The Washington herald., 1921-11-02
NOTRE DAME MAY
FLASH FINAL WORD.
I'm PASSING ATTACK
Western Coach Is Noted
For His Clever Use
Of Air Offensive.
~ ARrHuR RoBINsoN.

NEW lOHAs NOV. A---NoNAe OeH-N
comes out of the West Saturday to.
|. play the Army at West Point, and
Knute Rockne. the Notre Dame
coach. will turn up the cuffs Of his
shirt and show that he has nothing
in his hands and nothing up his
sleeves.
He will then probably conjure a
bowl of goldfish cut of the thin
air or else come forth with q rabbit
v,riEgling from one hand and the
flags of all nations fiuttering from
the other. But 1t is most likely
that he win perform a football trick
(which has never been done in the
East before.
The. modernists amoHg the foot,
ball coaches are like r=agicians in
the sense that they are always re-
sorting to deception on the playing
field. but among the modernists there
are only a few who dare to explore
new football fields of endeavor.
Rockne is one of these, and his
specially is the forward pass.
Passing Roekne's Speciality.
As an undergraduate seven or
eight years ago. Rockne played end
for Notre Dame and constituted one
half of what was probably the
greatest of all forward passing COM
binations. The other half was
QoFais. who played quarterback.
The forward pass was in its in
fancy then and between them
Rockne and Dorais did more to pop
uIarize the play than even the mem
bers of the rules committee who
realized that some changes in the
game we're vital
The old school or football coaches
frowned upon the play and declined
to take IL up seriously. Then Notre
Dame came East and Rockne and
Dorais amazed students of the game
by the manner in which they used
the play. The Army which had one
of the strongest teams hereaboutsj
was beaten by the score of 30 to 13,
but largely as the result of that
defeat, the Army beat the Navy by
the score of 20 to 3.
Rockne and Dorais opened the
eyes Of the Army coaches, and the
Army accepted the sour with the
sweet. The Army learned its les
son, and the Army particularly
learned how to. use. the. forward
pass Rockne and Dorais, the Cadets
found. were excellent teachers, and
. Merillat and Pritchard. Army quar-
iterback and end. quickly developed
into a forward passing combination
quite as good as the Westerners.
ROekne II "DInerent.,
Merillat was selected as an end for
the All-American team that year.
and Pritchard was considered one
of the best quarterbacks in the
East They both served brilliantly
during the war, and following the
war they returned to West Point as
assistants to Charley DAILY, the Army
head coach. They specialized, of
in the forward pass, and
Saturday they will be present to
study Rockne's improvements on
the play. t
Unlike the more conservative coaches,
Rockne Is not content with an often
sive which consists mostly Of line
plays which generally yield a minimum
Of result after a maxiDum expendi-
ture Of team energy. The three or
four-yard gain may satisfy other
coaches, but Rockne seeks the maxi
mum result with the minimum effort,
and since he has became head coach
at Notre Dame has almost always re-
vealed a trick which has baffed the
teams Of the West.
We do not want to create the i'm
preston that Rockne Is the Thurston
Of football Thurston's best tricks
served him well on the stage for many
years and like other magicians he used
rabbits. flags, pigeons and cards.
Rockne uses the same instruments that
other coaches use, but he has an air
Of mystery and generally he does at
least one football trick slightly diff
ferent from the coaches in the East
who follow beaten paths
Notre Dame Has Good Team.
Rockne has another good team this
year. though it was beaten by a slight
margin by Iowa early in the season
This defeat. 1t is explained, was due
% over-confdence, and It was the first
Hotre Dame has suffered in three
years. Iowa, by the way. is coached
by Howard Jones, a brother Of Tad
Jones, the present Yale coach. The
Iowa coach played end at Yale some
years ago, and later returned to his
alma mater as coach.
Last year Notre Dame came East
with a team which included George
Gipp. who proved himself against the
Army to be one Of the greatest backs
in the history Of the game. Gipp con-
tracted pneumonia as a result Of hts
heroic efforts against the Army and
died some time later. This years
team Is said to be as good as last
seasons. and the game will probably
do as much for the Army in the way
OF preparing It for the Navy as Rockne
and Dorais and their teammates did
IN their undergraduate days.
The trip up to West Point Satur-
day is recommended to those who have
no particular interest in the Harvard
Princeton spectacle. The Army showed
Il had a good team against Yale, and
on Saturday French. the Army star,
will probably play the entire game.
Without him the Army did well
against Yale for three periods, and
with him in the game in the last
quarter the Army looked like a new
team-a team which seemed strong
enough to create considerable doubt
as to the result Of the Navy game.
despite the fact that the Navy ap-
peared to be inyincible the day it beat
Princeton.