Bert Wilson on the Gridiron Part 6

"Buck up, fellows, for heaven's sake," urged Bert. "We mustn't let these Army men outplay us. What'll the boys at home think of us? They've already got the bulletin of this quarter, and they're wondering what on earth is the matter with us. Get a move on now and show them some real football. Just go in and eat them up."

This was an eminently desirable thing from the Blue standpoint, but the cadets refused to subscribe to such a cannibal programme. They were not ready to glut anybody's appet.i.te. On the contrary, their own was whetted by their st.u.r.dy resistance so far, and their ambition was rapidly growing. They had really not had much idea of winning at the outset. It would have been almost more than they dared to hope to hold these doughty warriors to a tie. Failing that, they hoped possibly to cross the enemy's goal line for at least one score or perhaps more. But their wildest hopes had hardly soared so high as to count on actual victory.

Now, however, that they had locked horns with their adversaries and found to their delight and surprise that they were holding them on even terms, they were fired with a mighty determination to win.

Nor did the second quarter dim their hopes. The Blues had not yet found themselves. There was a cog missing somewhere in the machinery.

Technically, their playing was not open to much adverse criticism. Their pa.s.sing was accurate and their tackling fair, but they were too mechanical and automatic. They needed something to wake them up.

That something came more quickly than any one expected. Out of a scrimmage on the forty yard line of the Army, a flying figure emerged, with the ball tucked under his arm. Twisting, dodging, ducking, he threaded his way through the field, bowling over Caldwell, eluding Axtell's outstretched arms and bearing down upon the Blue goal. As he neared Bert, who was running in a diagonal line to head him off, he swerved sharply to the right in an attempt to pa.s.s this last obstacle between him and a touchdown. But in a twinkling Bert had launched himself against him, gauging the distance unerringly, and they both came heavily to the ground on the Blue's ten yard line.

It was the Army's ball with only ten yards to go! The stands went frantic as the teams lined up for a last desperate trial of strength.

The Blues were thoroughly awake now. All their apathy was gone at this moment of deadly peril, and they swore to themselves to hold that precious ten yards if they died in doing it.

The jubilant Army men called on McAlpin, their giant fullback, to buck the line. He went into it like a maddened bull, but d.i.c.k at center refused to give an inch. He tried again at left and made two yards through Ellis. A hole made by his guards between Axtell and Martin yielded three more. Five yards yet to go and only one chance left! Once more he braced and hurled himself savagely against the right side of the line. But Bert was crouching there in readiness, his six feet of bone and muscle instinct with power and resolution. He went into McAlpin like a human pile driver, and threw him back for a loss of four yards. The goal was safe and the ball belonged to the Blues on their ten yard line.

It had been a close call, and a murmur of disappointment went up from the Army partisans, while the Blue stands rocked with applause.

The elevens lined up and Tom snapped the ball to d.i.c.k, who pa.s.sed it to Bert, five feet behind the line. The ball rose from his toe like a bird and soared down to the forty yard line. From there the Blues rushed it down to within thirty yards of the Army goal before the whistle announced the end of the second quarter.

It was a different crowd that gathered in the Blues' dressing rooms in the interval that followed. That threat against their goal line was the electric spark that was necessary in order to shock them into action.

They were worked up to fighting pitch. Their eyes were blazing, their features grim, and "Bull" Hendricks, who was primed to lash them to the bone with his bitter tongue, wisely forebore. He saw that they were fairly fuming with eagerness for the fray, and after making some minor changes in the line-up--Ellis having sprained his ankle and Caldwell broken a finger--he sent them out with the single exhortation to "hammer the heart out of them."

It wasn't as cla.s.sic as Wellington's "Up, Guards, and at them," but quite as effective. Against that electrified and rejuvenated team, the Army didn't have a chance. Their highly raised hopes went glimmering before the raging onslaught of the Blues. Every man worked as though the outcome of the game depended upon him alone. They plunged into the crumbling lines of the Army like so many wild men. Their opponents fought back n.o.bly, furiously, desperately, but to no avail. The "cla.s.s"

was with the Blues, and as this fact was driven home to the spectators, deep gloom settled over the Army stands, while from the opposite side the old college song went booming down the field.

The Blues were bent on ma.s.sacre. They charged hard and played fast. d.i.c.k plunged through the line again and again like a battering ram for tremendous gains. Tom did some dazzling running back of punts. Drake hit the forwards hard and often, and Axtell tackled with deadly accuracy, laying out his victims all over the field.

