The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-10-06

Canada and Great Britain Dy NOTtH American Newspaper Alliance for The Age-Herald. All rights reserved)
 AS TOLD BY J. w. HEISMAN Head Coach, Rice Institute; Former Coach of Georgia Tech and Univer-
 sity of Pennsylvania
 The season hadn't gone far before almost every follower of our team was asking why I wouldn't use Everett reg ularly and asking the question out loud. Well, it was justified. As far as l was concerned, I felt like l always wanted to apologize to the boy for not assigning him as a first string man.
 But he understood the situation per- fectly. Moreover, all the applause and hero worship he soon received didn't afefct him in the slightest. He had shown the stuff of which he was made by the mere fact of his entering Geor- gia Tech. He couldn't have picked a school with a harder curriculum if he had searched the whole south. But he was fine student and fine boy. What he was called upon to do he did and did cheerfully. He took good or bad with smile and he fitted himself into the system perfectly.
 Grew Better
 As the season progressed he grew better and better. A flesh on his feet, he could dodge and stiff-arm an oppon- ent with anybody. Moreover he had a trick of throwing his hips to left or right that spilled many taekler. He was a splendid receiver of forward passes, taking the ball over his head without turning while running at full speed. He was a sure tackler on de- fense.
 Above all he was a quick thinker and extraordinarily fast in finding an opening. A stunt he pulled in the University of Georgia. game illustrates his method-which was to keep the ene- my guessing. On one play he swept around right end with the most per fest interference imaginable. Then, just as he and his protectors circled end, he suddenly deserted them, cut in, to his left, ran right through through a mess of linemen and dashed on to a touchdown.
 Left Interference
 "Boy, why did you quit your inter- terence?" asked him after the game.
 "Shucks, saw an opening and knew could get through it," he replied. T suspected those fellows would all be playing for our interference and thought it would pay to puzzle them" We'll, November 25 and the game with Apburn finally arrived. The bat. tle was staged at Atlanta and huge crowd was on hand. It witnessed a struggle which was almost featureless down to the closing minutes of play. The two elevens were evenly matched. Play was almost entirely between the thirty-yard lines. Several times when Georgia Tech man seemed on his way to a touchdown, this big "Babe" Taylor, who was worth three ordinary men, would smash into the scene and stop him. With only a few minutes to go, the score stood nothing to nothing.
 Then The Big Chance Came
 We were following our usual plan. Everett Strupper was held in reserve, waiting for the moment to arrive when he could deliver telling bow. But it seemed as though it never would come.
 "When are you going to put Strup- per in?" the Georgia Tech crowd was yelling at me however, I held fast to my plan, and let the impression get out that he was hurt. Word came back from the Auburn side that this was accepted as 1acC there.
 Time Had Arrived
 Then, suddenly, the hour for action arrived. Spencer, our fullback, with the ball on our 35-yard line, got off high kick which was fumbled by the Au- burn safety man. Our quarterback, Morrison, tearing down the field, fell on the ball on Auburns 35-yard line. This was the opportunity for which I had been waiting. Before the teams could line up 1 sent Strupper in to relieve Captain Fielder at left half. He carried instructions to Morrison to use the new spread" formation. It was to be executed as follows
 Strupper To Win
 First, call on Fullback Spencer and Right Half Johnson to hit the line then, on fourth down, if Georgia Tech hadn't made its distance, Strupper was to run with the ball.
 Second, if Spencer and Johnson made the desired gains, keep right on using them. The chances would be that Au- burn, expecting that Strupper would carry the ball, would be playing for him, and would be fooled
 Unfortunately, on the first fOrma- tion, our center made a mistake and snapped the ball to Strupper. Our line men charged the wrong way, allowing a flock of Auburn men to cut right down on Everett.
 Looked Like Loss
 Looks like a ten-yard loss" I said gloomily to myself. But it was here that the boy showed just how good he was. He stood still for a period that seemed intending, watching those Au- burn boys bear down upon him. Then, just as the first man dived for him, he got into action. With wonder ful burst of speed, he eluded the whole crew, dashed toward the side line and made a 12-yard gain before he was forced out of bounds.
 That was fine strategy for the ball was brought 15 yards into the field. It was first down on Auburn's 23-yard line.
 Quarter Morrison now employed the Spread" formation as had been in- tended. But after Johnson hit the line for a two-yard gain and Spencer for one yard, Johnson was stopped dead on the next play. Again it was up 10 Strupper.
 Struper's Great Open-Field Run
 Without this lad, it is hard to tell what might have happened to the spread" With hiIh-well, in the sue ceeding moments the crowd was treated to an unparalleled exhibition of open field running Bear in mind that the end of the battle was less than a min ute away. Everything depended upon this one play. It was thriller.
 Auburn deployed their linemen to counter ours, each standing five yards apart. Georgia Techs center snapped the ball direct to Strupper. Everett dashed for the hol ebetween center and right guard There he saw that the Auburn left guard, moving oyer