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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/1921 Centre vs. Harvard football game/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Gog the Mild via FACBot (talk) 20 April 2024 [1].

1921 Centre vs. Harvard football game edit

Nominator(s): PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 23:31, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

After surprising many by simply being competitive the year prior, the football team from tiny Centre College returned to Boston for a rematch with football giants Harvard in October 1921. Led by star quarterback Bo McMillin, the "Praying Colonels" shocked the sports world by winning 6–0, a victory considered by many to be one of the greatest in college football history. After the game, a Centre professor remarked that Harvard had been poisoned by the organic compound "C6H0", giving the game a name that has stuck to this day. This article was super fun to rewrite and I look forward to any and all comments it receives. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 23:31, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments edit

  • Wikilink "rushed" and "touchdown" in the lead
  • Wikilink American football on the first use in the body
  • Wikilink Harvard on the first use in the body
  • Wikilink shutout on first use
  • Wikilink rushing and passing on first uses in body
  • "Centre was [singular] praised for its [singular] resiliency and for their [plural] unwillingness" - some grammatical disagreement here
  • "also an umpire for the National League" => "also an umpire for baseball's National League" for clarity
  • Link all the positions in the sentence starting "The starting offensive line" and the ones thereafter. I personally don't have a clue what any of them mean so links would be beneficial
    • Got a little sloppy here with linking, thank you for pointing this out. Added. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 05:37, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • What are a "varsity squad" and a "freshmen team"? Are there suitable links?
    • A varsity team is the school's first-choice team, and a freshman team is just a team composed of first-year college students (since Harvard, at the time, did not allow college freshmen on its top-level football team. Varsity team link has been added and Freshman team redirects to Varsity team#Junior varsity so I've added that, and tweaked a few words here and there. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 05:37, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Daily Messenger image caption does not need a full stop as it isn't a complete sentence
  • "and all around Danville students painted the so-called "impossible formula"," - I think "and Danville students painted the so-called "impossible formula", all around" would read more elegantly
    • the intended meaning was "students painted the formula all around Danville", not "Danville students" - never occurred to me that this was a confusing way to word that. Fixed so it's clear what I'm trying to say here. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 05:37, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • "A third game had been proposed" - a third game between Harvard and Centre? The sentence isn't completely clear
  • That's what I got Great work! I know basically nothing about American football and I was able to follow the article well -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 19:16, 25 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    @ChrisTheDude Thank you for the time and comments as always Chris! Everything above has been taken care of. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 05:38, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support -- ChrisTheDude (talk) 10:14, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Web/newspaper source check support by CactiStaccingCrane edit

Not so fast! Will review this article tomorrow. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 16:49, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewing this version, spot check one citation for every three. Skipping sources that I don't have access, would love to have someone else checking book sources:

  • 1: OK
  • 4: OK. Even though the source didn't say "Tournament East-West Football Game" explicitly, it is reasonable to assume that it mentions that game because the description in the newspaper largely matches with our Wikipedia article.
  • 6: Primary source, in order: a: OK, b: OK, c: cannot verify
    • 6c only covers the portion of the sentence that says Harvard had not been scored on in their first four games, using the scores in the schedule. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 02:58, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 7: OK
  • 12: cannot verify, please give me the quote for the citation
    • I will have access to this source again on Saturday - as soon as I'm back with the book I will give you the quote. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 02:58, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    • @CactiStaccingCrane: sorry, for some reason I saw it wrong and thought this was the book cite above it. I removed brought the team success since that was a little interpretative on my part; the newspaper source for the remaining bit uses a portion under the header "All-America football teams chosen by Camp", which has "Weaver, Centre" and "McMillin, Centre" listed under "First eleven" and "Roberts, Centre" listed under "Third eleven". I can reproduce the whole table for you if you like but those are the only bits that I used. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:23, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 14: OK

By this point I have to acknowledge that I don't have access to books listed, but a source check on them should be performed to ensure verifiability. PCN02WPS, it would be great if you could ask somebody with access to perform a book source check.

@CactiStaccingCrane: I don't know of anyone specifically that has access - I am more than happy to provide quotes from book sources to any reviewer, however. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 22:13, 5 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 17: OK, OK
  • 20: OK
  • 24: OK, but I prefer that the clipping is smaller.
  • 28: Primary source. OK. The source said "At Harvard the cage-men evened up the defeat suffered on the gridiron last fall by gaining a 41-36 victory over the Crimson". The sentence should be a bit less ambiguous though.
    • Where does the ambiguity come in? Perhaps I'm blind to it but I'm having a hard time seeing it. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:07, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 32: Seemingly OK, but limited access to the excerpt only
    • Yeah, I don't have NYT access so there's not much I can do about that (unless an editor that does have a subscription wants to lend a hand)
  • 36: Is "heaped 40 points" here in the first or second half?
    • I'm fairly confident it's the first half - I think all it's saying is Centre scored 40 before they took out their starters, and they got to 60 (a mistake on my part that I have fixed) before halftime. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:07, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 37: OK, OK, OK
  • 40: OK
  • 45: OK, OK, OK, OK. I prefer that you use {{rp}} to give more specific page number citations. It's not really vital in this case but it is a healthy habit to use it.
  • 58: Uh... with this huge clipping I have no idea where to verify the information. This seems to be a recurring problem with this article. You should either make the clipping smaller or use |at= template parameter to denote the sub-section names.
    • Sorry, for some reason I had it in my head that I had to clip the entire story instead of just the relevant parts. Fixed that; the relevant information here is near the bottom. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:07, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 61: OK
  • 66 (huge source): OK, OK, OK, suggest removal in favor of the other source, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, cannot verify, OK, OK, OK in footnote.
    • Removed fourth use as recommended; the bit about Covington uses this quote: Centre lost five yards and Covington replaced Captain Armstrong at left half back for Centre. It's in the last paragraph of the "Third Quarter" section. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:07, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 75: Again, the clipping is way too large. I literally cannot find the info on the page. See above
  • 78: OK
  • 84: OK
  • 91: OK

