THE FOOTBALL GAME (S) THAT SAVED LIVES…PART 1

The November 11, 1940, newspaper headlines throughout the nation were all about war.  War in Europe was very unsettling.  Bad weather had halted, for a few days, Germany’s bombing of London.  The Greeks were routing the invading Italians.  German advances in Romania were greatly stalled by an earthquake that killed over 1,000 civilians and disrupted the roads and occupied cities.  Japan in the Pacific was storming China.  Inside the news pages there were stories and pictures of the United States getting ready for war as well as the country’s support of England.  America was 13-months away from being directly pulled into the fight.  But on this day, there would be a few high school games and sport hunting to take people’s mind off the world events.  Many Thanksgiving ads were in the newspapers.  A small threat of cold weather was predicted for the upcoming week as the observance of the special day. Armistice Day was, in 1940, on a Monday.

November 11, 1940, was set to be a normal Armistice Day.  Today it’s called Veterans Day having the name changed in 1954.  The 1918 Armistice was Germany’s surrender in World War I to the Allies (United States, Britan, France and others) that took effect at 11AM that day…the 11^th month, the 11^th day and the 11^th hour of the November morning.

Prior to "The Great War" many big games were set for Thanksgiving Day, as I've mentioned in previous stories.  After World War I many teams played special games on both Armistice Day and then a final game on Thanksgiving for a few years.  But in the mid-1920’s the WIAA started taking more control of state school’s athletic season schedules. Many schools season end dates were completed around Armistice Day or even the weekend before in 1940 to help accommodate the start of basketball.  Crucial conference showdowns were often the case around this time in Wisconsin.  The Green Bay East/West dual was often on November 11 or close to then.  I’m also quite sure that in 1940 the WIAA didn’t take into consideration hunting seasons…ducks and deer but these were key dates that impacted attendance at the late season games.

Prairie du Chien vs. Boscobel

As Monday, November 11 dawned the expected high temperature was to be in most parts of Wisconsin around 50-55 degrees and that’s what it was as football fans from Prairie du Chien trekked through the hills of the western farmland to watch the Maroons play at Boscobel.  The game was turning out to be for the SWAL title as both were 5-0-0 in conference play.  Each had dispatched opponents like Cuba City, Lancaster, Darlington, Platteville, Mineral Point, Fennimore, Dodgeville and Mt. Horeb.  Each school in the conference had a six-game, round robin type schedule each season.  The Boscobel Bulldogs were ready for Prairie.  A number of fans for both schools put off hunting ducks on the Mississippi or nearby lakes to watch the game. 

In 1980, the former Maroons coach Cecil Smith, thought that at the 1pm start time the temperature was up in the 70’s. 

1942 PDC Blackhawk Yearbook

In all the other reports from around western and central Wisconsin the state had temperatures in the lower 50’s when the team showed up at 12 noon.  40-years later a bit of his memory about that day may have been a little clouded but there were several points that were clear.  It was a bright, sunny day to start.  He remembered the wind and the snow correctly.  Shortly before the opening kickoff clouds moved in and the wind began to pick up. The temperature started to dramatically drop.  The game itself became a game of who had the wind to their back as punting became the key to field position. 

As the game moved into the second quarter the temperature took an even more drastic dip.  On Tuesday, November 12 the Wisconsin State Journal (Madison), 74-miles east of Boscobel, reported, temperature wise, how things went horribly bad for people in that city. 

For players, fans and eventually anyone else out on the road in southern to central Wisconsin it was hazardous to be outside.  Winds hit the Madison airport so hard that a hanger collapsed.  Madison’s airport, where official weather information was recorded, stated that eight inches fell that day in the city.  On top of the above temperature chart posted on November 12, there were additional stories about the hazardous wind and snow and death.

In Minneapolis shoppers skidded on frozen sidewalks as the afternoon temps dropped from 55 degrees to 25 degrees in two hours with heavy rain turning to snow and winds hitting 60mph. 

