Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 261, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 November 1920 — GATHER IN TWO. MORE VICTORIES [ARTICLE]

GATHER IN TWO. MORE VICTORIES

LAFAYETTE BOWS TO INDEPENDENTS 12-7 AND KENT1 LAND FALLS BEFORE H. S. *r 9 » ’II - ' ' ' Two more games were put in the Rensselaer victory column Saturday anq Sunday when the high school team avenged their defeat of 1919 at the hands of the Kentland high । school eleven by smothering that club at Riverside park Saturday afternoon in a 34 to 0 victory, the game being little more than a romp for the home pets who scored almost at will during the first half. । The count would have mounted to a much larger figure had not Codch Leighly decided to give his second string men. a workout. The other Rensselaer victory followed on Sunday when Coach Parker’s independent eleven gathered in their fourth straight win of the season by upsetting Battery C of Lafayette in one of the most thrilling and gruelling gridiron classics, ever staged here. ./The game was perhaps the most notable victory ever won by a Red and Black eleven, ahd 'but few of the spectators realized the fact that opposed to the Rensselaer players were men who had won renown in western college circles. The finish of the contest found the game Rensselaer warriors battered and bruised standing on their own four yard mark with darkness fast descending and with, but one minute to play,.and the ball in the possession of Lafayette. A defeat looked imminent as the Lafayetteans had carried the ball from their own thirty yard line to within a few ffeet of the Rensselaer goal in a four-minute march. The* situation looked decidedly desperate as Coach Parker had no reserves to call upon and it was so dark that the Rensselaer players were having difficulty in distinguishing the runner. a A few seconds remained when Bailey, the visiting fullback, who had torn the. Red and Black line to bits throughout the afternoon, gathered the oval beneath his arm and crashed into the left side of the Rensselaer line in a final attempt to add the necessary six points for victory. Even before the ball had stopped moving the timekeeper’s whistle sounded. But the Rensselaer line mustered its strength and the hall waq four feet from the coveted mark when the referee untangled the players. Errors of ommission and commission and’ the failure to boot goals after their touchdowns were responsible for Rensselaer’s narrow es-

cape from defeat. Lafayette had left the field at half time with a 7 to 6 lead, their touchdown being of the flakiest variety imaginable. The play which almost resulted in a Rensselaer defeat occurred just at the close of the first half. The ball was in Lafayette’s possession on Renseslaer’s twenty-yard line. Just as the ball was snapped the timekeeper’s whistle blew for the end of the half which con fused the Rensselaer players who labored under the impression that it was an offside play. The runner advanced a few feet and stopped. By this time most of the Rensselaer players had left the field and a Lafayette player shouted to the runner to go ahead, and the latter scampered over the goal line unhindered. The touchdown was* legal but Dame Fortune was responsible for it At the beginning of the second half Rensselaer started one of her celebrated rushes and within four minutes had addea another touchdown, the result of some magnificent line smashing by Captain Nowels, and a Collins to Phegley pass. Captain Nowels crashed over the Hne on the fourth down, after smashing his way fifteen yards with three Lafayette players clinging to him. It was as fine an exhibition of Hne smashing as has been witness- , ed on the local lot this season. The first Rensselaer touchdown came in the second quarter and was made possible by the consistent gains of Nowels, Colins and Kirk. Quarterback Moore carried the ball. across from the one yard line but was tackled so fiercely that he dropped the oval after crossing the line. Putts beat a Lafayette jersey to it by a fraction of a second. The crowd was electrified thruout the afternoon by the many brilliant plays. Moore in particular was a sattelite during the. first two periods both on the offense and defense and it was his remarkable work that kept the invaders from registering at least one more touchdown. Once he' snatched a forward pass intended for a Lafayette player'out of the air and raced fifty yards behind hastily organised interference, finaHy being tumbled by the Lafayette safety. The intercepted pass came at a most opportune moment as the invaders were elfise to the Rensselaer goal at the tijme. But More was not alone for time and again the giant Putts arose to the emergency by tearing the Lafayette forward wall to pieces and stopping the runner. Then the Lafayette backs would center their attack on Thompson, who played the most remarkable game of his long career and saved many a yard for his' team. Kirk’s work was so uniformly good that it passed almost unnoticed. Ever steady and reliable he kept up the morale of the Red and Black m the moat critical moments and his interference

running for the Rensselaer backs has never been surpassed in a local game. Phegley at end also played a wonderful game and time and again dropped the runner in his tracks. i Lafayette greatly outweighed the locals, Hammond, their right guard, weighing '312 pounds and Lowe, their left guard, 270. The work of Bailey, a Notre Dame product, at fullback, was a revelation to the fans and rartely did he fail to- make frorii ten to fifteen yards when called upon to carry the ball. Tengen, a Lafayette boy and » member of the St> Louis American League baseball team, also made it miserable for the Rensselaer tacklers throughout the afternoon. A college player, a member of a big ten conference team this year, whose name we do not care to mention for certain reasons, played at center for the visitors. Individually the invaders outclassed Rensselaer, but they displayed a lack of team play which proved their un- * doing. On next Sunday Logansport will m&et the locals here, and for the first time this season Rensselaer will find the dope against her. Logansport has not met with a defeat this season and has victories to her credit over the Wabash A. A. and Kirklin. Playing the true Leighly brarid of football and thoroughly aroused over their defeat at the hands of Kentland last year, the Rensselaer high school team placated their followers by humiliating the visitors at Riverside park Saturday afterhoon by the lopsided count of 34 to 0, running up twenty points in 4 the first ten minutes of play by ripping the Kentland line to bits. Only the fact that Coach Leighly replaced his first string men with substitutes kept the score from mounting to a much larger figure, i Rensselaer simply toyed With the Newton county lads. When they tired of tearing through the visitors’ line and skirting the wing men, they resorted to an aerial attack which the Blue and White were unable to stop. It was little more

than a practice game and the decisive victory of the Rensselaer lads stamps them as being of state championship caliber. It was the third defeat of the season for Kentland, Logansport and Morocco having previously bowled her over. The work of “Doak” Collins at fullback was the feature of the Rensselaer play. He crashed thru the Kentland lina almost at will and gave it such, a battering that several of the linemen, were forced to retire from the game. Wright edged himself nearer to an end position on the mythical all-state eleven by his remarkable defensive work and receiving of forward passes. Weiss,, at center, seems to be the* find of the season‘and- displayed the same flashy work that he exhibited in the Watseka game. Larsh proved a great open field runner and repeated his performances of previous games by dashing through a broken field for long runs on several occasions. Lambert at tackle and Harmon at halfback ' also starred. . ’ The first Rensselaer touchdown came as a result of an attempted punt by Kentland after they had Deen held for downs. Rensselaer recovered the ball and quickly rushed it over for a touchdown after three minutes of play. Wright registered the second touchdown of the day, a forward pass turning the trick. The third touchdown respited from the line bucking of Collins. Coach Leighly inserted several a of his second string men at this point and the Rensselaer scoring became less frequent. Thompson at quarterback handled his team in a clever manner and proved a bulwark of strength on both the offense and defense. On next Saturday the' locals will play Emerson at Gary, a team that has shown but little strength this season, but one that is likely at any moment to bowl over some aspiring eleven, Kirklin will be here Armistice day to meet the Red and Black and if - Rensselaer can bag these two games they will be a , strong claimant to the state being one of the few Indiana teams that have not yet met with defeat.

Hennajah Hanson and Hazel Jones, who are teaching at Fair Oaks, were Rensselaer callers Saturday. *