(skipping similar contemporary sources, moving to modern sources)

  • 99: Primary source. I prefer to see the original source of the news.
    • I think the ESPN list itself is offline but I replaced the Centre source with a clipping of the newspaper story that's quoted in the Centre source. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:07, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • 101: OK, OK
  • 104: OK, OK
  • 106: OK, OK
  • 110: OK
  • 113: OK

I would say that the references need work on being more specific. Other than that, I see that there is only minor issues with source-text integrity. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 12:57, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@CactiStaccingCrane Thank you for taking the time to look through these - everything above has been fixed or responded to! PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:08, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Alright. This FAC receives a support in web/newspaper source check. Another book source check would be ideal but unfortunately I am very busy so I won't be the one that do it. If you want, you can help perform a source check at my Mars Society nomination. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 16:10, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Btw, I first knew about Centre College from this match 2 years ago :) CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 16:11, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Coordinator comment edit

Three weeks in and just the single general support. Unless this nomination makes significant further progress towards a consensus to promote over the next three or four days I am afraid that it is liable to be archived. Gog the Mild (talk) 20:07, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Wehwalt edit

I vaguely remember reading about this game as a kid, what stands out in my memory is declining the game ball after the first loss, pledging to be back the following year.
  • Wouldn't you refer to the location of the stadium as "Boston" rather than "Allston"?
  • I'd like to see your view on notability of this as an individual game per WP:SPORTSEVENT. \
    • I believe this game falls qualifies as extraordinary with a lasting impact on the sport; even into the twenty-first century, it still receives coverage as one of the greatest upsets in football/sporting history. The news coverage it received spanned from days/weeks before the game to days/weeks afterwards in papers around the country, and it was detailed in publications and books for the following 150 years. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 22:06, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Could we get a little more info on how it was that a small place like Centre College was a major football powerhouse at the time.
    • I tried to add a bit of emphasis that it was mainly the players that Myers was able to bring over, but if you think this isn't apparent enough I can try something else. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 22:06, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Do we have any article that lists these pre-NCAA national champions?
  • "during which span" I would cut "span"
  • "was a matchup with Penn State, which they played to a 21–21 tie" I would add "in" before "which".
  • Was there press coverage in anticipation of the game? Both in Kentucky and Boston? Game predictions?
    • I have in the first paragraph of "Game summary" that Harvard was favored to win with 3-to-1 odds; I have added some more about this and some about the press coverage in the buildup to the game. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 21:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • "followed the blocking of Roberts" I imagine from context that Roberts blocked ahead of the ball carrier on this play but it could be made clearer.
  • Did the MIT students root for Centre, as I'd expect them too?
  • Game analysis: I see some indication in the papers that the Harvard starters who did not play were injured, is that so?
  • Fair Park Stadium. Consider a link to Cotton Bowl (stadium)#History which at least mentions the previous stadium.
That's it.--Wehwalt (talk) 18:00, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Wehwalt: Thank you for the review! Everything has been addressed/responded to. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 22:07, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good then. Support Wehwalt (talk) 01:40, 19 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Image review from Dylan620 edit

  • All images used in the article are categorically PD because they were published in the United States over 95 years ago.
  • All images add encyclopedic value to the article. I like the final image of "C6H0" spray-painted on the side of a building - having been taken earlier this year, it demonstrates the lasting legacy of this game.
  • Suitably descriptive alt text is present throughout, solely excepting the lack of alt text for the poster in the infobox; however, this is a case where any alt text would probably be redundant to the caption.
  • Support on images. Dylan620 (he/him • talk • edits) 19:08, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I note with some embarrassment that I had missed the lack of page numbers on some of these images, but I've taken it upon myself to fix this issue over at Commons (see my recent edits there), so this should still be good to go on the image front. Dylan620 (he/him • talk • edits) 19:37, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    @Dylan620 Thanks for the review! Thank you for adding the page numbers, I appreciate it. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 19:46, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Support by RecycledPixels edit

I will review this article. RecycledPixels (talk) 22:09, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewing this version of the article. I'm familiar with American Football, but don't have much knowledge of College Football, so I'm approaching this as a typical reader unfamiliar with the sport would view it.

