“Tell them,” he said tremulously, “that I died game, fighting against tremendous odds!”
[CHAPTER XVII]
ALTON MEETS WITH DISASTER
The Gray-and-Gold presented a line-up that afternoon that lacked the names of four of its best players. Smith was at right guard in place of Captain Gus Fingal, Mulford played left tackle in place of Roice, Plant substituted Frost at right half and Barnhart ran the team. It was still a moot question whether Kinsey or Latham was first-choice quarter-back, but Barnhart was undeniably third-choice, and to-day, in the absence of both the others, he was faced by a stiff proposition. As Josh Plant had intimated, the visitors were a fine, sturdy looking lot, and they outsized Alton both in the line and the backfield. That they would score was a foregone conclusion. Whether Alton would score, too, was problematic. Watching the visitors perform during the brief warming-up session, many Alton partisans were flat-footed in the assertion that Coach Cade had erred in weakening his team as he had.
Before the first half was well along it had become evident that nothing save a miracle could save the home team from defeat. And miracles, as we all know, as often as they are longed for, seldom happen on the football field. Mount Millard found a soft place in the Alton line early in the game and pounded Smith for repeated gains. Varying attacks at right guard with off-tackle plays, the visitors rushed from their own thirty-five-yard line to Alton’s twenty-eight. There Cooper was sent in for Smith and two tries at the new incumbent gained but four yards and Mount Millard shot a forward-pass to the twelve yards. Levering was caught napping and Whittier reached the receiver too late to spoil the catch. Steve did the next best thing, however, and threw the enemy hard on the ten-yard line. Mount Millard wasted a down in an attempt to carry the ball out-of-bounds, missing by inches. Faking a similar attempt, she got three outside of tackle on the other side and landed the ball on the seven yards. Here an off-side penalty put her back to the twelve and she faked a try-at-goal that turned out to be a plunge inside tackle. Mulford was put out neatly and a Mount Millard back crashed through to the five-yard line. Scorning a fairly certain three points, the enemy tried a complicated cross-buck which, since the play had all the ear-marks of a forward-pass, nearly won her a touchdown. It failed, though, by a half-yard and Whittier punted on first down from behind his goal. Catching on Alton’s thirty-eight, the visitors started a second advance but lost the ball near the twenty-five just before the quarter ended.
At the resumption of hostilities Alton tried hard to get her attack going, but twice the enemy broke through and stopped the runner for a loss, and after an end-run had been spilled for a two-yard gain Whittier booted the ball. A fumble by the Mount Millard quarter was recovered for a ten-yard loss and the enemy put the ball in play on her thirty. She made it first down on her forty-three and crossed the middle of the field in two plays by her full-back. Her next attempt was stopped, however, and, with one to go, she tried a long forward-pass that was intercepted by Tennyson. The Alton full-back fought his way for eight yards before he was thrown. A moment later it was Tennyson who found a hole to his liking on the left of the Mount Millard line and plunged through for seven yards more. A second attempt by the same player failed to gain and it was Plant who made it first down. Two slams at the line netted but three yards and Whittier tossed across the right of the line to Levering who, although pulled to earth promptly, secured all but a few feet of the needed distance. Tennyson piled over the center for the rest. But what looked like an Alton invasion stopped on the enemy’s thirty-seven and Whittier punted. Those kicks from close behind the line found Mount Millard unprepared for a while, and on this occasion the quarter again fumbled. A team-mate saved the day, though, and reeled off twelve yards through a crowded field before he was finally run out. After that the play hovered about the middle of the field until, just before the end of the half, the Mount Millard left half got away inside Sawyer, at right tackle, and zigzagged toward the Alton goal in a breath-taking fashion for some thirty yards. It was Whittier who finally pulled him down near the twenty.
This was Mount Millard’s second chance to score, and now she had no intention of being denied. Really exceptional football was played by the visitors then, and the Alton line broke time and again before desperate attacks. The Mount Millard full-back was the star of that skirmish, making gains of four and five and six yards at a time. The right of the Alton line was weakened by the absence of Captain Fingal, just as Mount Millard had probably surmised it would be, and it was at the right that most of the gains were made. Alton stiffened on her four yards and gave grudgingly, but the enemy finally piled across, beating the whistle by a matter of seconds only. An easy goal followed, and Alton retired from the field with seven points scored against her.
Jim had his chance when the third quarter started, and, while he played a steadier game than had Sawyer, Mount Millard still found the Alton right side vulnerable when a short gain was needed. Cooper, playing in Captain Gus’s position, proved no better than Smith, and when, toward the close of the period, he began to show the effects of the attention given him by the enemy backs he was taken out and Smith was reinstated. The Alton rooters expected that their team would show some of the new plays that had been drilled into it during the past fortnight and momentarily looked for Whittier or Plant to get clear and put the game on an even basis. But the few plays didn’t materialize. Save for the new formation, which had its defamers on the Alton stand, the Gray-and-Gold showed nothing it had not shown before during the season. Even the nine forward-passes attempted in the course of the contest lacked novelty, and the running plays which Alton was supposed to have been perfecting were not exhibited. Alton was handicapped by the lack of a really first-class quarter, for Barnhart, while a hard-working, snappy youth, lacked experience sadly. His choice of plays were frequently more than questionable and he seemed unable to inspire his team. Yet in the final period he came near to atoning for all shortcomings when he shot out of what seemed an inextricable tangle of Alton backs and ends and skirted the enemy’s wing for sixty-two yards. It was the Mount Millard quarter who brought him down on the seventeen yards just when the shouting Alton rooters were visioning a touchdown. One unlucky stumble spelled Barnhart’s doom and Alton’s defeat. Had he not stumbled and momentarily lost his stride just before the enemy quarter sprang for him he would undoubtedly have gone on over the line, for Whittier was protecting him in the rear from the foremost of the Mount Millard pursuers. On such small things may Victory hinge!
Barnhart called for a smash at the left that sent Tennyson over the side-line and when the ball had been walked in he sent Whittier sliding off tackle at the right for six yards, and the Alton stand whooped it up deliriously. But when Steve went back to kicking position as the ball was snapped the enemy was not fooled and Tennyson’s dash around the right was nipped for a two-yard loss. Barnhart and Whittier, the latter captain pro tem, held a consultation then. The fourth period was young and there was still time to score again if the present venture failed. Barnhart wanted the three points a field-goal would bring, but Steve was firm for everything or nothing and Steve’s word carried. So Steve went back to drop-kicking position, and Cheswick passed the ball to him. It looked as though Jake Borden, well over to the left and sidling across the goal-line, was well uncovered, yet between the time that Steve shot the ball away to him and the instant it arrived a Mount Millard man dropped from the sky, or so it seemed, and smote the pigskin fairly out of Borden’s hands.