II is a
question whether this score means as
much i'll reality as on paper. 1t presents
most inexplicable problem in compar-
alive scores. Two weeks prior to this
game Harvard was actually outplayed by
the Navy, although escaping a 6-6 tie,
the Crimson touchdown being made on-a
long run after a tumble. One week later
the Indians beat the Navy 1876. and while
the Redmen scored all their points with
field goals the score ind Gated pretty &C
curately the relative strength Of the two
| teams. Then Harvard beat the Indians
40. which at the very least argues
Harvards immense superiority over the
Navy. Coach Glenn Warner declares
that the Indians slumped badly against
| Harvard. If they did it Is no wonder.
for any other team that tried to play
the Indian schedule would be a hopeless
wreck before the season was half over.
If Warmers statement that the Indians
| slumped against Harvard is correct then
Harvards victory should be discounted.
At any rate the Harvard score is likely
! to make the team and its rooters over