1909 college football season
Tennessee football program
Regular season	September 25–November 25
Champion	Yale
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The1909 college football season was the first for the 3-pointfield goal, which had previously been worth 4 points.^[1] The season ran from Saturday, September 25, untilThanksgiving Day, November 25, although a few games were played on the week before.^[2]

The 1909 season was also one of the most dangerous in the history of college football. The third annual survey by theChicago Tribune at season's end showed that 10 college players had been killed and 38 seriously injured in 1909, up from six fatalities and 14 maimings in 1908.^[3]

Schools in the Midwest competed in the Western Conference consisting ofIllinois,Indiana,Iowa,Minnesota,Northwestern,Purdue andWisconsin andChicago. Iowa was also a member of theMissouri Valley Conference, which included futureBig 12 teamsIowa State,Kansas,Missouri, andNebraska, as well asDrake andWashington University in St. Louis. In California, intercollegiate football programs (such as those ofStanford University and theUniversity of California) had been discontinued after the 1905 season, andrugby was the autumn intercollegiate sport.^[4]

Although there was no provision for a national championship, major teams played their regular schedules before facing their most difficult matches late in the season. The most eagerly anticipated games were theNovember 10 matchups, withPrinceton atYale,Dartmouth atHarvard,Michigan vs.Pennsylvania (in Philadelphia), andCornell atChicago.^[5]

The rules for American football in 1909 were significantly different than the ones of a century later, as many of the present conventions (100 yard field, four downs to gain ten yards, and the 6-point touchdown) would not be adopted until 1912.^[6]

Beginning in 1909, the worth of a field goal dropped from 4 points to 3 points. Touchdowns remained at 5 points. "This has come about gradually," noted one report, "owing to the feeling of players and spectators that two field kick goals should not be reckoned of greater value that a touchdown from which a goal is scored. As it is now, a touchdown if a goal results, counts six points, and two field goals count but six in the aggregate."^[7] For the first time, ineligible receivers were identified.^[8]

The rules in 1909 were:

• Field 110 yards in length
• Kickoff made from midfield
• Three downs to gain ten yards
• Touchdown worth5 points
• Field goal worth3 points
• Game time based on agreement of the teams, not to exceed two 45 minute halves
• Forward pass legal, but subject to penalties

• TheColorado Faculty Athletic Conference (CFAC, later theRocky Mountain Athletic Conference) began its first season of play in 1909 with four teams inColorado.

TheCarlisle Indians played a Wednesday afternoon game on September 22 at home against Lebanon Valley, winning 30–0. The previous Saturday, they had beaten a non-college team from Steelton, Pennsylvania, 35–0.

OnSeptember 25, defending championPennsylvania beat Gettysburg College 20–0 on two touchdowns, and a field goal (one of the first three-pointers) by Edmund Thayer.Carlisle beat visiting Villanova 9–0.Washington and Jefferson defeated Denison College 13–2.Lehigh beat Lebanon Valley 24–0. To the west,Ohio State defeated Otterbein 14–0,Minnesota beat Lawrence 26–0, andKansas crushed Kansas Normal (now Emporia State) 55–0.St. Louis edged Shurtleff College 12–11. In the South,Virginia defeated William and Mary 30–0 in a short (two 15 minute halves) game at home^[9] andVanderbilt defeated Southwestern Presbyterian (now Rhodes College) 52–0.^[10]

Defending co-championHarvard opened its season in a Wednesday afternoon game, beating Bates College 11–0 onSeptember 29. In other home openers,Brown beat Rhode Island 6–0,Yale beat Wesleyan 11–0, andDartmouth beat Massachusetts 22–0.Pennsylvania moved to 2–0–0 with a 22–0 win over Ursinus.^[11]

OnOctober 2,Brown beat Colgate 12–0,Yale defeated Syracuse 15–0 andHarvard won against Bowdoin 17–0.Army opened its season with a 22–0 win over Tufts.Pennsylvania earned its third win, over Dickinson, 28–0. Elsewhere,Auburn won 11–0 over Howard College (now Samford University),Pitt defeated Ohio Northern 16–0,North Carolina beat Wake Forest 18–0,Arkansas won 24–0 over Henderson State, andKansas beat little St. Mary's College of Kansas 29–0.State College of Pennsylvania rolled over Grove City, 31–0,North Carolina A&M (now N.C. State) trampled Maryville (Tennessee) College 39–0. In Western Conference play,Chicago overwhelmed Purdue 40–0, andMinnesota crushed Iowa 41–0.Carlisle yielded a score in a 48–6 win over Bucknell, andPrinceton surrendered two touchdowns in a 47–12 win over Stevens.Dartmouth was unable to score in a 0–0 tie with Vermont.Lehigh lost at home to Franklin and Marshall, 10–0. In a game the day before,Virginia held off Davidson, 11–0.

