by Roy J. Snell
CHAPTER XVI ONE MINUTE TO PLAY
On the following Monday evening a meeting of the team was called by CoachDizney. When they gathered in the back room of the Blue Moon, the playersfound a blackboard hung upon the wall. Lines, circles, and arrows hadbeen drawn upon the board.
"Next Saturday, as you all know," the coach began, "we are to play PittTech. And I'm giving you fair warning that we are up against a stiffproposition. Like the other teams we've played, they're heavier than youare, ten or twelve pounds to the man. Worse than that they are fiends atbreaking up forward passes. I've looked up their record for this year.
"So," he paused, "so what shall we do?"
"New plays," suggested Stagger Weed, the center.
"That's it," the coach smiled. "Newer, bigger, and better plays andtrickier ones. Now here," he turned to the board, "here is a play that'sa humdinger if you boys have the brains and the nerve to carry itthrough."
"Yeah brains," Punch Dickman laughed, "we check them in the class roombefore we pass out."
"You better bring them along next Saturday," the coach snapped back.
"Now this," he began once more, "as you will see, as far as the linegoes, is a balanced formation. The right half is behind his own tackle,full-back behind right guard two yards from line of scrimmage and lefthalf three yards back behind center. Quarter is in regular position.
"Now," he drew in a long breath, "the ball goes back to quarter. Rightend and right tackle plunge ahead prepared to block any interference. Theright half and center drop in to fill these places, to prevent a breakthrough the line. The left half-back goes out about five steps directlyto the right, then turns and starts back.
"Are you following me?" He did not wait for a reply. "When the quartergets the ball he immediately faces left and the left end comes round likean end-around play. The quarter fakes giving him the ball but hugs ittightly to his noble breast. When the Pitt line has swung round after ourleft end, the quarter leaps to position and laterals the ball to OldKentucky."
"And Old Kentucky goes racing forward to a touchdown," Rabbit Jones theright half breathed. "How sweet!"
"It's a keen play," Red Dynamite exclaimed. "If we only know it wellenough."
"You're going to know it well enough!" the coach struck the table withhis fist. "That one and two or three more as hard to learn and as swellto play, if only you know how. Will you do it?"
"Yea--yea--yea--" they exclaimed in unison.
"We've just got to do it!" Stagger said with solemn emphasis.
"And now the next play," the coach wiped the board clean, drew morecircles then started explaining a second trick performance.
All that week, sweating and toiling, working the old beans overtime, theteam went through the business of acting out plays that in the beginningwere confusing but in the end as natural and clear as the bright light ofday.
More than once, during those gruelling hours as Johnny stood beside himwatching, the coach turned to him with a smile to exclaim low:
"Good boy, Johnny! You sure found us a player. I never saw anything likethe way that Kentucky boy takes in those new plays. Quick as a whip too!I suppose it's his Kentucky breeding."
"Sure is," Johnny grinned. "There are times down there in the mountainswhen there are just two classes of people. The quick and the dead. Thequick one gets his gun out from under his coat, the other just naturallygoes to the cemetery. Kentucky's grandfather was killed in a feud. Hisfather had a silk handkerchief drawn through his chest once, where abullet had gone first."
"Whew!" the coach whistled, "No wonder he's quick!"
Strangely enough, despite the coach's warning, apparently disregardingall their trick plays, Dynamite, who was captain and called the plays,started the game with a series of forward passes. The first two wereblocked. The third, almost a lateral pass, was good for a gain of fiveyards.
They punted, held the opposing team to a single first down, then, as theopposing team punted, began again with forward passes. The second ofthese was intercepted and, but for a lightning-like tackle by OldKentucky--which brought the spectators to their feet--might have resultedin disaster.
"What's the good?" Stagger grumbled. "Lose our shirt, first thing weknow." Dynamite made no reply.
Once again as they came into possession of the ball, the opposing teamfailed to gain. They tried for a field goal at forty yards. No good.
Hillcrest's ball on their own twenty-yard line. Once more a pass. Thistime, by great good fortune, it was received by Dynamite who blasted hisway down to the enemy's forty-five-yard line.
After that more passes. Scarcely was the Hillcrest team in a huddle whena certain half-back began shouting: "Pass! Pass!"
Then something strange and startling happened. The team lined up and, asthe ball was snapped, Kentucky, Artie Stark and Tony Blazes raced toreceiving positions. The enemy, eager to block or intercept a passswarmed after them.
But the ball was not passed. Just as Punch, the full-back, posed the ballfor the throw, like a blackbird after a cherry, Dynamite seized it frombehind, went sweeping away around left end which was all but deserted,bumped squarely into one lonesome Pitt player, sent him sprawling andromped away to a touchdown.
"Did you see that?" a letter-man of other days exclaimed. "The old Statueof Liberty play. And gloriously executed!"
"Glorious!" echoed his companions. "Say! These boys are making footballhistory! And I'm told that more than half of them are working their way.Quite wonderful!"
"Wonderful and terrible," was the other's reply. "We old grads ought atleast to furnish a training table, where they could eat without costduring the season anyway."
The score, after the kick, stood 7-0. The boys were jubilant. They wereplaying a supposedly superior team and beating them.
That was the end to forward passes. All the passes that had gone beforewere in preparation for this one grand stroke. Now it should be somethingelse.
The next play they tried was too difficult. Artie Stark was smeared for aloss of three yards. Worse still the ball bounced from his grasp and waspounced upon by the enemy.