Lead

  • I'm a heavy user of the mouseover-the-bluelink method on Wikipedia to get a quick glance of what a wikilinked article is about when I encounter an unfamiliar term. The hover only shows the first few sentences of the linked article, which makes it super important to pack in the most important parts of the summary in the first few sentences. In this article, I'm happy with the first two sentences of the lead paragraph, but then it veers off into a discussion about the previous year's contest without answering the question of why this game matters. I'd like to see statements from the second paragraph like "Centre's defeat of Harvard is widely considered one of the greatest upsets in college football history" and "The game is often referred to by the shorthand C6H0; this originated shortly after the game when a Centre professor remarked that Harvard had been poisoned by this "impossible" chemical formula." appear much earlier in the lead as part of an overall summary before getting into specifics of the previous year's game and the details of this year's game, hopefully close enough to the beginning to get those two facts, or shortened versions of them, into the hover-text.
    • Reworked the lead into three paragraphs, keeping the first paragraph to more relevant information for the whole of the article as recommended. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • The revised lead is a big improvement. It introduced a couple of issues. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • The teams had played for the first time the year prior; Centre, led by Charley Moran, shocked many by taking a tie into halftime but ultimately Bob Fisher's Harvard squad took control in the second half and won the game. Change the semicolon to a period.
      • The conversion failed but the Centre defense held for the remainder of the game; Harvard threatened and even reached the Centre 3-yard line at one point but were unable to score. Change the semicolon to a period.
      • Their lone defeat came on January 2, 1922, to Texas A&M in the Dixie Classic, leaving them with a 10–1 record to finish the season. It's fairly clear that "Their" is referring to Centre, but since Centre and Arizona were both mentioned in the previous sentence, change "Their" to "Centre's".

