re: Why hasn't LSU ever claimed the 1908 NCAA football championship?

Not a horse, a player (Martin Lally) gave his check to sing at a theater to another person to sing for him while he went to play baseball.


That is all. He was cleared in the end, because everyone would have had to been banned otherwise, as all school were allowed to let their players play baseball for the same amount.

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LSU has it's Penn. 5 plus the Michigan 2 to go along with 1 Louisiana player that played in Penn for a number of years.

The other problem is he doesn't know the speed of the game in the east, one of the fastest players in the East became our coach in 1909 and he was not near as fast as Lally or Doc.

Siep would have been an all star in the east with Doc.

I know the players on all the eastern schools and the Southern schools.

Here is a little fun fact that writer has no clue about, LSU played the Yale, Havard All Star with the best end in the nation from Vandy on their team and tied them 0-0 and that was without the Smith Brothers, Seip or Lally.

SO much for his writing about the power of eastern football.

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None of this changes the fact that LSU played one good team all year (Auburn) which wasn't nearly as good as Penn or Harvard or Chicago.

Fact is that LSU played a WEAK schedule.

Again, 1908 LSU is like 2009 Boise State. Do you think Boise State should share the 2009 championship with Alabama?

No, of course not.

Bama already claims 4 national titles for the 1908 season.

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GM19

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Well the argument that the NC didn't exist before 1936 is more or less accurate. However, people most certainly DID have clear ideas about which team was the best at the end of each season, and eventually the press started naming "champions" on their own. This was problematic, of course, because different prominent newspapers in different regions would name different teams. In an era when cross-regional play was rare, this meant that you had 3-4 "champs" each year (hence, LSU's "Champions of the South" banner from 1908).

The AP was supposed to solve this problem, and coincided with the use of opinion polling in politics (rise of Gallup poll, etc) as the AP was simply a poll of sportswriters.

TxTiger82

Just to fix some of your miss gulded thoughts:

John W. Mayhew was an All American in track and field and 1st team AA in football in 1906 and 2nd team in 1908, he was one of the top 2-3 fastest players in Northeastern football. Lally and Doc beat him with ease in footraces. C. Smith was likely just as fast as John at 28 years old, but we will never know that for sure.

E.T. McDonald was a All American out of Colgate, that would not have started LSU. Both McDonald and Mayhew coach LSU between 1909 and 1916 both were know as fast players in eastern football, and Doc was still faster than both.

Siep broke his shoulder at Susquehanna University before transferring to LSU, even playing hurt much of 07-09 he was still likely the best offensive end in America.

What made LSU in 1908 is it's core backfield Doc, Lally, C. Smith and V. Smith. V. Smith was normally the crash blocker at the line, Lally would try to block the next man and C. Smith was the person Doc would put his hand on his shoulder as they rounded the line. Once in the open field Doc would take off.

On the Line LSU had 3 strong players in Thomas, Hillman and Gandy. Thomas was the best overall lineman, he played in Penn. Hillman was the quickest of the linemen. Gandy was the Capt of the team and the enforcer of the team (do you know what that is?) and the hardest hitting.

The largest lineman was Norblett, he was a huge linemen at the time at 220 lbs. LSU would normally run to his side of the ball with the backs stacked behind him.

The other line was the Jr. R. L. Stovall who could be called the rock of the line. He was a rough player who was always in the scrum.

At the other End was a split between Gill and R.F. Stovall. Gill was normally the player passed to on end around throw back routes.

What made LSU good was Fenton ability to throw on the run as well as kick on the run. Doc at a time when an incomplete pass was a 15 yard penalty., was better than an 80% thrower and this with a larger and rounder ball than todays game.


Eastern football on average tired 1 pass or less a game, LSU like Carlisle is over 4 a game. LSU wins the Auburn game by throwing the ball. This is long before Notre Dame beat Army by it's passing game.

LSU schedule is only as weak as it appears due to Alabama, Michigan, Tulane, Texas, Washington, Vanderbilt and Sewanee all not wanting to play the loaded LSU team. Many teams played LSU in 1907 that would not in 1908, and the coach for Tulane warned Yost,and McGugin not to play LSU.

The best play of the 1908 season by any team comes in the LSU vs Arkansas game.


As I posted before the game between LSU and Harvard-Yale All Star team, LSU ties them 0-0 without Lally, Siep or C. Smith. The Yale-Harvard team core group is made of 5 All Americans.

And as I post so much for the power east football, because when they came South they had to pass vs our line and failed.

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1908 was a great year. Industrial revolution. Invention of airplanes and cars. WW I was still a ways off. Ah, those were the days.

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Yes, the Gay 90's were nothing but a distant memory.

I would except a 2011 NC. We were undefeated, sec champs and defeated the eventual NC's

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this meant that you had 3-4 "champs" each year

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this meant that you had 3-4 "champs" each year

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All appointed champs by organizations that did not have authority to do so.

At best those pre-bcs champions are "probably should have been champions".

If I play you in rock paper scissors and I win the first game but you win the second. I can claim the championship and you might as well. But since we didn't agree before hand to set up a method for determining the champion there can not be a champion.

Until all the Div-1 colleges agreed to set up a Div-1 championship system there was no championship. People OUTSIDE of the NCAA can not dictate anything to the NCAA. Just like you don't have authority to determine the NCAA National Champion.