Blue White Illustrated

scholarship roster already decimated by the sanctions imposed by the NCAA, O'Brien and his coaches talked privately about altering the combative nature of practices, including a cutback on scrim- mages to try and avoid injuries. Drasti- cally changing the Blue-White Game in 2014 or canceling it entirely were possi- bilities. "I think the people who come back [for Blue-White weekend] have to understand the situation that we're in," O'Brien told reporters on one Coaches Caravan ap- pearance a few weeks after Zwinak's in- jury. "We cannot get our best players hurt in the Blue-White Game. That's when you get labeled a dumb coach. That's kind of what I'm driving at." Some in the media were publicly won- dering about that, too. "He's right. They can't afford injuries in scrimmages," wrote Josh Folck of lehighvalleylive.com and the Easton Ex- press. "So why not just make the event an open practice or even better a giant autograph session at Beaver Stadium for the next few years? It's not like the game exactly offers riveting football. When the actual scoring rules of football are for- gotten and points are awarded for non- contact sacks and plays more than 15 yards, the game is far from an instant classic. So why not eliminate the re- maining rules and make it something other than a game? The Penn State faith- ful will still show and fun will be had whether the event is a practice, meet and greet, carnival or a combination of all." Abolishing or suspending the actual games at the end of spring practice is not a radical concept in the highest divi- sion of college football. Not all the 127 teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision have spring games. Some teams have featured an alumni game of flag football along with a light scrimmage. It may be difficult to believe now, but from the 1930s into at least the late 1950s, there were schools, including Notre Dame and Oklahoma, that had extremely popular real games matching an alumni team against the then-current team. Even to- day, there is a 6-year-old company based in California, Gridiron Alumni Inc., that helps produce alumni games for charitable causes, primarily for high schools. The NCAA has frowned on such games and has occasionally tried ban- ning them but has never been able to get a rule passed by the membership. In the spring of 1958, West Virginia, then Penn State's third-biggest rival af- ter Pitt and Syracuse, had a real alumni game at old Mountaineer Field that fea- tured some of its former stars, including quarterback Fred Wyant and running back Joe Marconi, who led WVU to the 1954 Sugar Bowl. That West Virginia game gave me the inspiration as the sports editor of The Daily Collegian in the winter of 1958 to collaborate with the leaders of the Penn State Varsity S Club on a proposal for a similar alumni game to replace the nine- year-old Blue-White Game in the spring of 1959. The nucleus of the alumni roster would be members of the Lions' 1958 team, and the Varsity S was trying to line up then-current NFL players to partici- pate. Running back Lenny Moore of the Baltimore Colts was the first to commit, and such other standouts as defensive tackle Rosey Grier of the New York Gi- ants, linebacker Chuck Drazenovich of the Washington Redskins, quarterback Milt Plum of the Cleveland Browns and fullback Fran Rogel of the Pittsburgh Steelers had shown an interest. As I wrote in the Collegian, we figured it would be a "financial bonanza" for Penn State's then-undernourished scholarship program, and athletic direc- tor Ernie McCoy agreed. But after a cou- ple of months, McCoy formally rejected our proposal, saying "We do not have to bring in the pros to make our program go. That's not within the precepts of educa- tion and besides, it leads to overempha- sis." McCoy was a Michigan man, once a Wolverine basketball star and head coach, with high principals and integrity, and I wonder what he would think of the dominating and somewhat insidious pro influence on college football today. A Penn State alumni game may seem ludicrous and impossible today for many reasons, including a parallel concern about potential injuries and liability. One can be certain the NFL would pro- hibit active players from playing. But if actual intrasquad games are on their way out, what about a lighthearted all- alumni flag football game featuring such retired NFL pros as Kerry Collins, Curt Warner and LaVar Arrington with con- temporary NFL stars like Paul Posluszny, Tamba Hali, NaVorro Bowman and Sean Lee on the officiating crew? Combine the flag game with a medium to light workout for the current team and the other Blue-White weekend activities, and I think there would be few com- plaints from Penn State's loyal fans. Michigan's Lloyd Carr usually avoided a real game to conclude his spring drills and had open practices for fans. His successors, Rich Rodriguez and Brady Hoke, frequently turned to controlled scrimmages similar to other practice sessions because the coaches believed they didn't have enough healthy players for two full teams. Jim Harbaugh, who had competitive spring games when coaching Stanford, revised the Wolver- ines' actual game last spring and drew a not-surprising 60,000 fans to the Big House. After attracting 65,548 to its tra- ditional spring game in 2014, Tennessee went to the offense-defense scoring for- mat and still had 63,106 turn out. James Franklin went back to a real game in 2014 and 2015, although he watched it all on the field behind the of- fense while his assistants called the plays. The start of the 2015 Blue-White Game was moved to late afternoon (4 p.m.) for the first time in decades, and there was talk of a night game in the fu- ture, perhaps moving to midweek to en- tice ESPN to televise it live nationwide. As one insider told me, "The Blue-White Game has become a great recruiting tool with maybe 80 to 90 recruits invited. That's why the time of the 2015 game was pushed back. Some of the highly rated recruits had SATs in the morning and would not have been able to get here and see all the pregame festivities as well as the entire game." Yet, even that late-afternoon start time was not unprecedented. Penn State's 1958 Blue-White Game kicked off – yes, there were kickoffs – at 3:30. Future All-America quarterback Richie Lucas, then completing his sophomore

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