In Boscobel the wind was coming out of the west-southwest and seemed to swirl throughout the hills in the area.  Then it began to snow and show hard.  Neither team was making much headway as they each were limited in picking up any bit of meaningful yardage.  Midway through the second quarter coach Smith sent someone out to buy gloves and they returned with 18 pairs.  Just before halftime Boscobel had driven to Prairies one-foot line but failed to score.  Surprisingly, according to the Prairie di Chien Courier Press, despite the wind and snow Boscobel was able to complete several key passes but none led to a score.  Once, Maroon back Mike Elliot dropped back to punt and the wind blew it back over his head.  He was able to recover it before a safety could be scored.  Elliot had the one big run of the game, a 47-yard gain but Prairie failed to capitalize.  That big gain turned out to be Prairie du Chien’s only first down.  Boscobel, the bigger team, was able to pick up 12 first downs as they dominated the game despite the bad weather.  There were a few fumbles for both team, which was surprising considering the weather.  As the game clock was ticking down Boscobel mounted one last drive picking up three first downs, but they stalled at mid-field as the game ended.  In the end with multiple inches of snow the going was tough for both sides.  Coach Smith remembered several feet of snow but that may have been a build-up of drifts.  The game ended tied 0-0.

News reports in the Courier Press, reporting about the storm, felt that a number of fans who missed the day of hunting to attend the game, by their attendance in Boscobel, may have saved their lives. 

Next time, the killer storm and two other games.

THE UNDEFEATED 1970 ALMA RIVERMEN…GETTING SOME RESPECT, PART 2

Prior to the matchup against a 3-3-0 Winona Cotter, played in Winona, there was a twist in the A.P. polls.  In the recent poll Gale-Ettrick stayed #1 with Alma moving up to #4 in the “others”.  But there was a new wrinkle to the polls.   Kewaunee, which had been #10 in the Big Ten A.P. poll had notified the WIAA that their enrollment had dropped and they now had 592 students, eight under the minimum for the A.P. Big Ten poll so they were dropped to the Little Ten and as it turned out they were voted into the #10 spot the week of October 22, 1970.  The 32 points that they were awarded in the Little Ten poll would have kept them at #10 in the Big Ten poll.  The following week Kewaunee would move up in the Little Ten to the #7 spot. The poll posted on Wednesday.

Two days later on Friday night the Rivermen scored first against Cotter on a Jeff Bjork 16-yard interception return and with the 2-pt conversion Alma was up 8-0.  But a 55-yard strike from Cotters Steve Wiltgen to Mike Schultz showed that an opponent could score on the visitors.  The shutout run was over, but Alma wasn’t done.  The defense came up big holding Cotter to -31-yards on the ground and while the team allowed 150-yards passing they held their opponent to 119-total yards.  Cotter completed only nine of 30 passes but also tossed six interceptions with Bjork having three of those picks. Barry Ritscher was 6 of 13 for 94 yards and two scores, ran for 37 more, made nine unassisted tackles and scored the final touchdown on a 60-yard interception return.  With the win Alma moved up to the top spot on the A.P. "others" portion of the poll.

Now the final game was coming up against Elgin-Millville.  This would the fifth consecutive conference loss for the Watchmen as well as their fifth consecutive time that they had been shutout.  The 53-0 game was all Curt Gross.  The fullback scored five touchdowns, collected two 2-pt. conversion runs for 34 points and registered 31 unassisted tackles!  Those 34 points in the game moved him into the top spot in area scoring with a total of 118 points, jumping over Cochrane-Fountain City back Bill Baertsch who had 115 points in eight games.  Gross ended the season with a remarkable 127 tackles.  Barry Ritscher tossed two scores covering 60 and 33 yards against Elgin-Millville.

1971 Alma Yearbook…Note that there are 36 players on the squad…nearly every boy in the high school

1972 Alma Yearbook

It’s sort of strange that the final Little Ten poll showed Alma with an 8-0-0 record when they finished 9-0-0 BUT they got some respect as they jumped into the top 10 Little Ten A. P. poll.

Winona Daily News November 5, 1970

The local poll in the November 10, 1970 edition of the Winona Daily News had Alma tied for #1 with Gale-Ettrick.

Gale-Ettrick, Alma Eleva-Strum and Cochrane-Fountain City were the only Wisconsin schools on the list.  The rest are Minnesota schools including Spring Valley (MN) (Not to be confused with the Wisconsin village 60 miles north of Alma).

