Football Finale

For all major statistical purposes, the 1937 college football season shut up shop last week. Except in the Southwest Conference, where the season had another week to run before its champion could be determined, the major conferences were already hailing their heroes. In the Pacific Conference, California was undisputed champion with six victories and one tie (with Washington), assured of playing in the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day. In the Western Conference (Big Ten), Minnesota was champion with five victories and no ties or defeats but, having been beaten twice by non-conference opponents (Nebraska and Notre Dame) its season's slate was far from clean. In the Big Six, Nebraska just nosed out Oklahoma for top ranking. Two other conference champions were crowned last week in notable games:

Southeastern Conference. At Nashville, Tenn., a Vanderbilt team which had been defeated only once this season (by Georgia Tech) and had defeated such noteworthy teams as Southern Methodist, Louisiana State and Tennessee, romped onto the field to play unbeaten, untied Alabama. As the game drew to a close, it looked as if Vanderbilt and Alabama would each end the season with one defeat: the score stood 7-to-6 in Vanderbilt's favor. Then Alabama's portly Coach Thomas waved Haywood ("Sandy") Sanford, 200-lb. sophomore, into the game. The ball lay on Vanderbilt's 14-yd. line over at the edge of the field, in Alabama's possession and in imminent danger of being lost on downs. Sandy Sanford stepped back and at a 45-degree angle booted a place-kick true between the goal posts. Score: Alabama 9, Vanderbilt 7.

Rocky Mountain Conference. Not since 1924 has the University of Colorado been undisputed champion of its conference, but last week when undefeated Colorado lined up against the University of Denver no one doubted that it would be so this year. Led by a young quarterback, Byron ("Whizzer") White, who like his brother Sam two years ago is not only a great player but an honor student, president of the student council and leading candidate for a Rhodes scholarship, Colorado had romped over all its opponents. The question was whether Whizzer White would regain from Sid White (no relation) of Brooklyn the national scoring lead among college footballers. When the Colorado-Denver game began, Sid was ahead of Whizzer 113-to-100. This season Whizzer had averaged a gain of more than seven yards every time he carried the ball, had averaged 45 yards with his punts, had completed nearly half the forward passes he had thrown, and Denver was prepared to bottle him up. But Denver's preparations did no good. He scored three touchdowns, threw passes that led to two more, kicked four points-after-touchdown, ran his season's scoring record to 122 points. Score of the day: Colorado 34, Denver 7.

Other Final Games:

P: No football conference means more to its followers than the one-game-a-year conference of West Point and Annapolis. In Philadelphia before a rain-soaked crowd of 102,000,* Army and Navy met in a game that had no brilliance other than their rivalry. In the first period, two clever passes carried Army to Navy's 2-yd. line, and Halfback Jim Craig smashed over for a touchdown. For the next three periods, the most striking part of the spectacle was rain drenching 22 muddy players, sloshing on a slimy field. Score: Army 6, Navy 0.

P: Stanford, runner-up in the Pacific Coast conference, caught a tartar, as the supposedly weak Columbia team held them to a 0-to-0 tie in New York City.

P: Playing in the mud at Durham against Pittsburgh's mighty team, Duke's Honey Hackney fumbled two punts. The first, at the end of the first quarter, led to Pitt's Captain Frank Souchak kicking a field goal. The second, four minutes later, led to Dick Cassiano scoring a Pittsburgh touchdown. Final score: Pittsburgh 10, Duke 0. Pittsburgh finished its season undefeated, tied only by Fordham. In last week's Associated Press sportswriters' poll for the Team of the Year, 29 of the 33 votes were cast for Pittsburgh. Next were California, Fordham and Alabama.

P: In South Bend, with two minutes left to play, Notre Dame found itself tied with Southern California, 6-to-6 and stranded on its own 17-yd. line. Suddenly Fullback Mario Tonelli cut loose for 70 yards to Southern California's 13-yd. line. Two plays later Fullback Tonelli, still breathless, cracked over the goal line to hand Notre Dame a 13-to-6 victory.

P: In Morgan College's new stadium at Baltimore, 12,000 enthusiastic spectators watched Morgan play Virginia State for the championship of the Colored Intercollegiate Athletic Association. Morgan, undefeated in six years (48 games), rose up in its Ethiopian might, scored touchdowns in the first, second and fourth periods, triumphed 21-to-6.

* Largest football crowd of the year (120,000) gathered in Chicago's Soldier Field last week to watch Austin High School play Leo High School, lured by the attractions of highly publicized Bill de Correvont, Austin halfback, who helped his team win by scoring three touchdowns, to bring his season's total to 33 touchdowns, 204 points.

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