164 2009 GEORGIA TECH FOOTBALL BIG MOMENTS
Tech 222, Cumberland 0 MOST LOPSIDED GAME EVER CAME IN ATLANTA IN 1916 The most lopsided game of all time happened in Atlanta on Oct. 7, 1916. The previous spring, Cumberland’s baseball team had trounced Tech, 22-0. Cumberland University was located in Lebanon, Tenn., and the Cumberland squad was actually comprised of professional players from nearby Nashville. Georgia Tech head coach John Heisman was not amused, and the Tech students and alumni howled for revenge, so Heisman offered the Bulldogs a $500 guarantee to come to Atlanta for a football game. In the game, Tech scored 32 touchdowns, averaged 3.8 points per minute, carried the ball for 978 yards, and never threw a pass. Cumberland, since it was losing yardage faster than it was gaining real estate, began to kick the football back to the Jackets immediately after Tech kicked off to them. Amazingly, neither team made a first down in the game because Tech scored within four downs on every possession. All-America Everett Strupper led Tech with six touchdowns.
Wrong Way Riegels
H I S T O R Y
MOST STUNNING PLAY IN ROSE BOWL HISTORY The most stunning single play in the history of the Rose Bowl propelled Georgia Tech to its first bowl victory when Roy Riegels’ infamous Wrong Way Run turned out right as the Rambling Wreck beat California, 8-7, in the 1929 Rose Bowl. Early in the second quarter, with the score tied 0-0, Tech halfback Stumpy Thomason was hit by the Golden Bears’ Benny Lom. He fumbled around the Tech 35-yard line, and Riegels scooped up the bouncing ball. For Riegels, a center and captain of his Golden Bear team, fate had sent him running free and clear. He got a good block from a teammate, slipped off a tackler and spun around. But something was wrong. “Stop, Roy! You’re running the wrong way,” yelled Lom. Riegels thought the speedier Lom was asking for a lateral. At the 10-yard line, Lom grabbed Riegels, but Riegels shook him loose. Finally, at the one-yard line, Lom pulled Riegels down, but not before a 64-yard run into immortality. California still had the ball. On the first play, the Golden Bears attempted to punt the ball out of the end zone with Riegels snapping to Lom. However, the left side of the California line collapsed and Tech’s Vance Maree blocked the punt, which rolled out of bounds for a safety. Those two points turned out to be the winning points as both teams traded touchdowns in the second half, and the Rambling Wreck eventually prevailed, 8-7, in one of the strangest games ever played. Tech’s Rose Bowl win capped a perfect 10-0 season, the first undefeated season for head coach William Alexander, and the Rambling Wreck captured its second national title.
NCAA Rushing Record EDDIE LEE IVERY’S 356 YARDS SETS NCAA RECORD On a day (Nov. 11, 1978) when ice skates would have been more appropriate footwear than cleated shoes and when an agitated stomach threatened his very presence in Georgia Tech’s lineup, tailback Eddie Lee Ivery made college football history. On 26 rushes, Eddie Lee Ivery Eddie Lee gained 356 yards, IVERY more yards in a single game than any other major college back ever, on a field that required desnowing by a street sweeper twice before the game. In fact, the field was made even more treacherous by 20-degree temperatures augmented by a 20 mph wind (making the chill factor zero degrees) which turned the Falcon Stadium turf into a frozen tundra. Complicating Ivery’s plight was his stomach. After a nifty reversal of direction, which resulted in a 73-yard touchdown run early in the second quarter giving Tech a 14-0 advantage, Ivery could be seen on the sidelines doubled over at the waist, vomiting and in obvious pain. At halftime, Ivery had 122 yards on 12 carries, but his status for the second half was very much in doubt. An 80-yard touchdown run with 6:08 left in the third quarter gave Ivery 240 yards and broke Brent Cunningham’s school record of 217 yards set in 1970 against Clemson. With 10:25 left in the game, Ivery scored on a 57-yard run, giving him 309 yards. Besides giving Tech a 35-21 lead against a team that obviously was not going to surrender without a fight, it put Ivery within 41 yards of the NCAA single game record of 350 yards set by Michigan State’s Eric Allen against Purdue in 1971. When an Air Force drive fizzled at Tech’s eight-yard line on an incomplete pass, Rodgers told the team he’d let Ivery run the ball until he got the record. Ivery crashed over right tackle for 13 yards, leaving him just 28 yards short of the record. A run around right end gained another 13. Only 15 to go. Adding to the drama, Ivery’s stomach began to churn again at that point, to the extent he had to leave the game. His replacement, Ray Friday, shocked everyone by bolting 66 yards straight up the middle for his second touchdown of the day. More than six minutes remained when Tech kicked off to Air Force with a 42-21 lead, plenty of time to retrieve the ball and let Ivery get the record. The chance came when linebacker Henry Johnson intercepted a pass at the Air Force 41-yard line. Ivery trotted back onto the field and rushed 21 yards with his first carry, giving him the record. -- By David Davidson, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
12 CONSECUTIVE BOWL APPEARANCES RAMBLINWRECK.COM