1910 college football season explained

The 1910 college football season had no clear-cut champion, with the Official NCAA Division I Football Records Book listing Harvard and Pittsburgh as having been retrospectively selected national champions, by four "major selectors" in about 1927, 1947, 1970 and 1980.^[1] Harvard claims a national championship for the 1910 season.

Rules

Rule changes were made prior to the 1910 season to permit more use of the forward pass, with complicated limitations:^[2]

• The only eligible receivers were the two ends, who could catch a pass no more than 20 yards beyond the line of scrimmage, and could not be interfered with until the ball was caught.
• A legal pass could not be thrown unless the quarterback was at least 5 yards behind the line of scrimmage and the rest of the players, except the two ends, were at least 1 yard behind the scrimmage line.
• On kickoffs and punts, the kicking team's players could not be touched until they had advanced 20 yards
• Flying tackles were outlawed, and "the man making a tackle must have at least one foot on the ground".
• The ballcarrier could no longer be aided in any way by his teammates.
• Games were now played as four quarters, each 15 minutes long, rather than two halves of 35 minutes each^[3]

Other rules in 1910 were:^[4]

• Field 110 yards in length
• Kickoff made from midfield
• Three downs to gain ten yards
• Touchdown worth 5 points
• Field goal worth 3 points

The season ran from September 24 until Thanksgiving Day (November 24).^[5] Prior to Thanksgiving, the season's death toll was 22; the previous season's was 30.^[6]

Conference and program changes

• The Colorado Faculty Athletic Conference (CFAC) changed its name to the Rocky Mountain Faculty Athletic Conference (RMFAC, now just the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference) in 1910 after expanding into Utah.

Conference changes

School	1909 Conference	1910 Conference
The Citadel Bulldogs	Independent	SIAA
	Independent	Rocky Mountain
Howard Bulldogs	Independent	SIAA
Indiana State Normal Fightin' Teachers	Independent	Dropped Program
Louisville Cardinals	Program Established	Independent
	Independent	Rocky Mountain

Program changes

• Arkansas changed its nickname from the Cardinals to the current Razorbacks.

Conference standings

Minor conferences

Conference	Champion(s)	Record
Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference	Kansas State Agricultural	4–0
Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association	Alma	1–0
Ohio Athletic Conference	Oberlin	3–0–1

Minor conference standings

Awards and honors

All-Americans

See main article: 1910 College Football All-America Team. The consensus All-America team included Walter Camp's selections:

Position	Name	Height	Weight (lbs.)	Class	Hometown	Team
QB	Earl Sprackling	5'9"	150	Jr.	Cleveland, Ohio	Brown
HB	Percy Wendell			So.	Roxbury, Massachusetts	Harvard
HB	Talbot Pendleton					Princeton
FB	Leroy Mercer			So.		Penn
E	Stanfield Wells			Jr.	Massillon, Ohio	Michigan
T	Robert McKay			Sr.		Harvard
G	Albert Benbrook		240	Sr.	Chicago, Illinois	Michigan
C	Ernest Cozens			Sr.		Penn
G	Bob Fisher			Jr.	Boston, Massachusetts	Harvard
T	James Walker					Minnesota
E	John Kilpatrick					Yale

Notes and References

1. Book: Official 2009 NCAA Division I Football Records Book . 70. The National Collegiate Athletic Association . August 2009 . Indianapolis, IN . 2009-10-16.
2. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1910/09/15/105090293.pdf "New Football As Walter Camp Sees It"
3. News: Features of New Football Rules . . . 8 . September 21, 1910 . November 29, 2024 . newspapers.com.
4. Book: Danzig, Allison . The History of American Football: Its Great Teams, Players, and Coaches . registration . 1956 . Prentice-Hall . Englewood Cliffs, N.J. . 70–71 .
5. "Football Under New Rules Starts To-Day", New York Times, September 24, 1910
6. News: Death toll of football season . Eugene Daily Guard . (Oregon). November 23, 1910 . 6.