In four midweek games onOctober 6,Navy opened its season with a 16–6 win over the other Annapolis school, St. John's College, andPrinceton defeated Villanova, 12–0.Yale, in a 12–0 win over Holy Cross, andBrown (which beat Bates, 17–0), both stayed unscored upon and upped their records to 3–0–0.

October 9: Fewer teams stayed unscored upon.Yale won 33–0 over theSpringfield Training School college team,Penn defeated West Virginia 12–0, andBrown won 10–0 over Amherst College. Further south,Virginia beat St. John's of Maryland, 12–0. All four winners were 4–0–0.Harvard was surprised by Williams College, which led in the first half before the Crimson eked out an 8–6 win, andPrinceton struggled against Fordham, averting defeat with a last minute field goal, 3–0.Pitt beat Marietta College, 12–0, andLafayette rolled 50–0 over Hobart College.

Opening their seasons were defending southern championLSU with a 10–0 triumph over visiting Ole Miss,Kansas (11–0 over Oklahoma),Texas (12–0 over Southwestern),Texas A&M (17–0 over Austin),Wisconsin opened with a 22–0 win over Lawrence College. andMichigan, which struggled in a 3–0 win over Case.Alabama defeated Howard College 14–0, andArkansas allowed at TD in beating Drury, 12–6. Western Conference games sawChicago beat Indiana 12–0 andMinnesota defeat Iowa State, 18–0, butIllinois was surprised by visiting Kentucky State College (later the University of Kentucky), 6–2. When the Kentucky team was welcomed home, Philip Carbusier said that they had "fought like wildcats", a nickname that stuck.^[12]Navy won 12–3 over Rutgers andArmy beat Trinity College of Connecticut, 17–6.

The biggest game of the week was atWilkes-Barre, wherePenn State andCarlisle met on neutral ground. Down 6–5 when Larry Vorhis missed the point after, State was up 8–6 on a Vorhis field goal. Vorhis was sacked in the end zone by Emil Wauseka during a punt return, and the game ended 8–8.^[13]

October 13: In a midweek game,Princeton found itself losing 6–5 to visiting Virginia Tech after an interception was returned for a touchdown. The Tigers stayed unbeaten (4–0–0) on a drop kicked field goal in the last four minutes.^[14]

October 16: At Philadelphia,Pennsylvania hostedBrown. Both were unbeaten (4–0–0), and neither had been scored upon. Penn shut down the Bears offense and won 13–5.Yale, also 4–0–0 in four shutouts, earned a fifth, handingArmy its first defeat, 17–0. In an intersectional battle of Tigers,Princeton handed visitingSewanee its first defeat, 20–0. Once-tiedCarlisle faced Syracuse at New York'sPolo Grounds and won 14–11.Pitt yielded its first points in an 18–6 win over Bucknell, andHarvard handled Maine, 17–0.Navy was upset by Villanova, 11–6.

In the South,Virginia, unbeaten (4–0–0) and unscored upon, was upset by a (1–1–1) Lehigh team, 11–7, in a game at Norfolk.LSU beat Mississippi A&M (now Mississippi State), 15–0.Alabama edged Clemson, 3–0, at Birmingham.Arkansas defeated Wichita State, 23–6.Texas A&M and Texas Christian played a scoreless tie. To the West,Chicago beat Illinois, 14–8.Minnesota defeated Nebraska, 14–0.Michigan handed Ohio State its 10th consecutive defeat.Kansas defeated Kansas Agricultural (now Kansas State), 5–3, andMissouri beat visiting Missouri School of Mines (of Rolla, now Missouri S & T) 13–0.

