The Nevada Wolfpack’s Early Football History

The University of Nevada, Reno launched its football program in the autumn of 1896, when the institution was still known as Nevada State University. Coached by Frank Taylor, the team played its inaugural game on October 24, 1896, against a town squad from Wadsworth, Nevada. Playing on Evans Field in Reno, Nevada earned a dominant 30–0 victory. However, the fledgling program faced harsh early realities against established West Coast competition, dropping its remaining two games that season by lopsided scores to Belmont Academy and the California junior varsity squad.

During these foundational decades, the program experienced frequent turnover and interruptions, including a nine-year hiatus from 1906 to 1914 when the school played rugby instead, and a suspension in 1918 due to World War I. Despite the instability, several influential coaches shaped the program’s early identity. Allen Steckle (1901–1903) helped legitimize the team on the regional stage, highlighted by a landmark 1903 upset over the University of California. Later, Ray Courtright (1919–1923) stabilized the program post-war, compiling a strong 26–13–7 record, while Buck Shaw (1925–1928) began his coaching career in Reno before eventually leading the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers and Philadelphia Eagles.

In its earliest years, Nevada’s athletic teams were informally called the “Sagebrushers” or “Sage Hens,” a nod to the state flower. By 1922, student newspaper editor Leslie “Alkali” Bruce argued in The U. of N. Sagebrush that “Sagebrushers” was far too clunky for newspaper headlines. Bruce proposed “Wolves,” praising the native silver-grey desert wolf for its endurance and relentless fighting spirit. Students officially adopted the nickname in 1923, which naturally evolved into the “Wolf Pack”—always spelled as two words for Nevada athletics.

This newly christened Wolf Pack produced standout talent that put Reno on the national map. Early stars included two-way players and regional standouts of the 1920s, paving the way for Nevada’s first true national superstar in the early 1940s: fullback and linebacker Marion Motley. Motley starred for the Wolf Pack before breaking pro football’s modern color barrier and earning induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, cementing the legacy of a program born on a dusty Reno field in 1896.