Page 4 University Daily Kansan
Writer Predicts 27-21 Jayhawker Victory-
Tuesday, Oct. 14, 1952
Can the Jayhawkers Defeat the Miahtv Sooners?
By BOB NELSON
Kansan Snorts Writer
The most important topic of conversation this week at coffee time is, "Can the Jayhawkers Defeat the Mighty Sooners?"
Coffee shop quarterbacks and bull session grid experts will debate this question long and loud, and no doubt have the game won or lost . . . and still better, will even know the final score long before kickoff time Saturday.
Hundreds of thousands of football fans will witness the contest by television or hear it described by radio. The Columbia Broadcasting System will carry the game coast-to-coast. The National Broadcasting Company will carry parts of the contest on its weekly grid roundup on a coast-to-coast basis.
In the local area (including Greater Kansas City), the KU-OU battle royal probably will be witnessed by more television fans than have ever before witnessed a TV program. The game will be carried in this area by WDAF-TV in Kansas City, Mo.
Coach Jules V. Sikes' Jayhawkers are currently rated sixth in the United Press poll, a rating board established by 35 of the nation's leading college coaches. Oklahoma holds down the fifth place spot in the UP poll.
Never in the history of Big Seven football has a game produced as much pre-game excitement and interest, both on the local and national grid fronts.
Few, if any, Big Seven games have ever matched two conference teams rated among the nation's top 10 grid powers.
Kansas' sixth place rating is the highest ever accorded a KU football team. The Jayhawkers lofty perch is higher than that given the famous Big Six co-champion 1947 Orange bowl team, a club headed by All-American halfback Ray Evans. This team compiled a 8-0-2 record before losing a heartbreaker to Georgia Tech, 14-20, in Miami's Orange Bowl, Jan. 1, 1948.
Billed as the "Game of the Year" in Big Seven football, the winner of the KU-OU clash is expected to nail up the 1952 conference grid pennant, a championship prize that has been housed undisputed in Soonerland since 1948.
Going into Saturday's big Oklahoma game here, Kansas is the proud owner of a nine-game winning streak. Following last year's mid-season 21-33 setback to the Sooners at Norman, KU finished its '51 season with five straight wins. They have added four more this season.
Here is a game-by-game run-
down on the Jayhawker win streak:
*Kansas 33, Kansas State 14
*Kansas 27, Nebraska 7
*Kansas 34, Loyola of L. A. 26
*Kansas 27, Oklahoma A&M 12
*Kansas 41, Missouri 28
*Kansas 33, Kansas State 14
*Kansas 13, Texas Christian 0
*Kansas 21, Santa Clara 9
*Kansas 21, Colorado 12
*Kansas 43, Iowa State 0
This nine-game winning streak is the longest unbeaten KU record since 1909. It is the aim of Charlie Hogg and Co. to continue this victory string at the expense of the Sooners Saturday.
*Home games
By upsetting favored OU (Okla-
hma is currently listed a two-
touchdown favorite). Kansas could
well go all the way to a perfect
10-0 record this year. This would
be Kansas' greatest grid season of
all time and place the Jayhawkers
in line for a major past-season
bowl bid.
After opening with a none-to-impressive 21-21 tie against Colorado, the powerful Sooners have rolled to impressive victories over the highly rated Pittsburgh Panthers and the Texas Longhorns. Both wins were by 49-20 scores.
Beyond any doubt, Oklahoma has played a tougher schedule than
Kansas has averaged 24.5 points while holding its opponents to a 5.3 average per game in marking up a perfect 4-0 record. This is a 19.2 point average victory margin.
Oklahoma has averaged 39.7 points per game. The Sooners' opponents have averaged 20.3 points per game, a winning difference of 19.4 in compiling a 2-0-1 record to date. This is only 0.2 better than KU's victory difference.
is especially true of the running attack.
Kansas, Coach Bud Wilkinson's Sooner offense is regarded as even stronger than last year. On the defensive side, OU appears quite a bit weaker. Colorado, Pittsburgh and Texas each scored three touchdowns on the Sooners.
The Jayhawkers have shown excellent offense-defense balance (to date). In KU's last two games, Colorado (21-12) and Iowa State (43-0), the offense has shown steady and encouraging improvement. With improved offensive line play, this
Defensively, Kansas has turned in an excellent performance in every game. In KU's first four games, all opponent scoring, a mere 21 point total, has taken place in second quarters.
In this day of high scoring offensive minded football, it's indeed a rare accomplishment to shutout four straight foes through the final 30 minutes of each contest.
Oklahoma's last conference defeat was here against Kansas in 1946. End Paul "Golden Toe" Turner kicked a 43-yard field goal in the final 80 seconds to give the Jayhawkers a thrilling 16-13 story-book victory.
Since Coach Wilkinson took over at OU in 1947, the Sooners have never tasted a conference defeat in compiling a 26-0-2 record. Oklahoma is aiming for its seventh straight grid title this season. KU and OU shared the title in 1946 and 1947.
But the battling Jayhawkers are confident, but not overconfident.
that OU's Big Seven supremacy will come to an abrupt end here Saturday.
For eight senior starters, end Jerry Bogue, tackles George Mrkonic and Co-cap, Oliver Spencer, linebackers Galen Fiss and Merlin Gish, and halfbacks Co-capt. Charlie Hoag, Bob Brandeberry and Hal Clevinger, the Oklahoma game is "do or die."
These veterans have seen their team lead the Mighty Sooners 1-7 and 21-20 going into the fourth quarter the past two seasons, yet lose by 13-33 and 21-33 scores in 1950 and '51 respectively.
An air of impressive confidence is present this week in the Kansas football camp as the Sikesmen prepare for the Sooners. The players feel they can rise to the needed occasion to "whip" Wilkinson's Oklahoma club.
@
We also think Kansas will do the trick this year. The Jayhawkers have shown more balanced improvement (offense-defense) since last year than have the Sooners. And on top of that, Kansas has
since added a guy named Gil Reich, pretty fair grid hand in any league. And still another, linebacker Fiss, who missed last year's battle but is ready to go against the line smashes of Buck McPhail, Billy Vessels and Buddy Leake this year.
And on top of that, Kansas has
We're predicting a Kansas victory, 27-21, in a thriller that may well prove to be the greatest game ever played in Memorial Stadium.
8 Freshmen Named Intramural Managers
—SINK THE SOONERS—
Eight men have been appointed freshman intramural managers for the 1952-53 school year, Walter Mikols, director of men's intramurals, announced today.
They are Donald Krause, Kansas City, Mo.; Roger Collins, Mission; Dave Ross, St. Joseph, Mo.; Ronald Phillips, Mission; George Kinney, Garden City; Ed Enfield, Kansas City, Mo.; John Dixson, Topeka, and Harlan Stampe, Great Bend.
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Marguerite Ullmann City College of New York
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