o4e-

double duty from then on out it would not be my fault, and I
worked feverishly, revamping and struggling through to a tied
championship. We then played the triple tie-off between Okla-
homa, Missouri and Kansas at Wichita, Kansas, and after a sur-
prising upset defeated the Sooners 45 - 39, for our right to
represent the Big Six Conference.

"Then we had to play the Oklahoma Aggies team at —
Oklahoma City. the game was tied at the half, tied at the end
of the game, and in a surprising upset we won the play-off, and
the right to represent this district in Kansas City.

"When I walked into the Kansas City Municipal
Auditorium I paraphrased Lafayette's words, and I thought,
“Well, Bobby, here we are". And when the drawings were made we
drew Rice, and Colorado drew Southern California. We won over
Rice, as Southern California did over Colorado. And then we had
the big game with those big, sun-kissed Southern California boys.
We were supposed not to have a chance.

“I had written to John Bunn, my former pupil and former
assistant coach, who coached at Stanford University, and John
wrote me and said, "Dec, that Southern California team can whip
any team in the United States, but they play just hard enough
_ to win." We seized upon this phrase - they play just hard enough
to win. We placared it, then we underscored it in Bunn's letter
and placed it where everyone of the boys could see it, we preached
it to the boys and told them that they might be snowed under at
times but if they would remember that statement of Bunn's = they
play just hard enough to win - we would still: have a fighting
chance at the championship.

"Jack Gardner, the Kansas State coach and former
Southern California captain, in speaking over the radio between
halves of that epochal contest in the Municipal Auditorium, said,
“Well, Kansas is playing a surprising game, but California has
the power and finesse and they will smash Kansas in the second
half." The score was 21 = 20 in favor of Southern California at
the half. I reminded the boys again that Southern California
played just hard enough to win, and that there were nearly two
million people in Kansas listening for the second half over the
radio - some of them not having much love for athletics, but all
having a great state pride, and if we could defeat Southern Calif-
ornia it would be a triumph for Kansas.

And then in my talk I mentioned the Missourians and the
hecklers who were riding Bobby that night. He was having a terribly
bad night and those non-weliwishers were yelling, "Give the ball to
Junior. Papa's little boy, you are not doing it the right way,
Junior", and so forth.