Background:Recent years

  • Harvard finished their 1919 season with an undefeated record; they did not allow a point to be scored against them for the first six games of the season, until a 10–10 tie with Princeton. "Undefeated record" links (via redirect) to perfect season, with a hover-text that says "A perfect season is a sports season, including any requisite playoff portion, in which a team remains and finishes undefeated and untied." but then the rest of the sentence mentions the 10-10 tie with Princeton, so that's probably not a good wikilink to use.
  • and were retroactively named outright national champions by two selectors. I don't know what selectors are. Can you briefly explain the term in the article, or at least provide a wikilink? The term is used again in the next sentence about how only one selector chose them and the majority chose California instead. I don't understand what that means.
    • Added a bit explaining the selector system as best I can (it's tough, as well, because the NCAA didn't exist back then, nor did a real concept of a "national champion") PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • They went on to win the Tournament East-West Football Game against Oregon, 7–6, and were retroactively named outright national champions by two selectors; since there has never been an entity which has awarded a single definitive national championship in college football, the NCAA recognizes the retroactive picks of numerous national championship "selectors", who use different methods to determine their choice for a national champion. That ended up becoming quite a long sentence. But I still don't know what a "selector" is. Is it an individual, a publication, an elected body of representatives of various schools, sanctioning bodies, a poll of the general public, or what? How many of these selectors were there? RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
        • Put the selectors explanation bit in parentheses since it's not directly relevant but good background information, and added a bit to make this a little more clear. Selector is a blanket term for "entity (either a person, or a publication, or a computer rankings system, etc.) which is recognized by the NCAA to pick a national champion which is then recognized by the NCAA as a national champion in FBS football for that season". PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 02:44, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
          • I'm still finding it confusingly worded, but less confusing now that I have read through the College football national championships in NCAA Division I FBS article, which is already linked in the sentence. So when you write that the team was retroactively named outright national champions (it seems the word "outright" is inappropriate here, since there are multiple opinions), that might have included something like Parke H. Davis, who, in 1934, published a list of who he considered the national champions were for each year going back to 1869? If that's the case, it seems like it might be just clearer and easier to replace that who part by saying something along the lines of "In 19XX, so-and-so named the 1919 Harvard football team as the national champion in their publication Things I came up with one day" or something like that. My slowly growing understanding of the selector system then makes me question why the wording "a share of the national championship" is appropriate. In the paragraph about Centre, it looks like you've mostly done that with Jeff Sagarin, but it's not mentioned when Sagarin made that selection, and seeing that he wasn't even born until 1948 makes me understand that he didn't show up at the team's last game of the season and hand them a trophy, which is the impression that I had been under. Am I making sense about why I'm finding the current wording of the article confusing, and what might make it less muddied for me? I don't think we're that far off. RecycledPixels (talk) 22:38, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
            @RecycledPixels It's not the most intuitive system to say the least. The whole selector system is a byproduct of the fact that football is unique in that the NCAA does not recognize a single national champion at the highest level (Division I FBS) and instead recognizes the winner of the FCS Playoffs (whose participants are picked by a NCAA selection committee) as the Division I football national champion. The concept of a "national champion" has not been in place for a good chunk of college football history (and the concept of a single definitive national champion, it could be argued, has only existed since the 1998 founding of the Bowl Championship Series). In 1919, Harvard was recognized as national champions by five selectors in total (CFRA, Helms, Houlgate, NCF, Davis) but was the only team selected as 1919 national champion (outright champion) by only two of the five (CFRA picked Illinois as co-champ, NCF and Davis chose Notre Dame as co-champ, Helms and Houlgate only chose Harvard). A "share" of the national championship just denotes that they were not the only team picked to be national champions by a given selector; in the case of 1920, the Boand System retroactively recognized Harvard and Notre Dame as co-champions.
            Your interpretation of a team being retroactively named champions is correct; all that means is that at least one of the NCAA-recognized selectors who picked champions after the fact chose them (some selectors' national championship picks are recognized retroactively, while some were contemporary). Are you recommending I replace the information about selectors in parentheses with the names of the specific selectors (like I did with Sagarin and Centre)? I'm happy to do that if so - in my mind the new wordings would look something like this: ...and were retroactively named outright national champions by two selectors, the Helms Athletic Foundation and the Houlgate System. and ...share of the national championship, though this time only by one selector, the Boand System as the majority chose... If those are clear enough I think that's a good solution. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 23:23, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
            I think that would be a good solution to the problem without getting super wordy and taking the article completely off the rails (this information is just background information setting up the game that is the subject of the article, after all) but when I come across that unfamiliar concept, I can click through to those articles to find out what all that meant. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:31, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
            @RecycledPixels: sounds good, that's been changed. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 00:31, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • The team rebounded with a 7–1 campaign in 1917, earning shutouts in every win, Can you simply the wording of that, perhaps replacing shutout with a more understandable description of not allowing any of their opponents to score any points against them?
    • Maybe this is just from my perspective as a sports fan, but I think "shutout" is easy enough to understand as is, especially since it's a fairly simple concept and the explanation is given in the first sentence of its article, which is easily visible in its hover-text. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • It's not a sticking point for me, it's just that I think that the tone of writing of an encyclopedia entry would be different from the tone you'd find in a sports publication or news report, which is probably what a lot of the sources for this article end up being. After you spend so much time focusing on those sources, they become second nature to you and people who regularly read those reports. Some of what I do in real life involves translating highly technical jargon into something that somebody's 85-year-old grandmother could understand, so I realize that the process is challenging. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • All three players were named All-Americans by Walter Camp. I'm unfamiliar with who Walter Camp was, and the article hover-text didn't mention anything about his publishing a list of All-American teams until I eventually clicked through to that article and found it in the second paragraph of the lead. Can you rephrase the sentence, either to explain that Walter Camp was a widely respected sports writer who was recognized as the official selector in the early years of the 20th century (from the College Football All-America Team article) or something like that?
  • Centre finished the 1919 season undefeated and untied and were retroactively recognized by one selector, Jeff Sagarin, as the season's national champions. In the previous paragraph, Harvard was named national champions of the 1919 season by two selectors. Again, I'm confused about what these selectors are, and why there are multiple teams who are national champions.
    • Hoping this is cleared up by the earlier bit about selectors; if not, I'll see what I can do to make it easier to understand. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • They attracted attention with their win over West Virginia in November 1919; the Mountaineers had defeated Princeton in a shutout the week before and went on to finish the season 8–2 I had to hover over the West Virginia wikilink to find out who the Mountaineers were, but I don't know why defeating Princeton the week before was important. I'm assuming Princeton was a good team at the time, but this can use some clarification. Another use of shutout which could possibly be rephrased to make the article easier to understand by non-sports fans.
    • Added a note about Princeton being a Big Three school and one of the better CFB programs of the day. See above regarding the use of "shutout". PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Centre won a further eight games in 1920, capping the season with a 56-point win over TCU in the Fort Worth Classic MOS:CLICHE for "capping the season".
  • he went with former Harvard halfback Eddie Mahan to scout the Colonels. Earlier, the team was identified as the "Centre Praying Colonels". The article on the team seems to shorten the team name to the "Praying Colonels" as well as "Colonels" but when I was reading this article I had to go back and figure out what team was being scouted because the article had generally been referring to the football team as "Centre" up to this point.
    • The use of a team's nickname alone to refer to the team is very commonplace in college athletics, including football; I used "the Crimson" to refer to Harvard in the (now) second paragraph of the lead. I tend to use both the name and nickname when talking about a team to avoid letting the article get too repetitive in that aspect. I am very open to suggestions, of course, in the way of making the article more easily understood but I am hesitant to change uses of "Colonels" to "Centre", if that is what you suggest. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • Being unfamiliar enough with College Football, I tend to prefer that a team's name remain constant throughout the article because it's easier to keep track. Whether it's Centre, the Colonels, or the Praying Colonels. I glanced at 1998 NFC Championship Game, another featured article about American Football, and I note that each time a team was mentioned the first time, the city and the team name were used together ("Minnesota Vikings", "Atlanta Falcons", etc.) and each subsequent mention consistently only used the team name ("Vikings", "Falcons") and never mentioned any team by the name of the city alone. However, 2005 Sugar Bowl, another football article, switches back and forth between referring to the teams by their team name and their college name. So there does not appear to have an MOS standard, just editor preference. I think the 1998 NFC Championship Game is easier to follow. I also tried to look for general style guidelines on the Internet and did not find anything to help, but the SABR Style guide appeared to have the most complete guidance. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
        • I think the difference in the NFC championship and Sugar Bowl articles is a byproduct of the fact that one is NFL and one is college. In the NFL, teams are primarily known by their nicknames, while the name of the team itself is secondary, whereas in college the team name is most known and the nickname is secondary. From what I've seen, switching back and forth is sort of the norm for college, since the team is easily identifiable by both and introduced with both, and all college football articles I've written switch back and forth since it's super helpful to avoid repetition. This does create problems when both teams have the same or similar nicknames (e.g. Clemson Tigers vs. Missouri Tigers or Harvard Crimson vs. Alabama Crimson Tide), but I don't think that sort of issue presents itself here. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 02:44, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Out of time for today, I'll continue tomorrow. RecycledPixels (talk) 22:53, 9 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@RecycledPixels: Everything above has been taken care of or responded to! PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 16:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Still using the same revision as above, although by the time I finished this, additional edits had been made to the article which I have not yet seen.

