Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-12-28

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to get together for group discuss
Collegiate Athletic Association TAX
lens of intercollegiate athletics.
State will be represented.
Most colorful Of the meetings Is that
of the coaches, largely because OF the
prominence of the sport they repre-
sent. Banded in an organization Of
| ficially known as the American Foot
Ball Coaches Association, they have
rather heavy program, in which almost
every phase of foot ball is certain to
come in for some discussion. Usually
though, it is the byplay of the coaches
meetings in which greatest interest Is
taken. Talks regarding arrangements
for new alignments on the gridiron,
private comparisons of the value OF
this coach with that coach, and who
will get the job in that school or an
other school and so on.
Rules Sessions Lively.
Officially the coaches take greatest
interest in the discussion of rules and
usually some rather acrimonious re-
marks are passed.
Some three or four years ago, when
the shift began to get the attention of
the rules committee and efforts to curb
it we're becoming more pronounced, one
of the committees which met to work
out some compromise had about as
| stormy a session as possible without COM
ing to actual blows. Those coaches that
used the shift and those that did not
expressed opinions of one another's pro-
fessional capacity that to one not in
terested in foot ball would have been
extremely amusing.
OF late years, the coaches have
adopted a custom of having four out
standing members of their professions
give talks on highly technical phases of
play and these talks have been very
interesting and valuable, especially to
the coaches just out of college.
One of the talks tomorrow is to be
on End Play" and others will take
up different foot ball problems. Also
at the end of each talk the coaches are
free to ask such questions as they de-
sire.
Many Ideas About Rules.
The question of changes in the rules
Is sure to come in for a good deal of
overhauling. Coaches everywhere have
more ideas about rules. although very
few of them ever know fully the code,
than the dyed-in-the-wool agitator
knows about what is wrong with the
Government. If -hundredth part of
the ideas expressed in the coaches
meetings ever got into the rule book
foot ball would become the greatest
hodgepodge of sportdom Out of the
meetings, notwithstanding all the varied
suggestions that are offered, there
usually come some worthwhile thought
for the rules committee of the N. c.
A. A. to work over and adopt or not, as
the committee sees fit.
Three sessions make up the annual
coaches meeting. The morning session
Is given over to addresses and reports
the afternoon session to general dis
cuSS1ons, and the night to banquet
which has become famous for its Brown
Derby" stories. Annually the teller OF
the funniest story receives a gift of a
brown derby That these stories never
reach the public, although some of them
really are funny, is no fault of the
coaches. The newspapers Just can't
print them. However, some of the So
called humorous publications in the COL
leges might find these banquets a fruit
full field for material.
Health Problems Studied.
The meetings Tuesday are conducted
by those organization that have in keep
ing not solely the development OF foot
ball or any other intercollegiate sport,
but the recreational activities and
health programs of entire student bodies
The directors of physical education get
together to work out their programs so
that they may take advantage of what
has been accomplished in the whole
field or in any part of it. The Student
Health Association has some real prob
lens before it in seeking ways best to
look after the physical welfare of the
hundreds Of thousands of students for
which 1t must work out programs, be-
cause the Student Health Association is
nothing more or less than an organiza-
ton of the individuals in the country
who have charge of health work In the
colleges and schools.
The National Collegiate Athletic As
ISOLATION is made up of nearly all the
colleges in the country either as direct
member or through Affiliations as men,
bers of conferences. Representatives of
these colleges from every corner of the
land get together once each year to dis
sect the animal known as intercollegiate
athletics, try to find and eliminate any
cancerous tissue, so that the animal may
be sent forth as sound as possible for
another year Of activity.
Association Saved Foot Ball.
Out of the National Collegiate Asso-
citation meetings sometimes come good
stories. This professor, or that coll
! lege president, gets up and lambaStS
college athletics generally, and foot ball
| in particular, and they get a two-or-
three bank head as the leading article
on the sports page the next day. Then
everybody goes home and college ath-
letics and foot ball in particular, gets
about rs per cent of the sports page
for the remaining 299 days of the
scholastic year and a good representa-
ton the remaining time.
This, of course, Is just little face
tious, because a matter of fact, the Ma
has been one of the biggest factors,
perhaps the biggest, in putting inter-
collegiate athletics on a higher plane.
In 1906 it practically saved foot ball
and since that time has been largely
responsible for the onward march of
sports in the college field. The N. G.
A. A. has just won a fight 1t has been
carrying on for years to get better rep
resentation in the Olympic Association
and thereby to insure better conditions
for American athletes in the Olympic
| games.
If an outsider, one who knows little
of the inside workings of intercol-
legiate athletics, were to sit In on all
the meetings here for the next three
days he probably would leave wonder
ing what it is all about However, as
farfetched as are some of the sugges-
tions, as vitriolic as is some of the
criticism, and as much small politics
| as are some of the situations that de-
meetings usually are evolved worthwhile
thoughts that make progress possible
and rapid.