Get In There & Fight

> Will there be another Tom Harmon?

> Can Stanford, robbed of two of the three quick-breaking backs that made the tricky T formation click, march into the Rose Bowl again this year?

> Who can beat Minnesota?

> Will the new unlimited-substitution rule mean coach v. coach rather than team v. team?

These are some of the posers with which the 1941 college football season opens.

The game itself is not quite the same as last year. Most controversial change is a new rule permitting a coach to send on to the field any substitutes he wishes at any time (heretofore a player could not be taken out and put back during the same quarter). Opinions on the consequences of this change:

Coach Tuss McLaughry, long of Brown, this year Dartmouth: "It will be like a hockey game--running the big men in and out, developing an offensive team and another defensive team."

Coach Bernie Bierman of Minnesota: "It will not mean two different teams. Rarely do college teams have enough men to do that."

Fordham's Jim Crowley: "A coach will now be able to rest his players at intervals and shuttle specialists in and out of the game."

Originally recommended to allow small squads to nurse their strength, the new ruling may do just the opposite: make weak teams weaker, strong teams stronger. It will certainly encourage sideline generalship. In the Fordham-Southern Methodist game last week, there were 136 substitutions.

Two other rule changes this season: 1) an incomplete fourth-down pass into the end zone is no longer declared a touchback (ball will go to the opposition at point of last scrimmage instead of the 20-yd. line); 2) a kicked ball, touched first by the kicking team within the opposition's loyd. line, is now a touchback.

Midwest. Football's main tent this year is the Midwest. Experts have picked Minnesota for the team of the year; Indiana's Billy Hillenbrand for the rookie of the year, Notre Dame's Frank Leahy for the coach of the year.

Last year Minnesota won the Big Ten Conference and (according to an Associated Press poll) the mythical U.S. championship. This year's team should be as good or better. With the University of Washington already out of the way (14-to-6, last fortnight), Minnesota has seven more to go: Illinois, Pittsburgh, Michigan. Northwestern, Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin.

Last week nearly every section of the U.S. claimed "another Tom Harmon." Most touted is Indiana University's Billy Hillenbrand, a 190-lb. sophomore from Evansville, Ind. To get anywhere, the Hoosiers will need more than Hillenbrand's swivel hips. Last fortnight they lost to Detroit (14-to-7), last week to Notre Dame (19-to-6).

The Coach's bench at Notre Dame, hallowed by the great Rockne's buttprints, is the toughest spot in U.S. football. On it this season is 33-year-old Frank Leahy, who quit Boston College at the chance to coach at Notre Dame (his alma mater) when Elmer Layden last winter resigned to become tsar of the professional National Football League. Besides a traditionally tough schedule, brave Coach Leahy will be further handicapped by his resolve to overthrow the system of a successful predecessor, substituting stuff that may or may not work with the material at hand. But so great is young Leahy's reputation (only two defeats in 22 games as head coach at B.C.), rival coaches expect that this year's Notre Dame team will be among the country's top ten.

East. Fordham is the East's outstanding team. Last year the Rams pushed their way into the Cotton Bowl (where they lost to Texas A. & M. 12-to-13). This year boasting a Panzer division of backs--Noble, Blumenstock, Filipowicz, Pieculewicz, Andrejco, Cheverko, Ososki and big, blond Benny Babula--Fordham hopes to smash its way into the Rose Bowl, goal of every bowl-minded U.S. college. Last week, in the No. 1 intersectional game of the week, Fordham completed the first stage of its campaign with a 16-to-10 victory over Southern Methodist. Future Fordham opponents: North Carolina, West Virginia, Texas Christian, Purdue, Pittsburgh, St. Mary's, N.Y.U.

Beside Fordham, most Eastern teams look amateur. Most promising of the lot are Navy and Colgate. Cornell, having lost 21 of the bolts that kept the Big Red machine rolling for the past two years, is not even sure that it can beat Harvard (next week) or Yale (Nov. 8).

West. On the Pacific Coast, every college is out to trip Stanford, favorite to Notre Dame Halfback Jack Warner. win the Conference title again this year. Backs Hugh Gallarneau and Norman Standlee have graduated to professional football; Pete Kmetovic is the only ball-carrying regular left over. But Quarterback Frankie Albert, the blithe, brilliant southpaw who is the key man of Stanford's devastating T formation, will still handle the ball-carriers, whoever they may be.

To retain their title, this year's Indians must be even better than last year's. Rival coaches, with ample time to have studied slow-motion pictures of Stanford's 1940 games, should be better prepared to fathom Coach Clark Shaughnessy's tricks. So far, Oregon and U.C.L.A. have failed to do so. Last week against U.C.L.A., Shaughnessy used 48 substitutes, watched his tribe tomahawk the Bruins 33-to-0, Stanford's twelfth victory in a row. One team that may stop Stanford is Washington, bent on revenge for last year's defeat (its only conference defeat of the season).

South. Last week Duke swamped Tennessee, 19-to-0. No one was surprised. Tennessee, unconquered by any regular-season opponent during the past three years, has this year lost 13 lettermen as well as its supereminent coach, Major Bob Neyland, U.S.A. If Duke can get by Colgate, Pitt and Georgia Tech on successive Saturdays, Wallace Wade's Blue Devils may be well on the way toward their second trip to the Rose Bowl in four years.

Other Southern standouts: Mississippi State, pre-season dark horse which trampled Alabama last week (14-to-0) for its second Southeastern Conference victory; and University of Texas, led by triple-threat Pete Layden, one of this year's most versatile backs. Last week Texas trounced Louisiana State, 34-to-0.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.