Background: 1920 meeting

  • "the scoring machine of the football universe" by The Dayton Herald after totaling 241 points in their first three games combined less clunky to phrase it as something like "scored a total of 241 points" rather than using "total" as a verb.
    • I used "totaling" to avoid repetition of the word "scoring" - if you think use of "totaling" detracts from the reader's ability to understand, I can figure out another wording to use. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • I still like my suggestion, but it's not going to hold anything up if you disagree with me. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Attendance was estimated to have been at least 37,000 people (and was reported to have been closer to 40,000 or even 45,000); ticket sales were stopped the night before when the contest sold out and as many as 10,000 potential attendees were turned away at the gates. I'm confused by this sentence for a few reasons. The first, is a minor nitpick about the use of the passive voice "was estimated to have been" which doesn't say who was making the estimation. If it was the ticket office that made the estimate, I would assume they knew how many tickets were sold, but if it was a reporter in the stands trying to eyeball the crowd, I'd want to know who was making that estimation, especially since there were so many wildly varying estimates. Next, the Harvard Stadium article's infobox stated that between 1904 and 1928, the stadium had a capacity of 42,000, so I don't understand how there could have been estimates of 45,000 spectators, or how 10,000 people would have been turned away if there were 37,000 spectators. Finally, it doesn't really make clear if the people who were turned away were people who were just trying to buy tickets, or if they were people who had been sold tickets but refused entry, and if it was the latter, why was the stadium so oversold?
    • The 37,000 figure comes from The Dayton Herald, which uses a similar wording: "it was conservatively estimated that no less than 37,000 persons would witness the game." Added them into the sentence, removed the 40k figure, split the sentence in two, and added "as a result" to clarify that the people were turned away because they couldn't get tix after the game sold out. As for the capacity of the stadium, I don't know whether they sold general admission tickets or standing room or what their solution was, but then again I have no idea what it was like to buy a football ticket and attend a game in 1921 (as cool as that would be). It is not unheard of, though, for the attendance of a game to exceed the stadium's seating capacity, so I assume that's what happened. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • Ticket sales were stopped the night before when the contest sold out[21] and as many as 10,000 potential attendees were turned away at the gates as a result. Move reference from the middle of the sentence to the end. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Minor, and totally optional nitpick, not limited to this section but I just noticed it. I like how nearly every sentence is cited. It makes keeping the attribution easier when editors come along later and add uncited material in the middle of cited material. To keep the visual appearance of the article cleaner without repeating footnotes appearing all over the place, consider the advice given at WP:OVERCITE: "If consecutive sentences are supported by the same reference, and that reference's inline citation is placed at the end of the paragraph as described at WP:CITETYPE, an editor may want to consider using Wikipedia's hidden text syntax <!-- --> to place hidden ref name tags at the end of each sentence. Doing so may benefit others adding material to that paragraph in the future. If that happens, they can uncomment the hidden citations and switch to citing references after every sentence. Having hidden citations could cause confusion, especially among inexperienced editors, so the approach is strictly optional and should be used cautiously."
  • The Praying Colonels surprised many simply by taking a 14–14 tie into halftime. Why "simply"?
    • I have removed this; I think my intention was to stress that the very fact that they were tied was the surprising part, rather than the score or something else, but I think that meaning still comes through without the extra word. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Harvard scored one touchdown in each quarter, adding a field goal in the third quarter, and held Centre scoreless in the second half to finish 31–14 winners.. Awkwardly worded, how about "... to win the game 31-14" instead?
  • McMillin finished the game having tallied 151 rushing yards and 131 passing. Needs "yards" after passing. McMillin needs to be identified further, since he was only introduced in the previous section, and only by name, and what position he plays was never identified. In this sentence, it is not clear which team he was playing for.
  • During the game, Harvard used nine of its substitutes while Centre used three. That needs explaining, since when I watch football, I see substitutions happening all the time. Were there rule differences back then that limited the number of substitutes in a game, like soccer, or was it just not done, or what. Were those substitutions due to injury, fatigue, or a change in strategy?
    • Football is fundamentally different today than it was 100 years ago, so any modern-day game will be a poor standard of comparison (both with regard to rules and athletic ability) for any game in this era. Your question is a good one that I cannot answer unfortunately - the source only lists the names of the substitutes but doesn't give any reasons as to why they were brought on. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Boston Globe described the game as the most interesting to watch as had ever been played in Harvard Stadium The wording isn't identified as a quote from the source, but the way it's worded sounds like that early-20th century style of twisted writing that seemed to be so popular. Since it's not a direct quote, can you make its meaning easier to understand by changing it to something simpler like "described the game as one of the most interesting games ever played in Harvard Stadium" or something like that?
    • Good catch, I guess that's what happens when you read too much 1920s sports journalism. Simplified the wording a bit. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Centre was praised for its resiliency and unwillingness to give up; after the game, the Harvard team hosted Centre's team, coaches, and president for dinner. Another minor nitpick about the passive voice and not identifying who was praising Centre. The sentence seems to be made up of two fairly unrelated items, is a semicolon really appropriate here, or should it just be broken into two sentences?
  • Despite this loss, Centre was still seen as a strong team; the southern football historian Fuzzy Woodruff said that they entered their next game against Georgia Tech as an "unbeatable team",[26] though Centre ultimately lost this game 24–0. More passive voice. The use of "the southern football historian Fuzzy Woodruff" tripped me up, perhaps because of "the". Wikilink Fuzzy Woodruff, maybe simplify his title as "football historian Fuzzy Woodruff" since I'm not sure southern is really relevant. Who was calling Centre an unbeatable team? Was it Woodruff as a sportswriter, or was it someone else? If it was Woodruff, he should be identified as a sportswriter instead of a historian, but if it was someone else, then Woodruff isn't really relevant here and who wrote it should be mentioned instead.
    • Somehow never thought to see if he had his own article; modified southern football historian to sportswriter, though I am choosing to leave in "the" to avoid a false title. I tried to express that Woodruff's opinion was being presented without making it sound like WP's voice. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • McMillin and captain Norris Armstrong played basketball for Centre in the offseason, during which the Colonels defeated Harvard by five points. How relevant is this?
    • I included it because it was another Centre–Harvard game including some of the same players as the football games, which in my mind shows that the Centre vs. Harvard "rivalry" of the early '20s was not limited to football exclusively. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • McMillin was made a Kentucky Colonel by governor Edwin P. Morrow around the same time. The timeframe is vague here, can it be more specific? I assume it refers to the basketball game, but it doesn't mention if the honor was bestowed upon him as a result of the football game, or as an athlete in general. If it's not specific to the football game, I'd question its relevance in this article.
    • The source says that the honor was given to him in "Spring 1921", which I would use in the article if I could. Instead, I tried to express that it was early-ish in the year, closer to basketball season than football season for sure. The source doesn't give a specific reason why he was given the award. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Background: Starting the 1921 season

