Frank Armstrong at College

by Matthew M. Colton

That game in the towering Stadium was one that hung long in Frank's memory. It was a game of desperate attack and defense. Three times in the first period the rushing red-legged players had the Blue team down inside the five-yard line, and three times they were stopped by the stone-wall defense. All through the first half the Yale team fought on the defensive, crumpling up before the fierce rushes of the Harvard players, but somehow stiffening as the goal line approached.

So certain were the Harvard players of scoring a touchdown that they disdained to try for a goal from the field, and each time they were stopped by the men from New Haven they took the ball back with dogged determination, only to lose it again.

"We have them now," said Howard as his men were being cared for between the halves. "Go after them. They've shot their bolt, and it's our turn."

After the kick-off in the third quarter, Turner raised great hopes by running the ball back through the Harvard team, and, before he was tackled, laid it only twenty yards away from the Harvard goal line.

A smash at center earned only two yards.

"Armstrong, get ready, I'm going to send you in to try for a goal," said the coach, running down to where Frank was sitting, shivering with the excitement of the struggle that was going on out in the field. Frank slipped off his sweater, and made ready, but the chance he so longed for never came.

Madden's signal was mixed somehow, and the man who was to take the ball wasn't where the quarter expected him to be. He started to run with the ball himself, but was upset by a savage tackle, and dropped the pigskin, which went bounding backward toward his own goal. Half a dozen players took a driving shot at the leather, but it eluded them as if it had been greased. Finally a lanky Harvard end wound his body around it at midfield. Yale's chance to score at that particular moment was lost.

Frank gritted his teeth and slipped on his sweater again. The battle was once more taken up with renewed vigor. The advantage lay first with one team and then with the other, but never again did Yale have so good a chance to score.

Again striking its stride, after a lot of futile punting, the Yale Freshmen got together and began to plough through their opponents. Turner was playing like a demon while the little Yale contingent matched yell for yell with the Harvard supporters on the other side of the field. Turner on two tries reeled off twenty-five yards, and put the ball just across the center of the field. A forward pass netted fifteen yards more, and again the coach began to look for a chance to score, not for a touchdown, for the attack had not shown itself capable of beating down that splendid defense, but by a drop-kick if the opportunity came.