First "Boston rules" football game played in the United States | ||||||||||
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Date | May 14, 1874 | |||||||||
Season | 1873 | |||||||||
Stadium | Jarvis Field | |||||||||
Location | Cambridge |
First rugby football game played in the United States | ||||||||||||||||
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Date | May 15, 1874 | |||||||||||||||
Season | 1873 | |||||||||||||||
Stadium | Jarvis Field | |||||||||||||||
Location | Cambridge |
The 1874 Harvard vs. McGill football game was a two-game series between the Harvard Crimson and the McGill Redmen held in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on May 14 and 15, 1874. [1] [2]
With the first game being played under the Harvard's "Boston game", the second one was the first rugby-style football game played in the United States. [3] It used three periods or "games" and ended in a scoreless tie. [4] [5]
A Princeton vs. Rutgers football game had been played five years earlier (in 1869), but under a variation of England's The Football Association rules, closer to contemporary soccer than American football.
The Boston game rules were developed by the first organized football team, the Oneida Football Club, founded in 1862. Many of its members went on to found, and play for, the Harvard team.
On October 20, 1873, representatives from Yale, Columbia, Princeton, and Rutgers met at the Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York City to codify the first set of intercollegiate football rules. Before this meeting, each school had its own set of rules and games were usually played using the home team's own particular code. At this meeting, a list of rules, based more on association football than on rugby football, was drawn up for intercollegiate football games. [3]
Harvard, which played the Boston game, a version of football that allowed carrying, refused to attend this rules conference and continued to play under its own code. While Harvard's voluntary absence from the meeting made it hard for them to schedule games against other American universities, it agreed to a challenge to play McGill University, from Montreal, Canada, in a two-game series.
The McGill team traveled to Cambridge to meet Harvard. On May 14, 1874, the first game, played under Boston rules, was dominated by Harvard, which lead 3–0 after only 22 minutes when the game was ended. [3] [6] The next day, the two teams played under "McGill" rugby rules to a scoreless tie. [3] The first game featured a round ball instead of a rugby-style oblong ball. [6] McGill used a bladder covered by leather instead of a rubber ball as did Harvard, which was much more difficult to kick. [7]
The game drew about 500 attendees, most of whom were students. [2] This series of games represents an important milestone in the development of the modern game of American football. [1] [8] A similar game was played a year later between Harvard and Tufts establishing this as the first game between two American colleges played under rules used in today's version of American football.
At this time, the try was not used in American football. The try would later evolve into the score known as the touchdown. In late 1874, the Harvard team traveled to Montreal to play McGill in rugby, and won by three tries in front of 2,000 spectators. [9] [10] [11]
College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football first gained popularity in the United States.
Gridiron football, also known as North American football, or in North America as simply football, is a family of football team sports primarily played in the United States and Canada. American football, which uses 11 players, is the form played in the United States and the best known form of gridiron football worldwide, while Canadian football, which uses 12 players, predominates in Canada. Other derivative varieties include arena football, flag football and amateur games such as touch and street football. Football is played at professional, collegiate, high school, semi-professional, and amateur levels.
The Oneida Football Club, founded and captained by Gerrit Smith Miller in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1862, was the first organized team to play any kind of football in the United States. The game played by the club, known as the "Boston game", was an informal local variant that combined association and rugby football and predated the codification of rules for American football.
The history of American football can be traced to early versions of rugby football and association football. Both games have their origin in multiple varieties of football played in the United Kingdom in the mid-19th century, in which a football is kicked at a goal or kicked over a line, which in turn were based on the varieties of English public school football games descending from medieval ball games.
The Harvard Rugby Football Club is the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I rugby union program that represents Harvard University in the Ivy Rugby Conference. Having been established in December 1872, Harvard has the oldest rugby college program in the United States.
The Harvard Crimson football program represents Harvard University in college football at the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision. Harvard's football program is one of the oldest in the world, having begun competing in the sport in 1873. The Crimson has a legacy that includes 13 national championships and 20 College Football Hall of Fame inductees, including the first African-American college football player William H. Lewis, Huntington "Tack" Hardwick, Barry Wood, Percy Haughton, and Eddie Mahan. Harvard is the tenth winningest team in NCAA Division I football history.
