Life — October 12, 1928 — page 16: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SPORTSMEN and The Come-back of Notre Dame At a luncheon about a month ago a man was rash enough to stand up and say that Notre Dame wouldn't have a good team this year. His name was Knute Rockne. Said Knute: “We've got only one regular left from last year. That means our second team of last year is our Varsity this year. I call them my Minute Men because whenever I put them in, the other team scored in a minute. We're fixed for a nice, comfortable campaign. The only time a coach worries is when he thinks his team may be licked. Well, I know our team is going to be licked and I have nothing to worry about. We'll have some fun this year but we'll be building for next year. Our slogan at South Bend is: Watch out for us in 1929. I thank you.” These shocking sentiments caused sev- eral near-fatalities among the guests. Captain “Biff” Jones of West Point and Mr. Tad Jones of Yale almost died laugh- ing. Mr. Tad laughed even louder than Captain Biff, which might be due to the fact that Yale doesn’t play Notre Dame. Other guests went into a huddle at the lower end of the table, and having care- fully considered Knute’s prophecy of a Kieran weak Notre Dame team this fall, they adopted a resolution to the effect that 1928, being a presidential campaign year, is therefore a good a PRESIDENTIAL Al year for applesauce. sauce? It does look as if the boys suspected Knute. For that mat- ter, Bob Zuppke once said: “They certainly watch that man Rockne. I think they're trying to find out what he puts in afootbal] besides wind.” “Rock” does put something else in. Here’s part of it, and it may explain in some measure how Notre Dame, year after year, turns out teams that rate at or near the top. Hark to Mr. Rockne (in person and strictly not a picture) broad- casting on a ten-yard wave-length: “We sound a call for spring practice. It’s a ‘come-all-yez’; nobody barred. We divide ‘em up into teams of fifty. Maybe that’s why we do pretty well in some seasons. We start out with fifty men on a team. We give the teams names: Army, Georgia Tech, Navy, Minnesota, and so on. We give them plenty of work and make them play a round robin for the championship. This year the Army team won and I want to tell you, they were not Suy Younc Bre: I forgot to ask you, dear, how do you like your eggs? only the best football players of the lot but the biggest eaters as well. I know because I give the winners a steak dinner every year and the sight of a butcher throws me into a cold sweat ever since I paid that bill. “Well, that’s the spring. The fall cam. paige is different. Entrance to the foot all field is by card only. You can’t come unless you're invited. We invite 125 of the boys who were out in the spring and nat- urally we don’t invite the worst ones, We make seven or eight teams of them, but they all have the same name in the fall —wNotre Dame. The rest is simple. We just go out and play football. Some le are kind enough to say we're not realy bad at it. “I might say in closing,” added Knute, “that those who aren’t invited back for Varsity practice in the fall are expected to go out for class teams, dormitory teams and corridor teams. I imagine we have something between eight hundred and a thousand boys play- ing football _regu- larly on the different teams at South Bend every fall.” A team that had never played Notre Dame before once showed up at South Bend. The rival coach saw six Notre Dame teams running through signals up and down the field before the game. Having looked them over rather persistently, he finally strolled over to Rockne and asked: ‘Which is your Varsity, Knute?” “Well,” ‘grinned Rockne, “‘it really doesn’t make much difference.” “And the worst of it was,” said the rival coach later, “that he wasn’t kidding at all. He meant it, and doggone the luck, it was true!” BY WAY OF ILLUSTRATION I’p like to have a dog or two That Mr. Robert Dickey drew; And lying softly on the mat A tortoise-shell O. Herford cat; Then, too, to make complete such joj, A little Percy Crosby boy. Thus, home might be without a flaw, Depending on the girl J draw. Carroll Carroll. FANTASTIC STORY “Sue bought an expensive fur coat, yt she never draped it over a theater seat 10 give the customers in the row behind 2 glimpse of the label.” comicbooks.com