Word: yovicsin
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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WHEN JOE RESTIC arrived in Cambridge last fall, fresh from the wide-open Canadian pros with a fat playbook full of tricks under his arm, many Harvard fans, thoroughly bored by a decade of John Yovicsin's dive, sweep, incompletion offense, breathed a sigh of relief. But their relief soon became boredom again in the opening game, as Restic's man-in-motion, multiple set offense produced a paltry ten points against a Holy Cross team that had not won a game in almost three years (a performance that looked even more pathetic three weeks later when Syracuse stepped...
Restic certainly did not deserve all the blame for the opening game fiasco, however. Implementing a new system is difficult, and making the transition from the Yovicsin system to the Restic system is a little like launching into Paradise Lost after priming on Classic Comics. Restic's problems were further aggravated by slow-witted quarterbacks, slow-footed defensive backs and receivers who clutched inside the twenty yard line...
Countless times I pleaded with Yovicsin to let me play a quarter, or even five minutes, in a varsity game and carry the ball. I asked him to match me against the fullbacks in front of me in competitive drills. I suggested having each of is run at Gary Farnetti, then Harvard's premiere defensive player. Yovicsin refused all my requests, telling me "that isn't the Harvard way." He said he had made his "final decision" on the starting lineup...
There are some coaches who would not have agreed with Yovicsin's procedure. Joe Paterno, in his book Football My Way, discusses how many coaches would handle such a situation: "Alabama's Bear Bryant and Jim Owens of the University of Washington are of the hard-nosed school. They use what they call the 'challenge' system to stimulate competition. At Washington, for instance, if a second-teamer thinks he is better than the player ranked ahead of him by the coaches, he can challenge him to a contest. Usually it is brutal, sometimes bloody, one-on-one block and tackle...
...team is? He's Sidney Williams, that black guy sitting over there. And you know what? They wouldn't even let him play, but boy is he tough." When I heard Krohn, a Harvard halfback say this. I knew then that though I might not have impressed Yovicsin and his racist coaches, in the eyes of some of the players I had proven myself. And to me that is what the game is all about