1910 Part 2

The year of 1910 was one of the most important years in the evolution of football if not the most significant in the sport’s history. We have examined many of the revisions to the rules that the joint sessions of the Intercollegiate and Conference Committees proposed and passed from that year in the past few editions of this series. The two committees would sit together and be known as the American Intercollegiate Football Rules Committee. This part of our series will conclude the revisions of 1910 and also give the reasons that necessitated the change in greater depth.

One change that we really have not touched upon very much was considered by some committee members as being long overdue. Walter Camp and J. B. Fine of Princeton had been proposing the distance of the line to gain should be increased from five yards to ten yards. Others such as P. J. Dashiell of Navy suggested the distance should be increased to eight yards. The recommendations from the previous years would be accepted in 1910 as the rule was revised to a offensive team earning a first down by advancing the ball ten yards and having three downs to do so. If the team in possession did not advance the ball ten yards in three downs then the opposition would gain possession of the ball at its position after the third down. 

This extra five yards needed to reach the line to gain was significant as it somewhat nullified the mass momentum and interlocked blocking plays that had been practiced. These plays generally only produced short gains which were great when you had a distance of a mere five yards to conquer in three tries. It was a much more daunting challenge at hand to use the same plays to go twice that distance in the same amount of attempts.

Tackling rules modified as well

Tackling techniques were tinkered with as well in the rash of rules revisions of 1910. Tackling a runner below the knees was illegal unless you were a defender positioned on the line of scrimmage. The terminals of this defensive line were the exceptions though as they were not allowed to hit a runner below the knees. The provision of this ruling that a defender who made his initial contact above the knees and then “slipped” to contact with the lower leg of the runner was acceptable and legal.

Another rule that altered defensive play was that of piling on. Players of both sides were now not permitted to pile on a downed runner. Previous years had seen this as an accepted practice, especially by defenders, but the action had caused many injuries to players. This practice also caused a lot of ill will by guys on the bottom of the pile to those who were jumping on top of the mass of humanity as you can well imagine.

Rules for runners

Up till now players who had possession of the ball had free reign almost to do just about anything they wanted. The rules makers decided to put some restrictions on the ball carriers as well to create a more level and fair playing field. Hurdling players was not permitted any more with out penalty. A later provision in 1910 gave an exception to this rule stating that a man on his knee or knees may be legally hurdled.

The runner was allowed to place his hand on a team mate, but the runner could not grasp his team mate in a effort to be pulled along by him. New rules to who could become a runner changed too. The offensive guard carrying the ball as a runner was illegal and would now be penalized five yards for such an action. The runner also would be penalized if he tried to extend his arms with the ball after the play had been declared dead.

Runners had restrictions to when and where they could kick from too. A kick from scrimmage was only legal if it were kicked from a point five or more yards behind the line of scrimmage. This all but ended the rugby style practice of kicking a field goal while running down the field.

The reasons for change

The main reasons for this plethora of changes can be best summed up by looking at the statistics of the 1909 season. There were a barrage of deaths and serious injuries especially at the defensive tackle position. The reason for this position being victimized was that the forward pass forced the defensive backs to play further down field and not up with the tackles to take some of the burden of run support. The steps to reduce these injuries were ridding the mass momentum plays by requiring seven men on the line of scrimmage so that the big guys could not get a good head of steam before contacting the defensive line opponents. The line to gain extension to ten yards also assisted the riddance of the menace of the mass momentum blocking. To counter the loss of offensive fire power the scales were balanced by easing restrictions on the forward pass.

The 1910 Season

Harvard and Pitsburgh were both retroactively said to tbe the national champs of college football. Harvard had a stellar 8-0-1 record. Percy Haughton coached the Crimson to their outstanding 1910 season with the scoreless tie in the final game of the season at Yale. Harvard did not have one point scored on them as they knocked off teams such as Brown, Army, Cornell and Dartmouth.

Meanwhile Coach Joe Thompson led the Pitt eleven to a perfect 9-0 mark and the Panthers did not have even one point scored upon them playing mostly home games against teams from Washington and Jefferson, Carnegie Tech and PennState among others.

At the Pro level it was the Shelby Blues football team that won the Ohio State title, an accomplishment in that era as being the the top professional team.

The game was really taking the form of what it is in today’s era, but there was still some tweaking to do. Please look back soon for the Part 29 of this series when our story continues.

The picture in the banner above is courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons website of the Harvard Crimson football team depicted on a "premium" Murad cigarette card. It was drawn by an unknown artist