Penn State at Navy

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  Evening capital, Annapolis, Md., November 2, 1903, page 1

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  NAVY PLAYS Bad BALL. The Pennsylvania State College Eleven Victorious BY Heavy Score. Football enthusiasts at the Naval | Academy are busy trying TO account for the lamentable slump of the mid | dies IN the game against Pennsylvania State College last Saturday afternoon. 1t was generally expected that the contest would be easy” and the coaches partook of this rosy view of | the situation TO such an extent rs to send ON the field n lot of men who had scarcely played together once during the season. There may be reasons for regarding Pennsylvania State College rs deli. cate morsel for the local football appetite, but these reasons are not apparent ON the surface. For the past half dozen years or more the Pennsylvanians have had reputation for put ting up sturdy fight against the best eleyens in the East and while they have not, perhaps, met with brilliant success, they have always proved to be formidable. Ii required very few minutes of play TO show that the sailor boys We’re face TO face with n very serious proposition. On the very first kick-o by Navy the ball was caught by Forkman, States fullback, and, by clever inter ference and nimble lodging, returned it TO the center of the field From this point, after n fairly equal exchange of punts, the ball was given TO Captain Whitworth who, with the as sistance of nearly every member of his team, circled the Navy’s right wing and scored the first touchdown, after running nearly half the length of field. Forkman kicked the goal This event occurred after about five min utes of play, and, as result, the three substitute backs, who had started the game for Navy–Dicker, Dowell and Keene, were soon withdrawn in favor of Strassburger, Root and Halsey. After the next kickoff, State again forced the fighting, and advanced steadily until within about twenty two yards of the Navy goal. Here the middies braced creditably and prob ably would have held for four downs, had not their opponents elected to try for goal from field. The attempt was beautifully successful, and the score was State, IL Navy, 0. s-.~. In the second half, State, though handicapped by a heavy penalty Of | twenty yards, was enabled TO score with the kind assistance of some eyre | gious blunders on the part of their | opponents. On one occasion, after Navy had been downed twice without | gain, Needham, who had been sent in | as quarter, attempted a quarter back run. 1t was feeble and futile effort, and the runner was pinned for loss of about thirteen yards. A forward pass then gave the ball TO State on Navy’s 15-yard line, from which point a few hard plunges by the backs car ried the ball over the line. Score, State, II; Navy, 0. Near the close of the half, and being unable to gain, Gross passed to Hal sey for kick. Halsey is fairly tall | youngster, but the ball went yards over his head, forcing him to run back near the goal line. He made mas terly attempt to recover and punt out, but State got the ball, and would | probably have scored again, but for q second penalty of twenty yards for some offense, visible only to the lynx eyed umpire. An unusually large and sympathetic assemblage was present, and a victory | by the middies would have been ex- ceedingly popular. 1t was not to be, however, and is not likely to be, until some material change takes place in the style of the Midshipmen’s play. 1t is serious question whether such change can be effected in time Ia enable the team to put up an even fight against West Point. 1t is hard to say exactly where the admitted trouble lies. The coaches come here with excellent traditions, but with no | great regulations. The middies, of course, have but limited time for practice, and they are not, on the average, as old nor matured as their civilian opponents. What they appear to lack most, however, is what should most easily be supplied concerted action, aggressiveness and “dash. -

Public-domain newspapers from the Library of Congress’s Chronicling America, found through the American Stories dataset (Dell and Harvard, CC BY 4.0). The text is the machine reading of the page, mistakes and all.

Penn State leads 19–⁠17–⁠1 in 37 meetings, counting the 30 since this game.