  • Centre defeated VPI at home by the same score the following week[34] before traveling to Cincinnati to take on St. Xavier College, a 28–6 Centre win.[35] The placement of reference 34 in the middle of the sentence is awkward and disrupts the flow, move to the end of the sentence.
  • The Harvard game was their third consecutive road game and Centre entered with a 4–0 record "their" as a pronoun is not immediately clear since the previous sentence mentions both Centre and The Transylvania Crimsons and this sentence also mentions Harvard. It's probably technically ok, but I had to reread it a few times to understand the meaning.
    • Clarified. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • The Harvard game was Centre's third consecutive road game and Centre entered with a 4–0 record. How about replacing the second use of "Centre" in the sentence with "the team" or something like that? RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • The last of Harvard's four consecutive shutout victories came against Indiana by a nineteen-point margin, though they continued their winning ways against Georgia the following week by a score of 10–7. I'm not sure why "though" is used here, which generally means "but". Maybe drop the "though" and break it into two sentences.
  • The Centre–Harvard matchup captivated media attention in the weeks leading up to the game; on October 21, Boston Post reporter Howard Reynolds arrived in Danville. Probably better to split this into two sentences rather than use a semicolon.
  • During the buildup numerous publications assigned reporters to Boston, including the... needs a comma after buildup.

Players and personnel

  • Harvard started two halfbacks: Francis Rouillard was on the left, and Vinton Chapin on the right. Grammatically correct, but would flow better as "Harvard started two halfbacks; Francis Rouillard on the left, and Vinton Chapin on the right"
    • I removed the comma and "was" to try to make it flow better. I feel like the colon works because I'm listing the halfbacks, rather than talking about some kinda-related other thing. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:27, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Game Summary