October 23: InPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania (5–0–0) hostedPenn State (2–0–1) in a battle of unbeatens. Penn fumbled away two chances to score in the first half, but took a 3–0 lead on a 35–yard field goal. Penn State came within 15 yards of a touchdown, but settled for a dropkicked field goal to tie the Quakers.^[15]Harvard handedBrown a second straight loss, 11–0. At Pittsburgh,Pitt hosted unbeaten (3–0–1)Carlisle and won 14–3.Yale Bulldogs stayed unscored on and reached 6–0–0 with a 36–0 win over Colgate. The other major unbeaten team in the east,Princeton, was upset by visitingLafayette, after the Leopards' Frank Irmschler blocked a field goal in the final six seconds and returned it 92 yards for a touchdown, winning 6–0 in what the New York Times termed "probably the most sensational finish that has ever been seen in a football game."^[16]Navy was defeated at home, 5–0, byVirginia.

In the South,Vanderbilt hostedAuburn in a meeting of 3–0–0 teams at Nashville, with Vandy winning 17–0.Alabama andOle Miss played a scoreless tie at Jackson.Arkansas defeatedOklahoma 21–6.Sewanee beatGeorgia Tech in Atlanta, 15–0. To the West,Michigan averted being tied by Marquette, 6–5.Wisconsin beat Indiana 6–3.Missouri was tied by Iowa State, 6–6, andKansas (4–0–0) hosted Washington University in St. Louis (2–0–0) and won 23–0.

OnOctober 30, the fatal injury ofArmy player Eugene Byrne, at a game against visitingHarvard, overshadowed the other games of the day. With ten minutes left to play, Byrne had broken his neck in a collision with three Harvard men. The game was halted with Harvard ahead, 9–0.^[17] Byrne died the next morning, and Army canceled the remainder of its schedule, including the annualArmy-Navy Game.^[18]

In other contests^[19]Penn beatCarlisle, 29–6.Princeton beatNavy at Annapolis, 5–3. TheLafayette Leopards, who had upset Princeton the week before, tiedPenn State, 6–6, giving the Nittany Lions a record of 2 wins, 3 ties, and no losses. Meanwhile, theYale Bulldogs remained unscored upon as they registered their seventh consecutive shutout, a 34–0 win over visiting Amherst College. Yale had an average score of 21–0 against its opposition, but still had to face Brown, Princeton and Harvard.

In Western Conference play (the future Big Ten) between two unbeatens,Minnesota defeated visitingChicago, 20–6.Wisconsin won at Northwestern, 21–11. Further west,Missouri edged Iowa, 13–12, andKansas won at Washburn, 17–0.

In a big game atNew Orleans, theLSU Tigers suffered their first defeat in almost two years, losing toSewanee's Tigers, 15–6. AtNashville,Vanderbilt beat Ole Miss, 17–0, and atAtlanta,Alabama beat Georgia, 14–0.Texas A&M won at Baylor, 9–6.N.C. State (North Carolina A&M) beat visiting Maryland 31–0,Virginia beat VMI 32–0, andArkansas clobbered Ouachita College, 56–0.TCU lost at Texas, 24–0.

In intersectional games,Michigan beat visiting Syracuse 44–0, whilePittsburgh was upset by visiting Notre Dame, 6–0.

OnNovember 6Yale remained unscored upon, beatingBrown, 23–0.Harvard beat Cornell 18–0, andPenn State beat Bucknell 33–0.Penn averted a defeat by visitingLafayette, managing a 6–6 tie. Other ties were betweenPrinceton and Dartmouth (6–6),Pittsburgh and West Virginia (0–0), andNavy and Washington & Jefferson (0–0). The "Jeffs" had a 7–0–0 record before meeting Navy, against smaller schools. To the west, previously unbeaten (5–0–0)Michigan was upset at home by unheraldedNotre Dame, 11–3. Michigan's CoachFielding H. Yost told a reporter after the game, "I take my hat off to the Irishmen", and a story in theDetroit Free Press the next day made the "Fighting Irishmen" a nickname that would ever after stick with Notre Dame.^[20]Kansas won at Nebraska 6–0, to stay unbeaten, and once-tiedMissouri beat Washington University in St. Louis, 5–0.Minnesota andWisconsin were both idle and preparing to meet at Madison on November 13. In the South,Vanderbilt defeated visiting Tennessee, 23–0, and North Carolina A&M (N.C. State) won at Washington & Lee 3–0.Virginia beat visiting VMI 32–0.LSU had won earlier in a Thursday game at Louisiana Tech, 23–0. Further west, theUniversity of California played a football game, beating the University of Nevada 19–8, and theUniversity of Colorado beat the University of New Mexico, 53–0.^[21] In a Monday game at Houston,Texas A&M defeated Texas 23–0 to stay unbeaten.