After that, despite the team's heroic efforts to block them, their heavyweight enemies battered their way to a touchdown. The kick was good. Thefirst half ended a tie.
The Hillcrest team received the ball at the start of the second half.Punch Dickman carried it back to his own forty-yard line. When the teamwent into a huddle, Dynamite hissed two words that made them gasp:"Modified suicide!" This was all he said. It was enough. Every boy'snerves tingled as they lined up for the play. It was a strange formation,five men to right of center, one, the end, at the left. Kentucky was inhis usual position only two yards back. Rabbit Jones, the otherhalf-back, was thirty yards out from the end of the line. Center andfull-back crouched behind the line. Signals were to be called on thisplay.
Artie Stark was calling, "Six--ten--seven--ten--"
Dynamite was listening. Stagger Weed, big, a little too fat and veryobviously the center, moved uneasily, but no one noticed this. As thelast "ten" was called, Dynamite stepped in behind Stagger's great bulk.Rabbit Jones moved forward to the line of scrimmage. Someone from thebleachers roared, "Forward pass!" He was right, more right than he knew.
The eyes of the opposing back field were on Rabbit Jones."Six--seven--nine--eleven" Artie droned the numbers. The ball wassnapped. It went to Punch, the full-back. He leaped to the right, tookthree backward steps, then threw the ball high and far, not to the right,but to the left. Not to Rabbit Jones, but to Stagger, the center. Staggergathered the ball to his ample bosom then went lumbering like a freighttrain toward the distant goal. And why not? There was no one to stop him.
Then such a roar as went up from the Pitt side of the bleachers. How thePitt team crowded around the referee.
"He's their center!" they protested. "Their center! The center is noteligible to receive the ball."
"You're all wet," was the good natured refer
ee's reply. "When the ballwas snapped, there was no player at the left of center. That made himleft end. And so-o--"
He did not finish. There was no need. The disconsolate Pitt players,wandered back to the line.
The kick was good. "Fourteen to seven," Dynamite exulted. "If only we canhold it. And we must!"
They did not hold it, at least not for long. There is something aboutbeing totally deceived, that makes men see red. The Pitt men had beenthoroughly tricked. They saw red, very red indeed. In the next fiveminutes they took the ball from Hillcrest, made three first downs, threwa long forward pass, then went over the line. The kick, however, wentwild. They were still beaten unless--
The whistle blew for the end of the third quarter.
"We've got to hold 'em!" Dynamite muttered to Kentucky as they lay on thegrass. "We've just got to."
"Best way to do that is to better our lead," was Kentucky's courageousreply. "Remember how we went through left tackle?"
"Sure."
"Try it again."
Dynamite did try it again and with results he could not foresee.
The very first time Kentucky took the ball and Dynamite blasted him atrail, they went clean through the defense line of the enemy and wereaway. Then the fighting flight was on. Dynamite hit a husky opponent andsent him spinning. A second man appeared on the horizon. Dynamite tookhim on. He was big and powerful. Perhaps he fouled by holding, Dynamitedid not quite know. At any rate they went down in a heap and Kentucky,the slim, fast-footed half-back sped on.
A vast shadow loomed before him--the opposing team's safety man.Grinning, Kentucky sprang forward to offer him the ball.
Perhaps the giant had heard of this trick. Perhaps he was too dumb towant the ball. Whatever it may have been, he did not reach for the ball.Instead, he lammed straight at the slim youth. Kentucky was not quickenough. With an impact that could be heard all over the field, they wentdown in a heap. And Kentucky did not get up. Even when the referee tookthe ball from his hands, he did not stir. He was out for keeps.
"Poor Kentucky!" It was Jensie who spoke these words. She had seen it alland had come racing onto the field. It was she who directed the boys thatpicked him up, ever so gently, and carried him from the field.
Meantime the game went on. Football is the game of war. When a fewwounded have been carried from the field, a battle does not stop.
It was a grim battle that followed. No one blamed that big full-back, notreally, and yet--They must not win now. Pitt must not!
The crippled Hillcrest team battled hard but could not gain. They punted.Pitt carried the ball far into their territory. Two brilliantly executedpasses by Pitt men brought the ball to the Hillcrest ten-yard line. Oneline buck and the distance to a touchdown was cut to five yards, one moreline buck and a slim yard stood between Pitt and victory.
The Hillcrest bleachers were screaming: "Hold that line! Hold that line!Hold that line!" From the wall of blue on the opposite side came thewords of a song: "Forward! Forward! March against the foe!"
Little more than one moment to play with the ball on Hillcrest's one-yardline. It was a tense situation. Pitt went into a huddle, snapped out ofit quickly, crouched like tigers, shuffled uneasily for ten seconds,then--the ball sped. Dynamite followed it with his eye. "There! There!There it is!" His muscles registered a sensation that may never havereached his brain.
The Pitt full-back had the ball--that same giant whose hurdling force hadcrushed poor, slender Kentucky. Dynamite bore him no grudge--it was allin the game. And yet--"It's all for Old Kentucky!" he hissed as, straightas an arrow, he shot at the full-back. He struck him with the sudden,solid impact of a bullet. The ball leaped from the opponent's hands. Bysome strange chance, it shot straight into the air. It came curving downinto Artie Stark's arms. Too astonished to believe in his luck, Artiestarted streaking down the field. Only one opponent half-heartedlyfollowed. The moment was all for Artie. So too was the game for, a halfminute after the play, the whistle blew and Hillcrest's most exciting,most astonishing game was at an end.