Honors came to six of the Rivermen by way of the All-Centennial Conference football first team, posted in the Daily News.  Curt Gross made it as a fullback after being named on the defense in 1969.  Barry Ritscher was named as the squad’s quarterback, Brian Ruff made it at the offensive guard spot, junior Bruce Mueller made the team at the center position.  On defense Tom Reiter and Steve Pearson were named as ends.  Jeff Youngbauer, Steve Brovold and Jim Lorenz were named to the honorable mention list.  Farther south of Winona the La Crosse Tribune named Ruff to the second team of their annual All-Coulee Region Team.

1971 Alma Yearbook

On the season the team gained 3,054 yards on offense for a 339.33 per game average and the defense held opponents to 364 total yards, a 40.44 average.  Individual stats are hard to come by, but Curt Gross gained about 800-yards on the ground, scored 17 touchdowns with 8 2-pt conversions and 127 tackles.  Barry Ritscher was 66-34-698-7 and gained 324 yards on the ground.  Jeff Bjork corralled at least six interceptions with three coming in the Cotter game. Of the stars on the team only one, Barry Ritscher, went on to play college ball where he played defensive back for four seasons at UW-River Falls.

Many of the football players were part of a very successful basketball 1970-71 season as well as winning the 1971 Wisconsin State Summer Baseball Championship.  The football winning streak would expand to 16-games before losing in the fourth game of the 1971 season. 

Realignment came to both sides of the Mississippi in 1971 with the Centennial Conference expanding to 10-teams, all Minnesota schools.  The Wisconsin based Dairyland Conference would expand with Alma joining.  The Riverman started 1971 with two shutouts and allowed a safety in game three before they lost to “the other Alma…Alma Center Lincoln 22-20.  Iverson would stay on as head coach until 1980 when, because of two consecutive 1-8 seasons in 1978 and 1979 along with just not enough players to compete the school dropped the sport for the 1981 season along with baseball for two seasons.  Lynn Iverson spent about 19 years as the head football coach and 35 years as a teacher at Alma.  He passed away a few years ago.

Being the smallest school in the Dairyland they came back on August 28, 1981, under a new head coach, to win the season opener 22-20 in overtime to, guess who?  Alma Center. The program would have its ups and downs as Alma stood on its own at various times after co-oping with Gilmartin as they made the WIAA playoffs in 1989, 1990 and 1996 before going on their own and making the playoffs 2004-07.  They then began co-oping with Pepin in 2009, and the Pepin/Alma 2014 and 2015 teams were the state Division 7 runner-up those years.  The pairing of these two seems to be successful as they have made the playoffs 14 times. 

What Lynn Iverson started, current coach Mike Olson of Pepin is continuing the success.

I want to thank Curt Gross for giving me the heads up on the 1970 ALMA season and Amanda Burrow, Spanish Teacher/Library Assistant at Alma Area Schools who supplied me with yearbook research information. They both helped make this story possible.

THE UNDEFEATED 1970 ALMA RIVERMEN…GETTING SOME RESPECT, PART 1

When looking at season final A.P. or U.P.I. football rankings (1958-1975) you can look at the bottom of each list and if there isn’t a press recap you might miss some information.  Did that #9 team lose their last game and they ended 7-1-0 or 7-1-1?  If they dropped because of a game nine loss, where were they before in the week eight poll?  Did the team replace a squad that dropped down to the honorable mention list because of wacky pollsters voting?  There could be a number of reasons for a school eking their way into the top 10.  For those that did just make it onto the final ranking it is the cherry on top of the Sunde.

In the Small School or Little Ten polls it is often a matter of the voters just not knowing about another team.  How can they know about teams they don’t see or read about? The pollsters had to hear from others to help make their consideration.  For some teams it was like comedian Rodney Dangerfield use to say as he twisted his necktie, “I don’t get no respect, no respect at all”.   The 1970 Alma Rivermen team was just such a squad.  They didn’t just get the respect they deserved during the season.

