When Knute Rockne first met George Gipp | |
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It is a familiar story, of course. Told and retold numberous times. The legend presists and demands a retelling: the way Knute Rockne discovered George Gipp. How George Gipp has died more often than Camille, whether George Gipp was for real. He was! It should begin and end with that. But he sure was for real.
It was shortly after practice, early in September 1916. Rockne was still assistant coach at the time, and was on this day the last person to leave. He glanced towards the oposite end of the deserted field and saw a tall, rangy kid in street cloathes booting a ball to a third-string squad member who had not yet gone to the showers.
Knute Rockne tells it in his own words: "I first met George Gipp on a football field an early autumn afternoon in 1916. The practice field was all but deserted. It was a habit of mine to ride or stroll to the practice field and observe groups of freshmen or non-descript students kicking footballs around. Once in a great while you can spot, among these clumsy beginners, genuine talent".
"A tall lad lad in everyday campus clothes was booting a football to a boy in a playing suit who kicked it back. The uniform lad was a candidate for the freshman team.Their play seemed nothing more than a casual duet of punts between a football aspirant and some hall friend or roommate who had come out to oblige".
Rockne said: "The style of the taller boy caught my eye. He picked up the ball, poised his body with natural grace, slid the ball to the ground and drop-kicked with perfect ease - fifty yards. For about ten minutes i watched him".
Rockne, struck with the natural grace of this unknown, wondered how anyone without the toil of practice could get such distance and execution into his kicking, such accuracy and confidence in his passing. Gipp was so nonchalant, so easy in the way he moved his body, that Rockne was amazed. Here was one being of whom he´d dreamed of but never thought to run across, a natural athlete.
Rockne said : "His kicks were far and placed evidently where he wanted them to go to give the other player catching practice. When he strolled from the field, as If bored I stopped him":
- "What´s your name", Rockne asked?
- "Gipp, George Gipp. I come from Calumet, Michigan". - "Played high school football", Rockne asked? - "No, don´t particularly care for football. Baseball´s my dish". - "What led you to come to Notre Dame", Rockne asked"? - "Friends of mine are here", Gipp replied. - "Put on a football suit tomorrow, and come out with the freshmen scrubs. I´ll think you make a football player", Rockne said. - "Why", said the lad who had played with Gipp, "he´s been kicking those punts and drops with ordinary low shoes. What´ll he do with football boots"? That question was soon to be answered. Gipp was so certain that he could only do well in baseball that he didn´t bother to try any other sports. But suddenly he found himself in another atmosphere, that of football. And it was while he was kicking the ball around for exercise in his street clothes that Rockne first saw him.
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