  • He was assisted by a crew of three other officials: umpire W. R. Crowley, linesman J. J. Tigert, and field judge W. G. Crowell; Maxwell and Crowell, both from Swarthmore College, had also been part of the officiating crew for the Centre–Harvard game the year prior. Replace the semicolon with a period to break this long sentence into two sentences.
  • Entering the contest, sportswriters and pundits gave Harvard 3-to-1 odds to win, though some felt that Centre had a better chance to win than they had the year prior, especially given their improved line play. Explain what "improved line play" is to the reader.
  • Tickets sold for $2 apiece (equivalent to $34 in 2023); the game was sold out and attendance was expected to be around 45,000 people. Replace the semicolon with a period and break this into two sentences.
    • Changed as recommended. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • The game was sold out and attendance was expected to be around 45,000 people. The game began at 2:30 p.m. ET. The second use of "the game" could be changed to something else, like "the match", or similar synonym. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • Don't forget this. RecycledPixels (talk) 22:38, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
        Whoops, thank you for the reminder. I changed the first use to read "The stadium was sold out..." since I think that is technically more correct anyway, if that works for you. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 23:26, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Centre won the coin toss and chose to defend the north goal. Coin toss is wikilinked to coin flipping which would not adequately explain the context of why football teams are flipping coins to someone unfamiliar with the sport, including the fact that they elected to receive the opening kickoff as a result.
    • I don't know that there is an appropriate link to replace it, unfortunately. I'm not really willing to explain that a football game starts with a coin toss and what consequences of said toss are on this article since that seems a little off-topic and very specific about something not specifically related to this game. If you have suggestions for how to remedy this I'm open to them. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • The 2005 Sugar Bowl article phrases it as "Following the ceremonial pre-game coin toss, Auburn elected to kick off to Virginia Tech to begin the game, ensuring the Tigers would have possession to begin the second half." 1998 NFC Championship Game uses "The Falcons won the coin toss before the game and elected to receive the opening kickoff." 2000 Sugar Bowl uses "Actor John Goodman performed the ceremonial pre-game coin toss to determine first possession of the ball. Florida State won the coin toss and elected to kick off to Virginia Tech to begin the game." 2006 Gator Bowl uses "Virginia Tech won the ceremonial pre-game coin toss to select first possession and deferred its option to the second half; Louisville elected to receive the opening kick." RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
        • Added "ceremonial pre-game coin toss" and clarified that Harvard got the ball first. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 22:03, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Harvard was unable to capitalize on the miscue and punted; Centre reached the Harvard 11-yard line by the end of the third quarter. Eliminate the semicolon and split into two sentences.
  • Centre's ensuing drive ended with a turnover after McMillin's pass fell incomplete in the end zone; under the rules in place at the time, this resulted in a touchback rather than a simple incomplete pass, and Harvard took the ball on its own 20-yard line. Eliminate the semicolon and split into two sentences.
  • General comment about the game; There seemed to be a lot of missed kicks in this game but that might have just been how games were played, or it could have been a result of bad weather or bad field conditions, for example. Was that normal at the time?
    • From reading recaps of the game, the weather and field seemed to be good, so it likely was not a result of either. I'm guessing it was just a byproduct of the fact that kickers then weren't as good as they are now, so comparing 1921 kickers to 2023 kickers gives the impression that the former must have had something preventing him from performing better when in reality the comparison isn't really fair. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Around ten thousand fans descended from the stands and gathered on the field after the game, including students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in support of Centre, who tore down the goal posts. A long sentence that could probably be broken up to improve readability. A reader unfamiliar with the sport would probably be confused about why the Centre team tore down the stadium's goal posts.
    • Broke this sentence up and clarified that the MIT students (who were attending the game to support Centre) were the ones that tore the goalposts down. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:26, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Aftermath:Game analysis

  • Centre surprised sportswriters with its own offensive plan, involving far more rushing and fewer passes than were expected, in spite of their fewer numbers and smaller size, though this was intentional as Centre had intended to conceal some of the more elaborate parts of their gameplan until the second half so as to avoid giving Harvard the opportunity to make adjustments at halftime. This is a very long sentence that should be split up.
  • McMillin, in his own analysis of the game, complemented the performance of his offense; he praised the offensive lineman as "heroes" and said that "no better blockers ever played football". Eliminate the semicolon and split into two sentences.

Aftermath:Immediate impact and reactions

  • Once the game ended, McMillin was carried off of the field on the shoulders of fans. I understand the context here, and this is another nitpick, but this should probably be clarified that this was a celebration, and that he wasn't carried off because he was injured or unable to walk due to exhausion or other issues.
  • the Centre team was met by large crowds, as they had during much of both of their visits to Harvard Reword to eliminate clunkiness.
    • Changed "much of both of their visits" to "their previous visit". PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:53, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • After the game, Harvard coach Bob Fisher said "In Bo McMillin Centre has a man who is probably the hardest in the country to stop." Needs a comma before the quote. Needs a comma after "McMillin" within the quote as well.
    • Added first comma. I am more hesitant about adding punctuation to a direct quote however. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:53, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
      • It's an Associated Press wire article, and the ommission of the comma from the quote was a mistake on the part of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which was used as the source in this case. Look at other newspapers that use that article, such as the Hartford Courant (page 6Z, or page 42 on Newspapers.com for Sun Oct. 30, 1921). They include the comma. It was likely a quote of a spoken statement by Fisher, so it should have the comma. RecycledPixels (talk) 23:21, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Centre team returned to Danville on October 31 and were greeted by a homecoming party which included Governor Morrow, the Danville chamber of commerce,[81] the superintendent of education,[29] and 10,000 citizens. Citizens is an unusual word to use in this context, perhaps "local residents", "fans", or something like that? Chamber of Commerce should be capitalized. per MOS:PEOPLETITLES, Superintendent of Education should be capitalized.
  • Upon exiting their train, the team was paraded down Main Street. Passive voice not necessary here. Identify who paraded the team down main street, or say that the team paraded down Main Street, or that they participated in a victory parade.
  • Classes were cancelled at Centre and the local school district on the day of the team's return[83] and "Victory Day" was observed in nearby Harrodsburg on November 6, where another parade was held for the team. Move the citation to the end of the sentence so it does not disrupt the flow. I'm not that bothered by the two instances of passive voice here since it's pretty obvious who the actors were.
  • The phrase by which the game is most commonly known, "C6H0", originated from a comment made by a Centre professor shortly following the game: that Harvard had been "poisoned" by the organic compound with that formula. The colon seems inappropriate here, and since the sentence is already pretty long it's probably best to split into separate sentences.
    • I'm hesitant to split this because the bit before the colon introduces the bit after the colon. Starting a sentence with "Harvard had been 'poisoned' by..." risks misinterpretation since you don't have the reference back to the professor and his comment within that sentence. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:53, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • It stuck, and students painted the so-called "impossible formula" all around Danville,[30] including on various buildings around campus[29] and on the flank of a cow. The citation after the word "campus" should be moved to the end of the sentence.

