1940 Stanford Indians football team
1940 Stanford Indians football | |
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Conference | Pacific Coast Conference |
Ranking | |
AP | No. 2 |
Record | 10–0 (7–0 PCC) |
Head coach |
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Offensive scheme | T formation |
Home stadium | Stanford Stadium |
Conf | Overall | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Team | W | L | T | W | L | T | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
No. 2 Stanford $ | 7 | – | 0 | – | 0 | 10 | – | 0 | – | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
No. 10 Washington | 7 | – | 1 | – | 0 | 7 | – | 2 | – | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Oregon State | 4 | – | 3 | – | 1 | 5 | – | 3 | – | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Washington State | 3 | – | 4 | – | 2 | 4 | – | 4 | – | 2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Oregon | 3 | – | 4 | – | 1 | 4 | – | 4 | – | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
California | 3 | – | 4 | – | 0 | 4 | – | 6 | – | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
USC | 2 | – | 3 | – | 2 | 3 | – | 4 | – | 2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Montana | 1 | – | 2 | – | 0 | 4 | – | 4 | – | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
UCLA | 1 | – | 6 | – | 0 | 1 | – | 9 | – | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Idaho | 0 | – | 4 | – | 0 | 1 | – | 7 | – | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 1940 Stanford Indians football team, nicknamed the "Wow Boys",[b] represented Stanford University as a member of the Pacific Coast Conference (PCC) during the 1940 college football season. First-year head coach Clark Shaughnessy inherited a team that finished with a 1–7–1 record the previous season.[2] He installed his own version of the T formation, a system that had largely fallen into disuse since the 1890s and was viewed as obsolete.[3] The Indians shocked observers when they won all ten of their games including the Rose Bowl, which prompted several selectors to declare them the 1940 national champions. Stanford's dramatic reversal of fortunes prompted football programs across the nation to abandon the single-wing formation in favor of the new T formation.
Schedule
Date | Opponent | Rank | Site | Result | Attendance | Source |
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September 28 | at San Francisco* | W 27–0 | 25,000 | [4] | ||
October 5 | Oregon | W 13–0 | ||||
October 12 | Santa Clara* |
| W 7–6 | 54,999 | [5] | |
October 19 | at No. 19 Rogers Field | W 26–14 | 23,500 | |||
October 26 | No. 17 USC | No. 9 |
| W 21–7 | 60,000 | |
November 2 | at UCLA | No. 6 | W 20–14 | 55,000 | ||
November 9 | No. 11 Washington | No. 6 |
| W 20–10 | 65,000 | [6] |
November 16 | No. 19 Oregon State | No. 4 |
| W 28–14 | 35,000 | |
November 30 | at California | No. 3 | W 13–7 | |||
January 1, 1941 | vs. No. 7 Nebraska* | No. 2 | W 21–13 | 92,000 | [7] | |
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Preseason
Stanford center
Season
"It couldn't happen—but it did . . . Clark Shaughnessy, who coached the University of Chicago football team to dismal defeat and eventual extinction, is now leading an unbeaten, untied Stanford eleven toward the nation's greatest gridiron glory."[13]
Stanford opened the season with a road game against San Francisco U at Kezar Stadium. It was part of the first-ever major college football doubleheader, which also featured Santa Clara and Utah.[3] The Indians defeated San Francisco convincingly, 27–0.[16] In attendance was their next opponents' head coach, Tex Oliver of Oregon, and he said, "Half of the time neither we or the spectators knew who was the ballcarrier until someone would dart out from the sidelines with the pigskin under his arms... and it was probably quarterback Frank Albert."[17] Oliver added, "If we expect to stop their attack, we'll have to work fast", and immediately returned home to conduct intense practices in preparation for Stanford.[17]
