The ep23 Footballs Famous Coaches

This is Jimmy Powers coming your way with another Grantland Rice story. There once again this is yours truly Jimmy Powers. Football has come a long way since the days of Granny Rice's youth

when as a 138 pound half back he was all but massacred as a member of the Vanderbilt University 11 back in 1899. But Granny never lost the spirit behind college football and through his eyes the football coaches the men who taught and teach the game to the youngsters of our land constitute a vital cornerstone of a sports-happy America.

And so, with a warm salute to the every young spirit of granny rice, I take up his narrative in first person. Asa Bushnell, guiding hand of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, a federation which includes all colleges with a registration of more than 25 football players, recently asked me to rate the top 15 or 20 coaches I've known through the years.

I couldn't do it. There are too many friends I'd have to leave out. However, for about 25 years from 1904 through the late 1920s, I kept running into a group of the most colorful coaches football has ever known.

Most of them were great coaches because they were strong personalities. Their won-and-lost records had little to do with my affection and respect for them. I've learned more from a coach talking with him after a losing game than I ever did in discussing the play that won for him.

Lou Little remarked on this one evening after Columbia had been dumped by a mid-season foe. I wandered into the Columbia dressing-room after this particular game and found Lou practically alone. Granny, he chuckled, why is it that you always show up after we lose but I seldom see you when we win one?