|
A chance to play football; the big time; the Junior year 1972-'73 - Fate Fairies - book version
This entry was posted on 10/24/2011 1:45 AM and is filed under Fate Fairies:Fate Fairies - book version.
Coach Jim Crummey. The great man. He was a small man in physical stature. He had thick glasses, a tuft of unruly hair on the top of his head, and an occasional thoughtful and unimposing smile on his face. James Crummey had been the head coach at Whitewater as long as anyone could remember. From time to time he would comment that he had coached one of our dads or two. I believe the man's resume says he took over the job in 1943. There was a stint in the Navy during "'The War." And then back to coaching. He only mentioned the war once to us. It was in the context of smoking.
"I tried smoking in the Navy during the war fella's, and I did not like it. Even with all that stress and waiting that the military sometimes sends one's way," he said one day. He was trying to do that "behavior-off-the-field chat" with his "fella's," as he would call us all.
Coach's record and note keeping skills were legendary. During a team meeting it was not uncommon, in fact ritual, to hear him swear, "Now where the hell are my notes; who took my damn notes?"
I had gotten acquainted with Coach Crummey as a Freshman and Junior Varsity player. But also, the coach was one of the in-the-car Driver's Education teachers. In the spring of my sophomore year, a couple times a week Coach would dutifully take me and a couple of my peers out to practice driving. Coach Crummy had the patients of biblical Job. He would sit calmly in the passenger seat and give the driver guidance. Sometimes as we found out, Coach often had us drive by his boat-sales marina. No one found that unusual in those days. In fact years later as a supervisor with the City of Dallas I would sometimes drive by our house there to check and see if all was well. Anyway, by the time I got to the varsity team, I had picked up on a few of Coach's nuances.
In my untrained eye, but usually reliable Irish intuition, I could tell James Crummey was a decent fellow. But probably more important than my humble observations was the fact that Coach Crummey had a talent for tempering the culture of small-town sports politics. I can remember no one ever speaking ill of Coach - a remarkable accomplishment in a profession which was under constant pressure from boaster clubs, parents, athletic clubs, and businesses trying to influence a small town coach's decisions about how to coach the team and whose kids to play in the games on Friday nights.
Our preparation for Varsity football, at least in my case, had been adequate enough to avoid a major culture shock once we moved up to the big league. Remember, I had been on the J.V. taxi crew that would be brought up to the old black chat track field north of the high school to do a bit of scrimmage with the Varsity players. You knew you were at the big time when you were up there at that old field with the gridiron practice field on the inside of the crude old track field. Fall on that track and you would get a knee, palm, elbow, or butt full of black chat gravel and cinder. Coach always made us run a quarter mile race with our team peers in full equipment around that track each practice - linemen against linemen, backs against backs, ends against ends, et cetera. Being a small lineman, I usually compensated for my smaller size by being a good runner and caught the coaches' eyes by faring well in the races.
Coach Crummey's assistant was the venerable Jack Mead. Ol' Jack was the boy's physical education instructor (Gym Teacher). He also lived only a couple miles from our farm and once in a while I would find myself over at their farmette paling around with Jack's son Mark who was in my class and also on the football team. Although he had bad knees, Mr. Mead would sometimes play basketball with us. I remember his old car that had push-buttons on the dash to change the gears in lieu of a gear shifter. It was a big old lumbering vehicle from another era that seemed to shadow Jack's own personality. So, I was well acquainted with Mr. Mead. But perhaps most interesting and more important, Ol' Jack had played in the National Football League in his younger days, notably for the New York Giants.
Coach Mead was a big man and a quiet man. And, like my dad he rationed his words, but when he did speak you got the point. Coach Crummey would always ask Mr. Mead if he had anything to add after a pre-game pep-talk. Usually Coach Mead declined other than saying something like, "Let's get'em men." Once, Coach Mead told a story. We were all surprised at his departure from his usual three words as he headed into a vignette.
"Fellas," Coach Mead said as he started his contribution. "Once while playing for the Giants I was whistling in the locker room before a big game. The biggest guy on the team came up to me and said, "Quit whistling Mead...or I am going to punch you...right...in...the...nose."
We all waited for some type of anecdote to the story. Nothing came. That was it. That was Coach Jack. After that, I was always cautious to not whistle or tell too many jokes before a game. I think I got the point.
I got a shitty helmet that first year on Varsity. And, my shoes (cleats as we called them) fit like clown shoes. But I suppose I should take solace in the fact the equipment was provided in those days. I hear now, half the schools in the country expect the kids (mom and dad, or guardians) to provide all the equipment. But I was just glad to play with the "big team."
There was another variable to this new rung in my sports ladder - I drove myself to practice. The poetic full circle had come to fruition. Coach Crummy was part of my learning to get my driver's license. Now, I would be playing football for the man, driving to his practices myself, leaving the era of "reliant-on-mom's-taxi" long behind.
That year on Varsity, I did get to play. I played almost every special teams play that fall of 1972 - kickoffs, extra points, field goals, punts. In that capacity, I would frequently find myself as a lineman in those special teams situations. My name was also penciled in as a second string offensive guard and a second string defensive linebacker position on that clip board Coach always had trouble finding. But bear in mind Coach was not as goofy as first blush might suggest. His teams continually fared well in the always competitive Southern Lakes Conference - by then elevated to a 12-team, two division league. And, there was now an end-of-season playoff game for the championship.
The high school had no football stadium of its own in those days and they used the field up at the college. Prior to 1970 the high school Varsity games were played at the old and soggy Hamilton Field gridiron in the middle of the University of Wisconsin -Whitewater campus. I remember going to watch games there; that old stadium is gone now having been retired to a humble plot of grass between McGraw and Heide Halls; it sits at the base of the east side of the famous glaciated Drumlin hill that the original Old Main building was situated on.
After 1970 our games moved to the new Warhawk Stadium (now Perkins Stadium) built on the north side of Whitewater in amphitheater construction style and on another glaciated slope. It was and still is a state of the art presentation and is the third largest football stadium in Wisconsin able to hold upwards of 13,000 people at full capacity. I remember my breath was taken away by its intimidating size the first time I ran out on the field in the cool fall air on a football Friday night in 1972.
Coach seemed to be tapping some of the Green Bay Packers play book. One of our go-to plays was the Green Bay sweep - a play Coach Vince Lombardi had perfected in his heyday with "The Pack."
That Junior year of mine, we lost our first game to Jefferson (non-conference opener) but went on to win our eight conference games. We then played in the first conference interdivisional Championship game beating Burlington 35 to 0. The game was held on our own turf at Warhawk Stadium, on a Wednesday night if my memory serves me correct.
Note: This blog "Fate Fairies" - book version Category is a work in progress. The original vignettes are being edited for book form. Go to the Cooldadiomedia Web site and the Fate Fairies Page for an ordered chronology of the book vignettes (chapters).
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
