page_title: Tom Davies (American football)
section_title: Playing career
hierarchical_section_title: Tom Davies (American football) / Playing career
caption_attribution_description: English: Pitt's Tommy Davies runs during the 1918 game against Georgia Tech. Pitt beat the undefeated and unscored upon Tech team and claimed that season's national championship.
context_page_description: Thomas J. Davies was an American football player and coach. He played as a halfback at the University of Pittsburgh and was a consensus All-American in 1918 and 1920. After retiring as a player, Davies worked as a football coach for the next 26 years, including stints at the University of Pennsylvania, Geneva College, Allegheny College, the University of Rochester, the Carnegie Institute of Technology, the University of Scranton, and Western Reserve University. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a player in 1970.
context_section_description: Davies was a native of Gas City, Indiana.  He moved to Washington, Pennsylvania when he was 11 years old.  Davies played high school football at Aliquippa High School in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, and at Kiski Preparatory School in Saltsburg, Pennsylvania.  Davies was working in a Washington factory when he got the chance
  to play football at Kiski.  A friend refused to accept a football scholarship there unless Davies went along.
  Davies enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh where he played four seasons (1918–1921) of football under coach Glenn Scobey "Pop" Warner.  Davies played in 31 games for the Pittsburgh Panthers and averaged 150 yards per game over his four-year career.  He was selected as a first-team All-American in his freshman season of 1918 and again as a junior in 1920.  As a freshman in 1918, Davies weighed only 142 pounds.  In his first carry for Pitt, he ran for 13 yards against Washington & Jefferson—then a national power.  Three plays later, he ran for 38 yards, "setting the pace for a stellar playing career."
  
  Davies helped Pitt to an undefeated season and a national championship in 1918, as he led the team in rushing, passing and receiving.  He led Pitt in all-purpose yards all four years that he played.  In a 1918 game against Georgia Tech, the freshman Davies accounted for five touchdowns—running 50 yards for a touchdown, returning two punts for touchdowns (a 60-yard and a 50-yard return), and passing for two more touchdowns.  After watching Davies run back a kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown in 1918, one writer noted:
  "When Brother Tom Davies caught the kickoff on the ten-yard line at Franklin Field in Philadelphia one Saturday in November, we saw the prettiest piece of open field work not off at an angle, Tommie ran the length since the days of Jim Thorpe.  On a bee line of the gridiron, and in so doing he personally took care of seven men!  Then just for fun he added two more.  The papers said, ‘Tom Davies Beats Penn.’  It has been the same against Syracuse, Lafayette and Georgia Tech.  And now Pitt is counting on another All-American."
  As a junior in 1920, Davies led Pitt to another big win over the University of Pennsylvania.  In what some called Davies’ finest game, he threw a touchdown pass, ran 80 yards for a touchdown, returned a kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown and returned an interception 60 yards for a touchdown.
  Also in 1920, he led Pitt to a 35–0 win over Syracuse, as he rushed for 255 yards and scored 16 points in only three quarters of play.
  In December 1920, Davies was elected by his teammates to be captain of Pitt's 1921 football team.  Davies was selected as team captain at a team banquet at which the entire team gave Davies “a thunderous cheer.”  The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that Davies was so affected by the demonstration that he stammered only a few words of appreciation and left the hall saying, “I’m going to phone my mother and tell her all about it.”
  Davies continues to rank among Pitt's all-time leaders in scoring with 181 points and all-purpose yards with 3,931 yards.  He was survived by his wife and two daughters.
caption: Pitt's Tommy Davies runs against undefeated and unscored upon Georgia Tech in a 1918 game at Forbes Field. Pitt won the game 32–0 and is considered by many to be that season's national champion.
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