Hugh got into it in the second ten-minute period and played through that and most of the third, until a blow on the head turned him so dizzy that Davy Richards, hovering about the scene like an anxious mother hen, called him out. He did good work on the defence, too, considering his lack of weight. He seemed gifted with the faculty of anticipating the play and getting into it almost before it reached the line, although it was really less a gift than it appeared. What Hugh did was to watch the ball, instead of the players, and more than once Nick’s shouted warning proved wrong and Hugh’s diagnosis correct. He was pretty roughly used, for the second was in no mood to deal gently with objects in its way, and frequently he fumed in secret at his lack of weight.
In the final period—the second had so far failed to cross the defender’s line—the second was given the ball four times in succession on the first team’s ten yards and urged to take it over. But it was not until they had been allowed an extra down, with the ball on the two yards, that Manson piled through between Musgrave and Yetter and scored the single tally. It was in that mix-up that Hugh got his knock-out and Vail went in to finish the game.
Monday’s practice was a fair example of every day’s proceedings until Thursday. On Thursday the lower middle team, champions of the school, trotted over and faced the first. They proved an easy prey, and the first had little difficulty in running up twenty-seven points while the lower middlers were earning a scant six by the air route. Coach Bonner tried out two new plays which the first had been learning, and was able to gain with each several times. The best for all-round purposes was a split play in which an end shifted to the other side of the line and played some two yards back. The backs arranged themselves in oblique tandem, the ball went to full-back, quarter and the back-field end swung around one wing, the two half-backs around the other and the full-back plunged straight ahead, usually finding his passage clear. It was rather a difficult play for the opponent to diagnose, for it had all the earmarks of a forward-pass to either side of the field. The lower middlers never did solve it, although that by no means guaranteed that it would succeed more than once against Mount Morris.
The other new play, although he didn’t know it, was designed to make use of Hugh’s running ability. It was a tackle-over shift, with the back-field in square formation and the ball going to right half—in this case Hugh—on a direct pass. The attack was faked at the long side, and right half, with left interfering, went around the short side, the runner turning in sharply when the way was clear. The same formation was used for a variation in which left half ran wide beyond the short side and took a forward pass from full-back. The variation proved less certain of success, however, and was abandoned after a few subsequent try-outs against the second. But the play in which Hugh figured was tried four times in that Thursday game and gained each time. Once Hugh got clean away and covered half the field before he met his Nemesis in the shape of the opposing quarter, who, in spite of Hugh’s attempt to elude him, stopped further progress with a neat and decisive tackle. Another time Hugh gained twelve yards before he was brought down from behind, again he almost got clear and reeled off the better part of twenty, and, on the last attempt, with the ball under the shadow of the enemy’s goal near the eighteen yards, he dodged his way through at least a half-dozen opponents and scored the first’s fourth touchdown.
All that sounds as though Hugh played most of the game himself, but it is needless to say that he didn’t or that his part was only a small part after all. He held his own well on defence and several times made short gains on the wings, but lack of weight told against him. One thing he did not do, however, was fumble. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of either Bert or Vail. Bert played three periods at left half and Vail one period at right, going out in favor of Hugh. Vail’s fumble was not costly, but Bert’s was, for he dropped the ball when tackled in the line and a lower middler fell on it and three minutes later the pigskin was floating over the cross-bar for lower middle’s first field goal. The whole truth is that Bert played poorly that day. His sins were not only of commission, like that fumble on the twenty-yard line, but of omission, as when, time after time, he was stopped short in his tracks before he had penetrated the enemy’s first line of defense. Siedhof, who replaced him, while not especially effective, at least gained occasionally through a not very strong line.
Bert was ill-tempered and depressed that evening, and when Hugh, feeling very happy over his showing, tried to cheer him up, Bert sneered at him. “You think you know a whole lot, don’t you?” he asked. “Think you’re a regular fellow now, I guess. You’ve got a whole lot to learn yet about playing half, let me tell you. When George Vail gets back you’ll last about ten seconds and then you’ll find yourself ‘chewing the blanket’ again.”
“I dare say,” responded Hugh good-naturedly. “Don’t know just why Mr. Bonner has been so decent to me, anyway. Of course, I know I can’t play like you and Vail, old chap. Never thought so for a minute.”
“You act so,” growled Bert. “Coming around and patting my head! I’ll be playing half when you’re shouting ‘Rah! Rah!’ on the stand.”
“Right-o! Sorry I spoke.”
“You kids,” continued Bert, “have a lucky day and make a couple of runs and then think you’re the whole shooting match! You make me tired!”