Trying to bring down Derby’s John Pagliaro might have been a little like attempting to tackle a wind mill. His unforgettable running style resembled that of a drum major gone amok, churning knees seemingly scraping his chin strap.

It was a nightmare for high school linebackers, awoken, perhaps, in a cold sweat, by visions of Pagliaro charging full speed and knee-first. College defenders were equally strained. Just 5-foot-10 and 190 pounds, Pagliaro’s high leg action made him nearly impossible to tackle below the waist.
“If you tried to arm tackle him, you got a face full of cleats,” Yale coach Carm Cozza wrote in his autobiography. “And with his wild hair, thick black mustache, grease paint under his eyes, he was a fearsome sight to opponents.”

Cozza noted that Pagliaro’s decision to stay close to home and play at Yale rekindled local interest in the team, especially in the Naugatuck River Valley. For “Pags” wasn’t just a member of the team or a run-of-the-mill starter. He was a superstar.
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Yale University

Ever seen those beer commercials featuring a fictional character referred to simply as “The Most Interesting Man in the World?” He’s a handsome, wealthy, well-dressed gentleman full of tales and experiences.

One hundred years ago, that ad campaign could easily have been based on Yale’s Tom Shevlin. Aside from being a world-class athlete with matinee idol looks, he had a massive bank account rivaled only by his outsized personality and ego.

Shevlin’s zest for living may well have made him the most interesting man in the world in the early days of the 20th century. He died in 1915 at age 32, but accomplished enough to fill three lifetimes.

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Register file photos

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In retrospect, the “what ifs” barely warrant a mention in the telling of Yale football history.

However, there were a couple of instances when the legendary Carm Cozza almost walked away from Yale before coaching his first game.

A decade ago, when Cozza was on the eve of being inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, the winningest coach in Ivy League football history recalled a time when he wasn’t sure Yale was the place for him.

“I was leaving a beautiful country setting (Miami of Ohio) and when I came to Yale, it was a dreary day,” Cozza said in a 2002 interview. “I remember thinking, ‘Oh boy, I don’t know if this is my cup of tea. Am I doing the right thing bringing three young girls and my wife into a new environment?’”

That was in 1963. The following year Cozza had another chance to head off to greener pastures. Cozza was offered the head job at the University of New Hampshire and seriously considered it.

Delaney Kipputh, Yale’s athletic director at the time, wanted Cozza to replace the departing John Pont as Yale’s coach, beginning in the 1965 season. Kipputh asked Cozza to give him 24 hours before committing to take the UNH gig. Cozza obliged and the next day he became Yale’s head coach.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Cozza spent the next 32 seasons at the helm of the Bulldogs. Cozza won 179 games, posted 19 winning seasons and led Yale to 10 Ivy League championships.

Read Jim Fuller's complete story.

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Three part tribute to Cozza from YouTube

 

The words “Harvard Comeback Stuns Bulldogs” were plastered atop the New Haven Register’s sports cover on Nov. 24, 1968, but in reality it was the Harvard Crimson’s famous headline “Harvard Beats Yale 29-29” which best captured the essence of the most unforgettable finish in the proud history of The Game.

Yale, led by the irrepressible offensive duo of future NFL star Calvin Hill and Mr. Clutch Brian Dowling, led rival Harvard 29-13 with less than a minute to go when the unthinkable happened.

The visiting sideline was jubilant as the Bulldogs appeared on their way to a 17th straight victory and just the program’s second unbeaten, untied season since the mid 1920s.

What transpired was a final 42 seconds that had to be seen to be believed. A crowd of just over 40,000 was on hand at Harvard Stadium, although the number of fans who claimed they were there to witness history probably now numbers in the six figures.

Harvard scored two touchdowns and converted a pair of two-point conversions to tie the mighty Bulldogs 29-29.

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It was another perfect autumn afternoon at the Yale Bowl on Oct. 24, 1931. A crowd of 75,000 packed the stadium to see Yale and Army, two college football heavyweights of the day. The mood was positively electric as the teams traded touchdowns on the first two plays of the fourth quarter, the Bulldogs elevating the spirit of the home crowd on an 88-yard kickoff return by Bud Parker to knot the score at 6-6.

Within minutes, however, the bowl went silent as Army’s Richard Sheridan lay motionless on the turf.

Sheridan, a junior end who weighed 149 pounds, attempted to tackle Yale’s Bob Lassiter following a punt. Sheridan’s head struck Lassiter’s knee. The Army cadet suffered a broken neck.

Rushed to New Haven Hospital in critical condition he underwent emergency surgery, but doctors held out little hope. Sheridan died there two days later, the first and only on-field fatality in Yale Bowl history.

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The United States formally entered World War I in 1917, and its involvement greatly affected the national sports scene. Greater New Haven was certainly no exception.

As young men enlisted by the hundreds, many of them college athletes, Yale was forced to suspend several varsity sports or field patchwork teams. The football team in 1917 was made up of ROTC students and played only three games that fall.

Perhaps the biggest game played at the Yale Bowl was a matchup of training stations from Rhode Island and New York who played for the football championship of the U.S. Navy. Walter Camp, a New Haven resident and Yale football alum, helped bring the game to the city to aid the war effort as part of his duties as head of fitness programs for the Navy and Army Air Service.

Yale did not field a team the following year, marking the first and only time in 140 years the school did not play the sport it helped pioneer.

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