Punts Key to UMass Tie

Punts seem to bore most casual football fans. Regardless of how far the favorite eleven may boot the ball, most partisan rooters see it only as an unproductive surrender of the football. Booming opposition kicks similarly fall to arouse much distress.

But to explain Harvard's frustrating second half against Massachusetts last Saturday, shrewd fans look immediately at the punting statistics. They know that football is quite similar to chess. Success often depends on position as well as manpower.

For Harvard to have the ball deep in its own territory is usually less desirable than for Harvard to have the opposition in the same straits. The object of the punt, therefore, is to force the opponent into a bad position on the field.

And it was position football that gave Massachusetts a 0-0 tie last Saturday.

Early in the third quarter of the game, after both teams had exchanged a series of downs, Vanderses, the Massachusetts punter, kicked the ball from his own 48-yard line to the Harvard 5, a remarkable distance of nearly 50 yards. This was the key play in the second half, for it put Harvard deep in its own territory, a disadvantage which Bassett and company never overcame.

After the disastrous punt, a clipping penalty pushed the ball back to the Harvard two-yard line. Gahan of Harvard punted the ball out to the Harvard forty, where the Indians took over. A Massachusetts drive ended on the 28 with an unsuccessful field goal attempt. The Crimson got the ball on its own 20, eighty yards away from the last white line.

As the fourth quarter opened, Harvard had moved the ball from the twenty to its own 48, where the drive sputtered. A punt travelled a soant twenty yards to the Mass 30. After a series of offensive exchanges, Harvard found itself on its own forty with less than two minutes remaining. As it turned out, two minutes were not enough.

Many spot explanations can be given for Harvard's failure to score in the second half--a dropped pass here or a bad play there. But the overall picture given by the play charts shows that the Massachusetts punt early in the third quarter confined activity for the rest of the game between the 30-yard lines. Harvard gained good yardage between these two points, but to no avail.

A team naturally has a poorer chance to score the farther it stands from the goal line. A sustained drive of 80 yards is much more susceptible to possible fumbles, penalties, or pass interceptions than one of 20 yards. Punts thus stand out as potential game deciders.

But punting, although important, cannot win or lose a game. To say that Vandersea's punt sealed the fate of the contest Saturday is too much like Marxist mono-causalism; it is saying too much. A single dropped pass could have made the difference.

Nonetheless, both position and punting are extremely important aspects of football. Coach Yeviesin lists these priorities in his football philosophy: 1. the defensive game, 2. the kicking game, 3. the offensive game. But in last Saturday's game, punter Vandersea was probably the UMass hero