“Looks more like a nightmare! What’s in it?”
“Strawberry and chocolate and lemon ice-cream and blood-orange sirup. You take a third of each and——”
But Chester, with a gesture eloquent of repugnance, had flown. Fudge smiled calmly and stirred again with still more interesting results. “Some folks don’t know what’s good,” he murmured blissfully.
The Board of Strategy, as George Cotner chose to call it, met in Dick’s parlor that evening at half-past seven, Dick, Lanny, Cottrell and Cotner present. Dick disposed of the afternoon’s contest with Logan in few words.
“They outplayed us,” he said frankly. “Our line was fully as good as theirs, I think, but their backs were better. Besides, they had more plays and used them well. We were handicapped by a lack of plays and those we had didn’t fool them. They made practically all of their gains around our tackles and couldn’t make much impression on the line. They got their first touchdown as the result of a fine run by Showalter, their right half, which put the ball on our thirteen yards. From there they took it over in one play, around our right end. Felker was neatly boxed and they had no trouble. Their next score was after they had worked our ends and thrown a forward pass for gains that took them from the middle of the field to our twelve yards. They finally got through Wayland for the last half-yard. They made twelve first downs to our seven, I believe. We outpunted them by about five yards on an average. Hull, who took your place, Chester, ran the team very well and was very clever at carrying the ball. He promises remarkably well and ought to make a first-class quarter by next Fall. We used six substitutes in the third and fourth quarters. Merrick at right end showed up well and made a clever catch of a forward pass and a thirty-yard run that made possible our touchdown. On the whole, the substitutes did good work. I’m sorry we couldn’t have won, Lanny, but the game showed us our weaknesses, and that’s something. Now, what did you fellows learn at Springdale?”
“Mighty little,” answered Lanny. “They got on to us and stalled all through the last half.”
“What about the first half?” asked Dick.
“Weston played all around them in the first quarter. Used a lot of queer stunts from open formation, like double-passes back of the line, with an end breaking through or a half running wide. The plays weren’t much, but Springdale didn’t get on to them for a while. In the second period she opened her line out and dropped an extra man behind it. That worked better. She made her score by pretty clever work. Got off three dandy forward passes and mixed her plays up well.”
“What formation did she use on attack?” asked Dick.
“Same as last year. For kicking she played her ends way out. It wasn’t a fair test, though, for Weston is a light team and couldn’t do much with the Springdale line. If she’d use that kicking formation against us we could smear her every time, I guess.”