Monday, Dec. 05, 1949
"Today!"
The Army had the word straight from an old West Point superintendent now in Tokyo. Messaged General Douglas Mac-Arthur: "There is no substitute for victory." If West Point's tough, all-conquering football squad needed any further goad last week, it was supplied by pre-game gibes from the Navy cheering section. With President Harry Truman and 102,442 others watching in Philadelphia's Municipal Stadium, Annapolis banners flaunted some sore subjects.
One asking "After Davidson--Smith?" hit at the breather games on West Point's comparatively soft schedule. Making capital of West Point's unwillingness to play
Notre Dame (which is on the Annapolis schedule), another sign blazoned: "When do you drop Navy?" From the Army side came the answering banner: "Today!" Then, in one of its most powerful exhibitions of the year, Army gave Navy its worst drubbing in their 50-game series, 38-0.
There was nothing Navy could do about the savagery of Army's defense platoon, the precisely explosive blocking of its offense, the smart quarterbacking of All-America Arnold Galiffa. A versatile, 22-year-old ex-G.I. (who is also a baseball infielder and captain of West Point's basketball team), Galiffa bossed the team with easy nonchalance, completed eleven passes, scored one touchdown himself and called on heavy-duty Fullback Gil Stephenson to crash over for three more.
At South Bend, where Notre Dame's legendary Four Horsemen celebrated their 25th anniversary reunion, there was speculation about whether the 1949 Notre Dame's team was the best in the school's 62-year football history. "Let's say it's one of the greatest," said Horseman Elmer Layden, onetime fullback. But the 1949 entry made a good case for itself by crushing Southern California, 32-0, and stretching Notre Dame's unbeaten string to 37 games over four seasons.
On other college gridirons last week, the curtain rolled down with bowl bids and sectional championships hanging in the balance.
P: In New Orleans, Louisiana State upset Tulane, 21-0, and won an invitation to meet unbeaten, untied Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl.
P: In Houston, air-minded Rice switched to a ground game and surprised Baylor, 21-7, to win the Southwestern Conference championship and an invitation to the
Cotton Bowl (Rice's bowl foe: North Carolina).
P: In Philadelphia, the Ivy League championship for the second year running went to Cornell, which put on a spectacular rally and sank Pennsylvania, 29-21.
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