The Winslow mail., 1925-12-11
LAST GRID GAME
OF SEASON WON
BY APPRENTICES
By CHARLES ERICKSON


The local gridiron season closed
last Sunday, and, under clear
blue sky and the luke warm rays
of sunshine, the largest crowd OF
all witnessed a keen game of foot
ball at the city park stadium, when
the fast Needles town team suffer
ed a Is to 0 defeat at the hands
of our excellent Santa Fe appren-
tice eleven.
The Meteor City can well be
proud OF the splendid showing made
by the local apprentice team for
the past season. Despite not hav
ing anybody to take the interest or
responsibility of coaching them,
they practiced faithfully and went
into every game full of real red
blooded American fight to the fin
ish' determination to win if pos
sible. Everyone of these boys de-
serves a great deal of credit and
more especially Dan Hitchcock and
Herman Thornton, who not only
have wonderful athletic ability,
but also the spirit of clean sports
manship. 1t was they who organiz-
ed, trained and, in railroad slang,
were the brains of the team that
won the gridirOn championship of
the coast lines and fought hard
for the system high honor. While
I'm raving along here | might say
that these two, together with Jack
Pullins, are already getting in
shape for the coming basketball
season
The "pigskin" contest last Sun
day was indeed worth seeing as
you will doubtless conceive when
l say that all of the scores were
made in the last quarter of the
game.
The visitors won the toss-up and
elected to receive, so Hitchcock
kicked off and the battle was on.
The ball was booted, carried and
passed from one 20 yard line to
the other, the entire first half of
the game, with brilliant playing by
both teams. The splendid tackling
and all around playing by Harry
kemmis, a couple of nice fake end
around plays by Bobby Pacheco,
wonderful yardage gains by Her.
man and Paul (Bullet) Thornton,
and Ed Janeway, keen, live bucks
and forward passing by Dan Hitch
cock, hard fighting linemen and
neat center playing by Larry Searle
featured for Winslow, while the ex
oeptionally fast work Of A. Clark
on Needles right end, who was
sure there" on the receiving end
when it came to completing passes,
the fine tackling of c. Fullerson
and the "cleancut" style of playing
exhibited by the whole Needles
team was greatly admired by the
local fans.
In the second quarter Dan Hitch
cock received an injury to his
"game" ankle and everyone on the
s'delines groaned. However, he
was replaced by Melvin Rushing,
one of the best players in the state
who indeed was too much OF sub
stitute for the "mild-climate" boys
to handle 1t was a treat to
watch Rushing plow straight thru
the line for a 5, 10 or 20 yard
gain.
Que outstanding and rather sur
prising fact of the game was that
Winslow fell away below par in
their aerial work as they were able
to complete only four out of eleven
attempts, while Needles made seven
out of ten passes.
The following plays took place
in the fourth quarter:
Needles defending the west goal
with WinsloW in possession of the
ball on the 2S yard line. Winslow
gained ten yards via Mel Rushing
through off tackle and Bullet
Thornton and Janeway on left and
light end runs.
Needles held Winslow on the fif-
teen yard line for three downs. On
fourth down quarterback Herman
Thornton made a perfect 25 yard
pass over the goal line to Harry
Kemmis for Winslow's first touch
down.
The crowd just simply went
wild. Winslow failed to convert.
Hitchcock again entered the game
replacing Janeway. Bullet Thorn
ton next made beautiful 45 yard
kick and after fumbling, the Nee
dies made couple line bucks and
then attempted long pass which
Hitchcock intercepted and made a
thrilling dash and 20 yard gain.
Taking the Californians by sur
prise, Mel Rushing carried the
"pigSkin" Is yards for touchdown
off right tackle. Rushing failed to
convert by drop kick.
The Blonde headed Thornton boy
repeated his long kick off and this
t me Needles got back to the 80
yard line, but was forced to punt
ION fourth down WinSlOw recover
ed on their 40 yard line and by a
series of end runs, line lucks and
a forward pass, they worked up to