In the Line

by Albertus T. Dudley

Then began another series of short advances toward the Hillbury goal-line, through Laughlin, through Lindsay, Hendry through the other side, an attempt at an end run, a wing shift with Milliken plunging outside tackle, Hendry again, another delayed pass, left guard back, and straight hard smashes of backs through the centre. The result of the experimenting was that Wolcott’s side of the line was the more frequently called upon, especially the hole between guard and tackle. Hendry and Read did not always succeed in boxing their end. Wolcott sometimes failed to get his man where he wanted him; the Hillbury secondary defence often nullified his efforts; but for some reason Jackson found that here was the line of least resistance. On the defence no one held like Laughlin. On the attack he was always sure, always eager to do his own work and help out Bent, crushing his way like an ice-breaker through the line. Two yards behind Laughlin were always to be counted on with assurance. His very weight and strength and hardness made him terrible. Yet the gains through Wolcott were often greater. He blocked no one’s way; he made his hole and turned in it to drag the runner on; he got into plays for which he might have shirked the responsibility; he was where the ball was, where it was going to be the next instant, wherever his strength and help were needed, pushing and pulling and dragging and keeping his men on their feet.

They were on the ten-yard line now. The spectators around Mr. Lindsay were excitedly guessing on the distance yet to be covered, which some put at five yards, others at fifteen. On the Seaton side not a cheer was uttered. The whole student audience hung on the play in tense and eager silence. Hillbury was shouting full and strong and regular, “Hold! hold! hold!” which fell on the ears of the Hillbury champions like a rallying trumpet call. Hendry came flying from his post, took the ball from the quarter, and swung hard into the line, beyond the other tackle. Down he went without an inch of gain. Laughlin dropped back and drove Buist through Hall. “Three yards! The third down!”

“Hold! hold! hold!” Into these syllables the whole Hillbury cheering force was concentrating its strength and hope. The Hillbury line heard and gathered themselves together for a final desperate resistance. Wolcott heard and heeded not, for the signal was ringing in his ears, and he knew that the last responsibility was upon him. Laughlin was back once more, this time to play the shunting locomotive for Milliken. The track lay over the spot on which Wolcott was standing. Hendry did his work well. Wolcott’s shoulder was at Moore’s hip almost before Moore had moved; the tandem jammed its way into the narrow opening, over the line half-back, like a squadron of horse over a thin line of infantry, and down in a wild heap of friend and foe four yards farther on!

It was a first down with but three yards to the goal line!—three yards in three downs, an easy task for a strong line flushed with victory, which had already battered its way from the middle of the field. Wendt made a yard outside of right tackle in a cross buck. Then Hendry fell back for the ball, and the heavy wedge, with Laughlin at its apex, Hendry in the centre driven along by Buist and Milliken and Jackson pushing behind, piled the Hillbury defence on either side of its course as a snow-plough masses the snow right and left as it drives its way through a heavy drift. Hendry was yards across the goal-line when the wedge broke.

While Jackson was bringing out the ball and adjusting it for Bullard’s kick for goal, Wolcott with dry lips and panting breath, but joy unspeakable in his heart, was watching the antics of the Seaton audience, which danced and yelled and cheered and waved flags in a frenzy of delight. Somewhere in section D was his father, in what state of mind he hardly dared guess; but he remembered with relief that but few stops had been made on pretence of injuries, while not one on either side had left the field; and he fervently hoped that his anxious father was observing the scene of carnage without distress. As a matter of fact, Mr. Lindsay was at that moment thinking very little about carnage and very much of the possibility that Bullard would fail to kick the goal. The ball sailed between the tips of the goal-posts, the crowd shouted, the players scattered to their new places, and Mr. Lindsay resigned himself with surprising cheerfulness to a continuation of the brutal contest. Above him the enthusiastic Harvard men were extolling the Seaton line in general, and in particular the solid centre, where the big captain and “Beefy Bullard” and that green man Lindsay, “as quick as nine cats and strong as a bull,” held the line with an anchor that wouldn’t drag.

Seaton kicked off and Joslin of Hillbury got the ball and zigzagged back to the twenty-five-yard line. Thence Hillbury worked ahead a dozen yards and punted. Jackson, who received the punt, was too eager to get away, and fumbled. In an instant the Hillbury end was upon the ball. Now the bank of blue ribbons had something to cheer for, and the vehemence and volume and splendid evenness of the mighty chant which swept across the field put hope into the hearts of the blue, and suggested to the red that the first score might after all have been a mistake. Wolcott remembered Laughlin’s remark of the night before, that a punter and two good ends, with the help of a fumbling back on the other side, could beat the best line that ever played; and felt his heart sink. Had Hillbury detected the Seaton weakness? But Laughlin showed no sign of discouragement.

“Hold ’em, fellows, hold ’em! Stop ’em right here!” And the first charge was downed in a heap as it struck the line. The ball went back to Cates, the Hillbury quarter, who dashed toward the end of the line.

“Quarter! quarter!” yelled Laughlin, bursting through at Cates’s heels. The whole Seaton line poured after Cates. But Cates had held the ball only a moment, and shot it to Joslin, who darted for the other end of the line, where one of his backs and the end and tackle were in waiting. The Seaton end fell before the assault, and Joslin, running clear, raced down the field with Brooks, the Hillbury end, before him, and only Jackson between himself and the goal-line.

What happened then happened quickly. Jackson flung himself at the critical moment straight at the man with the ball. His arms enclosed three legs, two belonging to Brooks and one to the man with the ball. He went down with the two legs tightly clasped, but the one tore away; and Joslin, free and swift as an arrow, sprinted over the white chalk-line to the Seaton goal-posts.

A few minutes later, with the score six and six, Hillbury lined up for the third kick-off. Wolcott felt relieved as he saw the ball settle into Read’s grasp, for Read was safe. The ball was down on the thirty-yard line, and the heavy Seaton machine started immediately to hammer its way down the field. A delayed pass gave ten yards, a quarter-back run another ten, but the advance was mainly by steady driving of strong men in unison against a desperate, but yielding defence. Now on one side, now on the other, with Laughlin back, or Lindsay or Hendry locked in an irresistible interference with Milliken, Wendt, and Buist, the ball drew nearer the Hillbury goal. Now a swaying mass rolled its way through the struggling line as a steam shovel eats into a sandbank; now a narrow gap would open and a single man be dashed into it, as an express train into a tunnel.