The extra preparation did not halt the Stanford attack, however, and according to Harold Parrott in The Milwaukee Journal, "the duped Webfoots chased phantom ball carriers all over the field. They tackled everybody but the nonchalant-looking Stanford man who actually had the ball."[13] Stanford won again, 13–0.[16] The following week, the Indians narrowly edged Santa Clara, 7–6,[16] to remain "the only untied, undefeated team in the Far West."[18] After defeating Washington State at home, 26–14,[16] Stanford met the defending Pacific Coast Conference (PCC) champions, Southern California.[19] With 90 seconds remaining to play, the game was tied at seven, but Stanford used its deception tactics to score two touchdowns to win, 21–7.[13]
The Indians then beat
Postseason
In the final
Nebraska received the opening
After the season, three
Legacy
An earlier doubter, Pop Warner acknowledged the unexpected success of the revived formation. During Stanford's meteoric 1940 season, Warner said, "Shaughnessy has taken that T formation we used when I played at Cornell in 1892 and made it work as it has never worked before. This is because he has added his own ideas. There is no mystery about Shaughnessy's success at Stanford as I see it. The only mystery is where the ball is on some of those tricky plays of his."[13]
The 1940 Stanford Indians, who became known as the "Wow Boys",
Players drafted by the NFL
Player | Position | Draft year | Round | Pick | NFL club |
Norm Standlee | Fullback | 1941 | 1 | 3 | Chicago Bears |
Hugh Gallarneau | Halfback | 1941 | 3 | 23 | Chicago Bears |
Peter Kmetovic |
Halfback | 1942 | 1 | 3 | Philadelphia Eagles |
Frankie Albert | Quarterback | 1942 | 1 | 10 | Chicago Bears |
Vic Lindskog | Center | 1942 | 2 | 13 | Philadelphia Eagles |
Fred Meyer | End | 1942 | 12 | 103 | Philadelphia Eagles |
Notes
- NCAA-recognized selectors the Billingsley Report, Helms Athletic Foundation, and Poling System declared Stanford to be the 1940 championship team.[1]
- ^ Vow Boys" teams of the mid-1930s.
References
- ^ a b "National Poll Champions", 2007 NCAA Division I Football Records Book (PDF), pp. 74–76, National Collegiate Athletic Association, 2007. Accessed 2009-07-28. Archived 2009-07-31.
- ^ a b c Wow Boys: The Team That Changed the Game, Stanford Magazine, Stanford Alumni Association, January/February 2007. Accessed 2009-07-28. Archived 2009-07-30.
- ^ a b c d e A Melding Of Men All Suited To A T: Clark Shaughnessy was a dour theoretician, Frankie Albert an unrestrained quarterback and Stanford a team of losers, but combined they forever changed the game of football, Sports Illustrated, September 5, 1977.
- Newspapers.com.
- Newspapers.com.
- Newspapers.com.
- Newspapers.com.
- ^ a b c "Clark Shaughnessy". College Football Hall of Fame. Football Foundation. Retrieved July 28, 2009.
- ^ a b The 1940s: The Bears roll out the T formation, Sports Illustrated, August 30, 1999.
- ^ Clark D. Shaughnessy Records by Year, College Football Data Warehouse, retrieved July 28, 2009. Archived 2009-07-31.
- ^ Chicago Yearly Results: 1935-1939 Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine, College Football Data Warehouse, retrieved July 28, 2009.
- ^ Sport: Football, Nov. 4, 1940, Time, November 4, 1940.
- ^ The Milwaukee Journal, p. 10, December 29, 1940.
- ^ ISBN 0-8032-7632-X.
- The Evening Independent, p. 13, September 11, 1940.
- ^ a b c d e f g Stanford Yearly Results: 1940–1942, College Football Data Warehouse, retrieved July 28, 2009. Archived 2009-07-30.
- ^ Eugene Register-Guard, p. 6, September 30, 1940.
- ^ Stanford On Climb Again; Shaughnessy Does Good Job In New Post, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, p. 17, October 17, 1940.
- The Bend Bulletin, October 26, 1940.
- ^ Sport: In Waltz Time, Time, November 18, 1940.
- Eugene Register-Guard, November 25, 1940.
- The Evening Independent, November 14, 1940.
- ^ ISBN 1-4013-3703-1.
- The Evening Independent, December 2, 1940.
- ^ The Milwaukee Sentinel, p. 4B, January 1, 1941.
- St. Petersburg Times, January 3, 1941.
- St. Petersburg Times, January 1, 1941.
- ^ "1941 NFL Draft". Pro-Football-Reference.com. Archived from the original on October 25, 2009. Retrieved September 16, 2014.
- ^ "1942 NFL Draft". Pro-Football-Reference.com. Retrieved February 13, 2017.