2002 Week 4
September 18, 2002
Whoa, was that some impressive performance that Penn State put on against the Nebraska Cornholio last weekend or what?
I haven't seen a licking like that involving a bunch of Johnsons since Phyllis George's audition for "The NFL Today".
Speaking of programs making a comeback, was that some kind of hurting that USC put on Colorado or what? Coach Holtz seems to have USC at the top of their game, and I know he has to be proud of his efforts. From what I saw in that Auburn game, though, Lou is still having trouble filling up his stadium, just like the attendance struggles he had when he was coaching Notre Dame.
The Irish seem to be coming around as well under Coach O'Leary with their win over Michigan. It was pretty exciting to see Notre Dame defensive back Omar Walton have such a fine game.
That Walton clan has done pretty well over the years, mostly making their mark in basketball of course, but I'm sure Omar's father Bill is proud of his football-playing son as well. I just want to know what happened to Bill's brother John-Boy.
The strangest thing over the weekend was watching all the TV stations with their constant updates on the location of Hannah Storm. I asked my good friend Mike Tirico if he knew anything about Hannah's location.
Mike said that the previous three nights Hannah looked to be staying in her apartment but that her shades were usually down and he couldn't get up the fire escape for a closer look.
That seems strange because the TV people kept on saying that Hannah Storm was in the Gulf of New Mexico.
In the big games in the Southeast last weekend there were lightning delays in the Georgia/South Carolina and Florida/Ohio State games.
In this modern day and age we're always very quick to stop the game when the thunder starts rolling in, to protect the players and fans.
Lightning can prove to be very dangerous, as my good friend Lee Corso learned a couple years back when his rented car was struck as he was driving away from Virginia Tech's stadium. The lightning bolt not only made his hair perm truly permanent, it also led to Lee having constant facial twitches and a tendency to scratch himself while on the air (that's why "Gameday" is now on a 7-second delay).
Years ago teams didn't stop when there was thunder or lightning, instead the players just kept on playing. That changed after an unfortunate incident on September 21, 1912.
On that day the Yale Bulldogs were visiting tiny Kaiser College of Pickelhaube, Pennsylvania. Pickelhaube was a small town in central Pennsylvania in an area heavily populated by German immigrants.
Kaiser College was relatively new to the sport of football, but their bright young head coach Hans von Schtupp did quite a good job building his program. He was noted for being very inventive with equipment and with tackling methods. Many teams feared to play his boys because of the risk of injury.
Early in the 2nd quarter, with Yale ahead 7-3, a thunderstorm rolled in. The rain came down in sheets, and many of the fans went for cover. But the Kaiser students continued to stand in support of their team in the student section located right behind the home team's bench on the west side of the field. The Kaiser students were a rowdy bunch and used to support their teams by wearing replicas of the school's unique football helmets.
Yale called a time out, and both teams returned to their respective sidelines. Ten seconds into the time out disaster struck. A huge lightning bolt came down along the western sideline and dozens of Kaiser players and students were hit by lightning and electrocuted in a most unfortunate accident.
The game was called off and a new rule went into effect. No, not the rule about not playing in lightning, that wasn't put into effect until the mid-50's. The rule that was changed was the one banning the spiked helmet.
Coach von Schtupp's greatest innovation was to put a pointed metal rod in the top of the helmet, which made it far easier to take out opposing players. The students, inspired by these intimidating helmets, decided to wear replicas. Unfortunately, the conductivity of the metal spike in both the players' and the students' helmets led to a horrible disaster and many many deaths and injuries.
Once the NCAA heard what had happened, they banned spiked helmets, which had the benefit of not only reducing lightning injuries, but also cutting back on the number of players garroted.
Overseas, the people of Germany were very upset with the tragedy that had happened to their emigrant kinfolk at Kaiser College. The king of Germany, Wilhelm the Conker, was so moved that he changed his title to "Kaiser" in honor of the victims.
The German army, similarly moved, changed their helmet design to add spikes, again out of respect for the many German-American victims, and named them "Pickelhaube" after the town where the disaster occurred.
Unfortunately, due to jingoistic sentiments in World War I, where sauerkraut was renamed "Victory Tomato" and many Germans (including coach von Schtupp) changed their names, things also changed for Kaiser College. The State of Pennsylvania stepped in and bought Kaiser College. Pickelhaube PA was renamed "State College Station" and the school was renamed "Pennsylvania State University".
As for young Coach von Schtupp, he's still with us 90 years later, under his more famous name, Joe Paterno.