Transcript
A (0:00)
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B (0:30)
Now the Rest of the Story Athletic games, as they are now played, evolved over a long period of time. Many of the modifications in sports are fairly recent, easy to pinpoint, but the major rules and traditions originated long ago, and they're harder to track down. We have tracked down one the football huddle. Now for a while, Coach Zuppke of the University of Illinois was credited with the invention of the huddle in 1922. But that's not so. The huddle dates back to the 1880s and it was innovated for a very specific reason. Gallaudet College, to say the least, has an innovative football team. In fact, much of the razzle dazzle we associate with college football began at Gallaudet considerably before the turn of the century. And among those innovations, well, let me describe one of them, perhaps as it occurred for the first time. Gallaudet versus the Visitors. The teams trump onto the field. The visitors win the toss. They will receive the punts, return to the 28 yard line, 1st and 10. The visitors offensive unit is milling around behind the line. Their quarterback discusses a play with a potential receiver. At last the offense hits the line in formation. The center snaps the ball. The quarterback fades 12 yards. The pass is good for a gain of eight. And this drive grinds away dead ends on the Gallaudet 42. Each time the visitors offense had come up to the line, it was from a disorganized, informal stand up meeting. Or perhaps without even that. Well, now it's Gallaudet's ball. Now a curious thing happens. Before Gallaudet's offensive goes into the line, they drop back 10 yards or so and form a circle. And they bend low toward an imaginary hub of this human wheel. And for the first time anywhere we have the football huddle. Some of the visitors laugh. People in the stands elbow each other. They could not possibly have realized at that time the football history they were witnessing. But then, with a sudden coordinated movement, the circle breaks. The Gallaudet offense hits the line. It's a Handoff. Gallaudet walks through a king size hole in the visitors defense. Gain of 20. First and 10. First and 10. First and ten. First and ten. And each time prior to offensive formation, Gallaudet forms a huddle. A deliberate, concerted, ominous looking meeting in a circle behind the line. Well, the fans were impressed. You can bet the losing visitors were impressed. Soon the huddle became the talk of college football. The position for this quiet, close means of communication to discuss plays quickly became the topic of conversation among other football teams, other coaches, other sports fans. The huddle was such a fast, practical way of getting a team together on the field that one college after another adopted it. And today it appears as though the huddle had been born with the game. But you know better. You know that the huddle began at Gallaudet College in the 1880s. And perhaps not in the entire world is there a football team whose offensive unit does not go to the huddle before each Play. Because nearly 100 years ago, one team had to. I said one team had to. One team had to get close enough to see the hand signals or the diagram in the dust for the next play at Gallaudet College for the Deaf. And now you know the rest of the story.