November 13 saw a number of intersectional games. Previously unbeaten and untiedVanderbilt (5–0–0) traveled to Columbus, O. and lost 5–0 to Ohio State. On the same afternoon, unbeaten (5–0–2)Pennsylvania went to Ann Arbor to meet once-beaten (4–1–0)Michigan, and sustained their first loss, 12–6.Penn State stayed unbeaten, reaching 5–0–2 after defeating visiting West Virginia 40–0.Lafayette went to 5–0–1 after beating Stroudsburg, 43–0.

At a Western Conference game between two unbeatens at Madison, Wisconsin,Minnesota (5–0–0) facedWisconsin (3–0–0). The visitors won 34–6. In the MVIAA,Missouri (5–0–1) hosted Drake (4–0–0 against smaller opponents), and Missouri won 22–6.Arkansas (5–0–0) andLSU (4–1–0) met atMemphis, and the "Cardinals" of Arkansas won 16–0. CoachHugo Bezdek remarked that his players were like "a wild band of razorback hogs", giving Arkansas teams a new nickname.^[22]Alabama stayed unbeaten with a 10–0 win at Tennessee, andTexas A&M reached 5–0–1 with a 47–0 win over visiting Trinity College of Dallas (and three days later at Dallas, A&M defeated Oklahoma, 14–8)

Kansas andNorth Carolina A&M were idle.Virginia won at Georgetown, 21–0, but the Cavaliers' halfback Archer Christian was fatally injured.

In the East, unbeaten, untied and unscored onYale (8–0–0) hosted once-beatenPrinceton (5–1–1). Yale had a ninth straight shutout, winning 17–0 in its last game before it would meetHarvard, which raised its record to 8–0–0, defeating Dartmouth 12–3.

• OnNovember 20Yale, which had allowed no points in nine games, played its only away game of the season, facing theHarvard Crimson, who had allowed only 9 points all season. Both teams were unbeaten and untied, and met before 38,000 at Cambridge. Yale's Carroll T. Cooney blocked a punt by Wayland Minot, who fell on the ball in the end zone for a safety, and a 2–0 Yale lead. Later, Stephen Philbin's 30 yard run brought Yale to the Harvard 20, andTed Coy kicked a field goal for a 5–0 Yale lead at halftime. In the second half, Harvard made it past the 55 yard line only once, but still kept Yale out of its end zone. Coy managed another field goal late in the game, and Yale won 8–0.^[23]

In other games played on November 20, unbeaten (6–0–0)Minnesota lost, at home, to once-beaten (5–1–0)Michigan, 15–6.Kansas stayed unbeaten with a 20–7 win over visiting Iowa. In its annual game against Lehigh,Lafayette won 21–0, while at New Orleans,Alabama and Tulane played to a 5–5 tie.

Other teams closed out their seasons with games onThanksgiving Day (November 25). AtKansas City, the MVIAA championship came down to unbeaten (9–0–0)Kansas against unbeaten and once-tied (6–0–1)Missouri. The Missouri Tigers won, 12–6.

Arkansas beat Washington University in St. Louis 32–0 to finish unbeaten and untied (7–0–0). Arkansas was considered the unofficial "Champions of the South" for 1909.Colorado beat Colorado School of Mines 16–0 in a season with four college games, for a 6–0–0 finish.

Lafayette beat Dickinson,Texas A&M won at Texas, andPenn State won at Pittsburgh; the score was 5–0 in all three games, and all three winners finished unbeaten. At Norfolk, unbeatenNorth Carolina A & M (the future N.C. State) lost to once-beaten Virginia Tech, 18–5, and at Birmingham, unbeatenAlabama lost toLSU, 12–6.

The consensusAll-America team includedWalter Camp's selections:

• Rushing yards leader:Jim Thorpe, Carlisle, 781

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