Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - History of the University (Nevins) [PAGE 268]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

250 UNIVERSITY AFTER IT FOUND ITSELF by his successes with a high school team in Cook County, was brought to the University the next year. The wisdom of the selection was proved by a record of two seasons after 1913 without a defeat. A pronounced element in the increasing strength of the team, however, is the new wealth of football material, especially in colleges other than engineering, where the class work had always required such close application as to prevent many students from training for it; another is the revision of football rules to favor open tactics and light players. But the long experiment with graduate coaches was creditable to University spirit, and never in the darkest days were unfair playing methods used. In baseball the University has steadily led the West, and in track has always occupied a position better than the average. Coach Huff remained in eharge of the nine, as well as athletic director, from the beginning of the administration. In 1907 the undergraduates were frightened by his departure to manage the Boston American team, but he was induced to return. A repetition of the spectacular Eastern raid was prevented by conference rules, but in 1912 the team won every game played. The track team grew perceptibly stronger as the years went by, and in 1907,1909, 1913, and 1914 won the outdoor conference meets of the West. It has been better on the outdoor than the indoor tracks, *and has won its place rather by general excellence than by the production of stars. The first basketball was played in 1906, and the team now has its own coach. One of the best measures of the growing vigor of student life was the rapid increase! in student organizations, which in large part represented the natural striving towards student democracy. Not merely literary and professional bodies, but State clubs, county clubs,