Aftermath:Concluding the season...

  • The Centre victory was a shock, but perhaps not a fluke; the team finished the 1921 regular season 9–0, with shutout defeats of Kentucky, Auburn, Washington and Lee, and Tulane; this last game was scheduled as a replacement for their original opponent, Georgetown College, who backed out prior to the season after determining they would be too outmatched. Run-on sentence that should be broken up, ideally eliminating the multiple unnecessary semicolons.
  • McMillin was married on the morning of the game; the wedding was attended by members of the Centre team who afterwards went to the stadium to play. Be a bit clearer which game that refers to. I don't love the semicolon.
    • Changed "the game" to "that game" to point the reader to the most-recently mentioned game. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 20:53, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Legacy

  • No concerns

Overall

  • The article has several sections where there is a heavy use of the semicolon to join smaller sentences into longer, more complicated sentences. This decreases the readability of the prose and in many of the instances I've called them out above. There are others that I chose not to nitpick about, but in general, I'm not a fan of the use. There are other segments of the article that don't use any semicolons, probably a reflection of some of the different editors and writing styles that have come through the article. There aren't any "deal-breaker" objections that I have, most of the comments relate to needed clarifications and improvements to the prose and I've tried to highlight each issue without being overly bossy about "you much change it to this wording".
  • There's a decent amount of sports jargon present in the article that will be familiar to readers who are used to reading sports recaps, but in many cases the jargon can be simply be reworded to be more easily understood by someone unfamiliar with the jargon, keeping in mind that the target readership of Wikipedia is a general audience. Examples like "suited up", "shutout", "took the field", etc. Technically accurate and definitely not deal breakers, but areas that I think could be polished. RecycledPixels (talk) 18:32, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Summary, using WP:WIAFA as a guideline.
    It is:
    well-written: Yes
    comprehensive: Yes
    well-researched: I have not performed a source check and verification, a different reviewer has, above.
    neutral: Yes
    stable: Yes
    compliant with Wikipedia's copyright policy: Source check not performed, search for close paraphrasing not performed.
    It follows the style guidelines, including:
    lead: Yes
    appropriate structure: Yes
    consistently formatted citations: Not checked
    Media: Image check not performed, a different reviewer has, above.
    Appropriate length: Yes
    Conclusion: I support this nomination. RecycledPixels (talk) 00:45, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source review edit

I don't think that Harvard University and Texas A&M University are a website, but rather the publisher. Ditto "College Football at Sports-Reference.com" which isn't the website. While less certain, I am not sure that "Grace Doherty Library." should be referred to in the website parameter, either. Otherwise I see no issue with the sources, but qualify that local US newspapers aren't my area of expertise. I kinda wonder about the reliability of "The Wonder Team: The Story of the Centre College Praying Colonels and their Rise to the Top of the Football World", given this review. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:02, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Jo-Jo Eumerus All four website parameter issues have been acted on; first two switched to "publisher" and last two removed. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 01:10, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Jo-Jo ? Gog the Mild (talk) 21:02, 16 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
One question about "The Wonder Team: The Story of the Centre College Praying Colonels and their Rise to the Top of the Football World" still outstanding. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:04, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Jo-Jo Eumerus I believe the book to be reliable with respect to the information I used from it. The book was independently published by Butler Books out of Louisville - they publish plenty of history-related stuff (at a glance, a good number of biographies) - and it is cited by the Register of the Kentucky Historical Society journal article, which is peer-reviewed. The review you linked does raise some good points, though I recognized when writing the article that the quotes were likely not entirely genuine and as a result did not include any quotes or information derived from the quotes. I also did not echo the viewpoints Robertson made about Centre's 1919 team as the greatest in football history (I placed information about that team in context and mentioned their undefeated record, the one selector who recognized them as national champions, and highlighted one win from that season which multiple sources - not Robertson - mentioned as being among their best), nor did I reproduce his rather grandiose opinions about the Centre-Harvard three-game series being the best in the sport's history. I agree that the book is a little long but when using it I did my very best to use only the information that would not be reasonably challenged, were devoid of the opinion of the author in any way, and did not place either team or the games they played on any sort of pedestal using a superlative of any kind, so far as I can tell/remember. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 19:43, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I guess that's all, unless folks want a spotcheck too. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 06:54, 18 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]


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