As for Bert at fullback, no such demon playing had been seen at West Point for a generation. His handling of the forward pa.s.s was a delight to the eye, and even the hostile stands were stirred at times to involuntary applause. Twice he carried the ball over for a touchdown--once by straight bucking and again by a spectacular run of fifty-five yards through a broken field. The quarter ended with a result of 15 to 0 in favor of the visitors.

From that time on, it was only a question of the size of the score. The battle had become a rout. In the last quarter the ball was in the Army territory all the time. There was no necessity now for tricks to further befuddle the demoralized cadets. By "straight football" the Blues pursued their victorious course down the field and added two more goals before the game was called, with the ball on the fifteen yard line, and destined, had the play continued two minutes longer, to make a final touchdown. It was a dashing victory, gallantly won after an inauspicious start. The weary players drew the first long breath they had permitted themselves since the start of the game. The cadets, game as pebbles, gave their conquerors the rousing Army cheer and the Blues responded vigourously. The rival teams fraternized for a while and then the Blues retired to their quarters to dress and make their "get-away."

Naturally, despite the immense fatigue that weighed them down, they were tingling with exultation. It was the first time they had been pitted against a really big team, and they had clearly outcla.s.sed them. The contests with the smaller colleges had been little more than practice, and in most cases the scrub could have won as certainly if not as overwhelmingly as the 'Varsity. And the victory to-day had been won not by a "fluke," but by clearcut playing. To be sure, the memory of the first part of the game kept rising up like Banquo's ghost to make them uncomfortable. But they had redeemed that so royally in the final half as to silence the most captious critic.

Moreover, they had come through that crucial contest in good shape.

There had been no serious accident to weaken the team. The injuries to Ellis and Caldwell were only trivial and in a week they would be as well as ever. Of course there were minor wounds and bruises galore, but they were incident to the hardening process and were of no consequence.

The mere fact that they had won, satisfying as it was, counted for little compared with the enormous benefit of the game in welding the team together. It had taken eleven stars and molded them into a team. No individual brilliancy, however great, can atone for the lack of team work. To-day they had tested each other, supported each other, played into each other's hands, forgotten that they were anything but parts of one great, smoothly moving, swiftly running machine. And, having so tested his fellows, each one would play with the confidence and self-forgetfulness that alone can win a championship.

For all these reasons, it was a very hilarious bunch that foregathered in the dressing rooms and tumbled into their clothes, after the soothing ministrations of shower and rubdown.

"I guess we're poor, eh, old top," chuckled Tom, as he poked Bert in the ribs.

"Ouch," responded that worthy, "haven't I been punched enough to-day without you soaking me? I'm black and blue all over."

"I don't wonder," put in d.i.c.k. "The way that big McAlpin lammed into you was a crime. He piled on me in one of the scrimmages, and I thought the Flatiron building had fallen."

"He's a tough bird, all right," said Drake, "but he ran up against a tougher one when he tried to go through Bert for that last down in the second quarter. I never saw anything prettier than the way Bert flung him back as though he had been a lightweight. I caught the bewildered look on his face as he went over. He didn't know for a minute what had hit him."

"It was the only thing that saved us from being scored on," said Martin. "It's the tightest place we've been in so far this season."

"Well, a miss is as good as a mile," said Bert, slipping on his coat.

"But hurry up, you fellows, and let us tackle some eats. I'm so hungry that it hurts."

He had struck a responsive chord and in a few minutes they were on their way to the mess hall of the cadets, who had insisted that they should be their guests at supper.

To reach the dining hall they had to cross the baseball field, abandoned now in the early fall, but the scene of fierce diamond battles earlier in the season. To Bert and Tom and d.i.c.k it brought back the memory of the great game they had played there two years before--a game that had gone into extra innings, and had been won by a wonderful bit of playing on the part of Tom who was holding down third.

"Remember that game, Tom?" asked Bert.

"O, no," mocked d.i.c.k. "He doesn't remember. A man who has made a triple play una.s.sisted never thinks of it again."

"He's blushing," exclaimed Drake. "Look at him, fellows. What a shrinking violet."

Tom made a pa.s.s at him.

"A mere bit of luck," he countered. "You fellows give me a pain."

But there had been no luck about it. The game had been bitterly fought, and at the end of the ninth the score was a tie. The Blues had got a man round in the tenth, and the cadets went in to do or die. Before long the crowds were on their feet and screaming like maniacs. There was a man on third, another on second, n.o.body out, and the heaviest slugger in the nine was at the bat. Amid exhortations to "kill it," he caught the ball squarely on the end of his bat and sent it whistling toward third about two feet over Tom's head. He made a tremendous leap, reaching up his gloved hand, and the ball stuck there. The batter was out, but the man on third, thinking it was a sure hit, was racing like mad to the plate.