The 1869 college football season was the first season of intercollegiate football in the United States. While played using improvised rules more closely resembling soccer and rugby than modern gridiron football, it is traditionally considered the inaugural college football season. The 1869 season consisted of only two games, both between Rutgers and Princeton. The first game was played on November 6 at Rutgers' campus, and the second was played on November 13 at Princeton's campus. Both games were won by the home team.
Division 1-A Rugby is the highest level of college rugby within the United States and is administered by USA Rugby. Division 1-A rugby is modeled after NCAA athletic competitions, with the 46 D1-A rugby schools divided into eight conferences: East, Midwest, Rocky Mountain, California, Big Ten, Red River, PAC, and Independent.
The McGill Redbirds football team represents McGill University in Canadian football in U Sports and is based in Montreal, Quebec. The program is one of the oldest in all of Canada, having begun organized competition in 1874. The team won its first collegiate championship in 1902 and also won in 1912, 1913, 1919, 1928, 1938 and 1960 prior to the inauguration of the Vanier Cup in 1965. McGill appeared in the Vanier Cup final in 1969, 1973 and 1987, with the Redmen finally winning the title in the 1987 game. McGill plays out of Percival Molson Memorial Stadium, where the Canadian Football League's Montreal Alouettes also play.
The Yale Bulldogs Rugby Team, or simply, Yale Rugby is the rugby union team of the Yale University. Yale has fielded a team that has played using the rugby rules since at least 1876. The school competes in the Ivy Rugby Conference and in Division I-AA of USA Rugby's intercollegiate competition. The YRFC plays a fall and spring schedule, which includes both a 15s and a 7s program. The team has approximately 45 players and is coached by Head Coach, Craig Wilson and Assistant Coaches Brad Dufek, Alycia Washington and Greg McWilliams.
The 1874–75 Harvard Crimson football team represented Harvard University in the 1874 college football season. The team finished with a 1–1 record and was retroactively named co-national champion by Parke H. Davis. The team captain was Arthur B. Ellis.
The 1893 Princeton Tigers football team represented Princeton University in the 1893 college football season. The team finished with an 11–0 record and was retroactively named as the national champion by the Billingsley Report, Helms Athletic Foundation, Houlgate System, and National Championship Foundation. They outscored their opponents 270 to 14.
The 1873–74 Harvard Crimson football team represented Harvard University in the 1873 college football season. The team played only two intercollegiate games, both against the team from McGill University in Cambridge, with one game ending in a Harvard victory and the other ending in a scoreless tie. The first game was played under Harvard's rules, while the second game played using McGill's rules on May 15, 1874, was the first rugby-style football game played in the United States. The team captain was Henry R. Grant.
The 1875 Yale Bulldogs football team represented Yale University in the 1875 college football season. The Bulldogs finished with a 2–2 record. The team won games against Rutgers and Wesleyan and lost to Harvard and Columbia.
The early history of American football can be traced to early versions of rugby football and association football. Both games have their origin in varieties of football played in Britain in the mid–19th century, in which a football is kicked at a goal or run over a line, which in turn were based on the varieties of English public school football games.
The Intercollegiate Football Association (IFA), also known as the American Intercollegiate Football Association, was one of the earliest college football rules-making and scheduling organizations in existence; it was active from the 1873 to 1893 seasons. The IFA teams, Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale, are now members of the Ivy League.
The first recorded match between two colleges in game played in United States using rugby union code rules occurred on May 14, 1874 between Harvard University and McGill University. Predating rugby using the rugby union rules were rugby union style "carrying games" with use of hands permitted including a game between Harvard College Freshmen and Sophomores at a game played at Harvard campus in 1858. Harvard varsity interscholastic rugby team was not founded until December 6, 1872
The Boston game, also known as the Boston rules, was an early code of football developed by the Oneida Football Club, formed in 1862 and considered by some historians as the first formal "football" club in the United States. Rules allowed carrying and kicking and is considered the first step to the codification of rules for association football, rugby football, or American football. After Oneida disbanded, former members established the Harvard University Football Club, which continued to play football under those rules.
The Harvard Women's Rugby team is the women's rugby union program that represents Harvard University in Division I tournaments organised by the National Intercollegiate Rugby Association (NIRA). Harvard competes in the Ivy Rugby Conference.
The Canada All-Stars, also referred to as All-Canada, were one of the earliest college football teams. Representing the Football Association of Canada, it was composed of some of the top Canadian players at the time, and was best known for having played several games against the Harvard Crimson in the 1870s.