1891 college football season

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The 1891 college football season was the season of American football played among colleges and universities in the United States during the 1891–92 academic year.

Contents

The 1891 Yale Bulldogs football team, led by head coach Walter Camp, compiled a perfect 13–0 record, outscored opponents by a total of 488 to 0, and has been recognized as the national champion by the Billingsley Report, Helms Athletic Foundation, Houlgate System, National Championship Foundation, and Parke H. Davis. [1] Yale's 1891 season was part of a 37-game winning streak that began at the end of the 1890 season and continued into the 1893 season.

In the Midwest, Kansas led the way with a 7–0–1 record. In the South, Trinity (now known as Duke) was recognized as the champion.

Ten of the eleven players selected by Caspar Whitney to the 1891 All-America college football team came from the Big Three (Yale, Harvard, and Princeton). The eleventh player was center John Adams from Penn. Five of the honorees have been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame: quarterback Philip King (Princeton), halfback Lee McClung (Yale), end Frank Hinkey (Yale), tackle Marshall Newell (Harvard), and guard Pudge Heffelfinger (Yale).

Conference and program changes

School1890 Conference1891 Conference
Case football Program establishedIndependent
Sewanee Tigers Program EstablishedIndependent
Tennessee Volunteers Program EstablishedIndependent
West Virginia Mountaineers Program establishedIndependent

Awards and honors

All-Americans

The consensus All-America team included:

PositionNameHeightWeight (lbs.)ClassHometownTeam
QB Philip King 5'6"154So. Washington, D. C. Princeton
HB Everett J. Lake Sr. Woodstock, Connecticut Harvard
HB Bum McClung 5'10"165Sr. Knoxville, Tennessee Yale
FB Sheppard Homans, Jr. Sr. Englewood, New Jersey Princeton
E Frank Hinkey 5'9"150Fr. Tonawanda, New York Yale
T Wallace Winter Jr. Hudson, Wisconsin Yale
G Pudge Heffelfinger 6'4"178Sr. Minneapolis, Minnesota Yale
C John AdamsSr. Penn
G Jesse Riggs Sr. Baltimore, Maryland Princeton
T Marshall Newell 5'7"168So. Great Barrington, Massachusetts Harvard
E John A. Hartwell Sr. Sussex, New Jersey Yale

Statistical leaders

Conference standings

The following is a potentially incomplete list of conference standings:

1891 Colorado Football Association standings
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Colorado Mines $   5 1 1
  • $ Conference champion
1891 Eastern Intercollegiate Football Association standings
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Williams $ 3 0 18 2 1
Amherst 2 0 28 4 3
Dartmouth 2 1 12 2 1
MIT 1 3 05 7 2
Stevens 0 4 04 7 0
  • $ Conference champion
1891 Indiana Intercollegiate Athletic Association football standings
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Purdue $ 4 0 04 0 0
Butler 3 2 04 3 0
Wabash 1 3 01 3 0
Indiana 0 5 01 5 0
  • $ Conference champion
1891 Pennsylvania Intercollegiate Football Association standings
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Penn State $ 4 1 06 2 0
Bucknell 3 1 16 2 1
Swarthmore 3 2 09 2 0
Franklin & Marshall 2 2 02 4 0
Dickinson 1 2 12 3 1
Haverford 0 5 00 6 0
  • $ Conference champion

Independents

1891 Eastern college football independents records
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Yale   13 0 0
Harvard   13 1 0
Princeton   12 1 0
Tufts   7 1 0
Penn   11 2 0
Colgate   4 1 0
Army   4 1 1
Bucknell   6 2 1
Navy   5 2 0
Cornell   7 3 0
Geneva   4 2 0
Washington & Jefferson   4 2 0
Lehigh   7 4 0
Rutgers   8 6 0
Brown   4 6 0
Springfield YMCA   5 8 1
Fordham   1 2 1
Syracuse   4 7 0
Massachusetts   2 5 0
Western Univ. Penn.   2 6 0
Lafayette   2 9 1
NYU   1 4 0
Columbia   1 5 0
Wesleyan   1 6 0
1891 Midwestern college football independents records
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Ohio Wesleyan   4 0 0
Kansas   7 0 1
Illinois   5 1 0
Missouri   3 1 0
Lake Forest   6 2 0
Washington University   4 1 1
Minnesota   3 1 1
Wisconsin   3 1 1
Cincinnati   4 2 1
Iowa   3 2 0
Doane   2 2 0
Iowa College   1 1 1
Miami (OH)   1 1 0
Nebraska   2 2 0
Northwestern   2 2 3
Michigan   4 5 0
Ohio State   2 3 0
Case   1 2 0
Buchtel   1 3 0
Washburn   1 5 0
Michigan State Normal   0 2 0
1891 Southern college football independents records
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Trinity (NC)   3 0 0
Wake Forest   1 0 0
VMI   3 0 1
Vanderbilt   3 1 0
Navy   5 2 0
Virginia   2 1 2
Delaware   5 3 1
Kentucky State College   1 1 0
Georgetown   2 2 0
Sewanee   1 2 0
Central (KY)   0 1 0
Furman   0 1 0
Tennessee   0 1 0
West Virginia   0 1 0
Johns Hopkins   0 2 0
Mercer   0 2 0
North Carolina   0 2 0
Richmond   0 2 0
1891 Far West college football independents records
Conf.Overall
TeamW L TW L T
Stanford   3 1 0
California (spring)   4 2 0
Washington   1 1 0
USC   1 2 0
Colorado   1 4 0
California   0 1 0

References

  1. National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) (2015). "National Poll Rankings" (PDF). NCAA Division I Football Records. NCAA. p. 107. Retrieved January 4, 2016.