As Tom came down he landed squarely on the bag, thus putting out the runner, who had by this time realized his mistake and was trying desperately to get back. In the meantime, the man on second, who had taken a big lead, was close to third. As he turned to go back to second, Tom chased him and touched him out just before he reached the bag. The game was won, three men were out, and the bewildered spectators were rubbing their eyes and trying to make out just what had happened. They had seen a "triple play una.s.sisted," the thing that every player dreams of making, and one of the rarest feats ever pulled off on the baseball diamond.

"We've certainly got the edge on Uncle Sam's boys in both baseball and football," commented d.i.c.k, in discussing the incident, "but it's only an edge. They always make us extend ourselves to win."

They had a royal time at the mess hall and afterward at the barracks, where both the vanquished and victors mingled on terms of the most cordial good fellowship. But the demands of training were not to be set aside, and all too soon they were forced to tear themselves away and repair to their hotel. By ten o'clock they were in their beds, lights were out, and they were sleeping as only a college team can sleep after a day of such storm and stress.

After Reddy had made his rounds and a.s.sured himself that all his charges had retired, he joined "Bull" Hendricks for a chat and smoke over the day's happenings. Few things had escaped their keen eyes during that crowded hour, when conditions and formations changed with the swiftness of a kaleidoscope. And now that it was all over, they could recall every play, every gain, every fumble, every pa.s.s, with a precision that would have been astounding to any one less versed than they in every turn and angle of the game.

Their mood was one of deep, if quiet, satisfaction. A long and bitter experience had made them cautious in prediction. They were by no means ready to admit yet, even to themselves, that they had a team of "world beaters." There were still a host of faults to be corrected, of raw edges to be polished off, of plays to be developed. But, on the whole, the boys had done surprisingly well. The dogged way in which they had held the enemy when their goal was threatened was worthy of the best "bulldog" tradition. And the slashing, ding dong way in which they had worked the ball down the field in the last half had been gratifying beyond words. It showed that the "never say die" spirit, that they had tried so hard to instill, was there in abundance.

There was still another cause for congratulation. They had not been forced to uncover any of the new tricks that they were holding in reserve for the championship games. At one point, in the early part of the game, they had feared this might be necessary, but the quick recovery later on had enabled them to depend upon straight football. The scouts for the "Greys" and "Maroons," several of whom had been "spotted"

in the stands, had had "their trouble for their pains," and the coach was greatly elated in consequence.

"They'll go home with an empty bag from this day's hunting," he chuckled.

"They sure will," a.s.sented Reddy, as he filled and lighted his faithful cob. "And I'm thinking 'tis a little bit shaky they are, after seeing the way we ripped up the Army line."

"That boy Wilson is certainly a hummer," commented Hendricks, flicking the ash from his cigar. "I haven't seen such plunging and line bucking since the days of Heffelfinger. You could no more stop him than you could a runaway horse."

"He's all there, full sixteen ounces to the pound," was Reddy's emphatic endors.e.m.e.nt. "I've seen some crack fullbacks in my time, but none to top him. He's got the weight, he's got the speed, and as for nerve, begorra!

Did ye note the way he toyed with that big rhinoceros, McAlpin?"

"What he did to him was plenty," laughed Hendricks. "I guess that's one position we don't need to worry about any longer. And I'm feeling pretty good, too, about Trent and Henderson. They worked together at quarter and center like a pair of shears. Axtell tackled like a tiger, and if he keeps it up, we can count on him as a fixture. And Drake, too, did some dandy work at end. Did you see the way he got down under Wilson's punts?

Johnny-on-the-spot, every time the ball came down."

"For them five positions there's nothing better in sight," said Reddy.

"I rather think so," acquiesced the coach. "There's only one weak spot in the back field, and that's at left half. Martin, for some reason, isn't playing his game. He's too slow in starting, and he doesn't tackle as hard and fast as he ought to. Then, too, he's a little bit thick when it comes to the signals. He got mixed up twice to-day, and he was all at sea on that 'fake' pa.s.s in the second quarter. He needs more blackboard work, and I'm going to see that he gets it.

"But it's in the line that we've got to make some changes. Most of the forwards to-day would have been 'pie' for the 'Greys' or 'Maroons.' I can excuse Caldwell for not playing his best, since he broke his finger in the beginning of the game and n.o.body knew it until twenty minutes later. Plucky of the youngster, but he ought to have told us. Ellis is all right, but that's the second time his b.u.m ankle has given way, and I don't know whether he can stand the strain of a big game. Hodge has got the weight and the strength, but he leaves too much of the work to Trent. As for Boyd, I'm afraid he lacks sand."

"I saw him flinch to-day, when McAlpin piled into him," mused Reddy.