Alma is located, tucked along the Mississippi River, about 26 miles north of Winona, MN. The school first began playing football in 1958, going 0-8-0.  They failed to win a game for two seasons but there wasn’t a lot of support from the small student body.  The sport was new to the students and it would take an innovative coach to get the program moving.  In 1962 Lynn Iverson, a recent graduate from Winona State University was that person but it wasn’t an instant success.  Playing an independent schedule, Iverson’s boys went 0-5-1 in 1962, scoring only 25 points and allowing 148.  1963 saw the Rivermen go 4-4-0, their best record ever.  Then came their entrance into the Centennial Conference, as the only Wisconsin school vs. six Minnesota schools.  Things got better as Alma posted 8-1-0 and 9-0-0 records in 1964 and 1965.  Iverson was getting the boys out to play.  They would go 6-3-0 in both 1966 and 1967 and then followed this success up with a 7-1-0 season in 1968 and 6-1-0 in 1969.

Despite the past success, most coaches in the Centennial Conference picked Wabasha, the largest school in the conference, to take the 1970 title.  In 1969 Wabasha went 8-0-0 but only beat Alma 8-0.  The Alma juniors and sophomores gained a lot of experience.  The Rivermen returned three 1969 first team All-Conference players who would repeat in 1970.  Curt Gross was a middle linebacker on the 1969 All-Area team who also played the fullback position.  Barry Ritscher earned All-Centennial as a cornerback/safety while starting as the team’s quarterback.  And Brian Ruff was named to the offensive guard spot as well as playing defensive guard. 

Most of the opponents were small towns, like Alma, that had about 450 people, so the school district drew students from the surrounding area.  Alma had only about 80 high school students.  Cochrane-Fountain City had around 170, Onalaska Luther had around 300, and Mazeppa, like Alma, had about 80.  Wabasha, a town of 2,371 people was the largest public school in the Centennial with around 300.  Goodhue just had a touch over 100 students while Randolph, the smallest city/school in the conference with nearly 70.  Winona Cotter, a private Catholic school numbered around 400 pupils and Elgin-Millville had about 95 students.  So, for the most part, the Alma opponents’ numbers were fairly equal in size.

Playing two larger Wisconsin schools as the season opened, Iverson and his charges showed that 1970 would be their season.

Note the offensive vs, defensive yardage stats, nearly a 300-yards per game difference!

The offense clicked as well as featuring a very tough defense.  With an opportunistic offense, feeding off the tough defense, which recovered numerous opponent turnovers, the Rivermen would roll.  Against Mazeppa four fumbles were recovered which led to Alma scores.  After their third win Alma moved into the #2 spot in the weekly Winona Daily News area top10 poll.

They rolled over a tougher than expected Faribault Deaf Hilltoppers, holding them to only two first downs but Alma’s three turnovers slowed them down, a bit.  Fullback Curt Gross scored two touchdowns and two 2-pt conversions to power the offense as well as having multiple tackles. Their fourth victory corresponded with  the A.P. starting their weekly prep football poll.  Besides the top-10 there were 31 “others” who received votes.  Alma received 8 votes and was listed as at the #15 spot.  Interestingly, Cochrane-Fountain City, a team that Alma had shutout 42-0 and with a 3-1-0 record was four spots ahead on the list.

Game five was a matchup against the previous 1968 and 1969 conference champion’s Wabasha.  Regular starting quarterback Barry Ritscher only played on conversion attempts due to an injury.  Junior Jeff Bjork, the quarterback backup turned in a superb performance tossing two, third quarter touchdowns to flanker Steve Brovold who hauled in scores of 84 and 70 yards.  Alma rolled up 367 yards and allowed only 39.  The next week the Rivermen moved into the area top spot, tying Gale-Ettrick who had been the top team for the first three weeks of the poll.  The G-E Red Hawks were riding a 22-game win streak and ranked #1 in the Wisconsin A.P. poll.

Against Goodhue, the #2 team in the conference, it was another whitewash, for Alma, 28-0.  The game was played at Alma in a very wet, messy, cranberry like bog.  Slowed to gaining only 262-yards the defense again shone held Goodhue to 37-yards.  Ritscher was back from a hip injury and on a fourth down and 12-yards to go he lofted a 26-yard pass to Brovold who made a great over the shoulder finger-tip catch for the opening score.  Six fumbles, only one lost, slowed the run game but the 135 yards passing made up the difference.  It was a solid win.

In the recent A.P. polls Gale-Ettrick had traded the top spot with Auburndale but now they were back in the #1 position.  #6 in the “others receiving votes” was Alma. 

They were now getting some respect. 

PART 2 COMING SOON