NEW YORK—As Columbia Football's all-time winningest coach (110 victories) and longest-tenured coach (27 years), Lou Little was a gifted teacher of football but was a man who cared more for the personal growth and well-being of his players and being a humanitarian than he did for his won-loss record.
Named a "Genius" of American football after appearing on the cover of Newsweek magazine on Sept. 29, 1947, Little was a giant among the nation's football coaches. He coached at two of the nation's most prestigious universities, Georgetown and Columbia, from 1924 to 1956. His teams won 149 games while losing 128 and tying 12.
At Columbia, he posted 110 victories, 68 more than the second-winningest Lion coach, Ray Tellier. Several weeks before he began his tenure as head coach at Columbia in 1930, he told a group of alumni, "I did not come to Columbia to fail." Over the next 27 years, Little's Lions were seldom out-thought, never out-fought. From 1936 until his retirement in 1956, he had only seven winning campaigns and registered 12 seasons of over .500 football, yet he developed many of game's leading players and led Columbia to many of its most memorable wins and upsets. Little's pet single-wing play was the double-spin run or pass and his teams used it with immense success. Little retired in 1956 after leading Columbia into the Ivy League. Columbia's annual rivalry game against Georgetown is named the Lou Little Cup.He was elected president of the American Football Coaches Association and played a key role on college football's Rules Committee. Four of his players — Paul Governali, Sid Luckman, Cliff Montgomery, and Bill Swiacki — were elected to the College Football Foundation Hall of Fame, and he soon joined them in 1960.
Little was a demanding coach, whose sharp tongue could be heard on the sidelines both in practice and at games. But his players revered him and played harder than they ever thought they could. "He always expected the best from his players," someone wrote. "He demanded that they play football his way, or not play at all."
Little was one of the best-known figures in New York City, found most nights in one or another of the city's famed nightspots, swapping stories with mayors, sports figures, and entertainers. He was justly famous for his wardrobe, especially his shoes, of which it was said that he owned a different one for every day of the year.
🦁🏈 LOU LITTLE
🔷 Brought @CULionsFB into the @IvyLeague
🔷 Cared more for the personal growth and well-being for his players than his won-loss record
🔷 President of the @WeAreAFCA and Rules Committee
Story: https://t.co/Cqqa1By7vt
🎖️ Best of #CUFootball150 🎖️ pic.twitter.com/ZNUgUN0Gmb
— Columbia Football (@CULionsFB) November 20, 2020
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The following is a listing of Lou Little philosophical quotes which were printed in the October 1, 1977, Columbia football game program (contest was played vs. Penn). The quotes are part of a package honoring Little on his first (and last) return to Baker Field since his retirement 21 years earlier in 1956.
LOU LITTLE LOOKS AT FOOTBALL
THE VALUES OF FOOTBALL
I think it is dangerous for a boy not to play football. Nowadays particularly, when so much courage, moral and physical, is demanded of our sons. (1954)
The real test is whether a man gets what he's good enough to get out of a game, or out of life. (1956)
Physical contact develops physical courage and it is my experience as a player and coach that physical and moral courage are closer kin than usually credited. One breeds the other. (Football) will teach your boy self-confidence and sharpen his ability to think quickly under stress as will almost no other game I know. (1934)
Football will develop a keen spirit of competition and the ability to get up and hit harder after you've been knocked down. (1934)
I don't admire a football player who lose; easily and happily. Football should teach your boy to be dissatisfied with failure. Lose with a smile—yes. But it ought to be a smile that is a little forced. (1934)
Nothing he does in his high school years will help you assess a boy's potential more than his athletic competition and the manner in which he stands up to it. (1957)
(A serious problem with football) is the danger of your boy's reaction to the prominence and publicity he'll receive as an individual after a few long runs for touchdowns for which the blocking back or running guard probably deserves more credit than he. The national, or state, or even local spotlight turned on your boy as a result of his gridiron exploits can test his character as no boy really deserves to be tested at nineteen or twenty. He may decide the world owes a person of his prominence an easy living. Cracking the world for plenty of dough with all these friends will be easy—he thinks. And the shock of disillusionment comes harder than any block he ever took on the football field. (1934)
Football shouldn't be the reason for a boy going to college. Nor will it make a man of any youngster who wouldn't be a man without it. If a lad has the competitive drive and the physical equipment for the game, football can be a wonderful experience for him. It's the greatest sport I know. But it isn't the goal of all existence. (1954)
A coach who doesn't constantly watch over the academic, grades of his players is extending an invitation to disaster. A math prof with that gleam in his eye is more to be feared than a pair of 200-pound tackles. (1948)
Through the years, in our good seasons and bad, I have found that diligent attention to studies pays off—on the football field as well as off. Given two boys of equal athletic ability, the one who is also good in the classroom inevitably makes the better football player. He learns his plays better. He realizes better the value and meaning of teamwork. And he plays today's brand of intricate football with the intelligence and perseverance which the game demands. (1948)
FOOTBALL STRATEGY
You'd like a definite formula for winning football teams? Gosh, wouldn't I? (1934)
Football strategy, the chief asset in the light, outmanned team's fight against superior power, may be summed up simply as "doing the unexpected thing at the right time." An attack based entirely on deception never will win consistently. But power alone is a giant which can be hobbled often by intelligent, resourceful opposition. (1934)
Upsets in the true sense of the word don't happen very often nowadays. In nineteen cases out of twenty, perhaps more, the team wins today which deserves to win. And that's no upset, you will admit. (1934)
(Columbia's 1934 Rose Bowl game) had been won in the three and a half weeks of preparation when this squad had convinced itself that, through full use of its resources, it had the capacity to win. (1934)
When two teams that "won't be licked" happen to get together on the same field, victory usually goes to the one which is the more clear-headed. (1934)
Perfection pays in football. (1934)
My years of coaching have taught me that a first-class, chance-taking quarterback may be a law unto himself. He may have a touch of genius not to be hampered by the laws that govern ordinary mortals. (1934)
The fastest man in the world can't score when he hasn't the ball. (1934)
Nobody who has played football ever gets over those pre-game jitters. That goes for coaches, too, of course. If they don't show up quite as much on the coaches as they do on the players, it's because the coaches are better actors. (1948)
Football today is a living game which is continually undergoing changes in its rules and style of play to keep it in tune with our modern place of living. It is this "living" quality, as much as any other, which will continue to assure its popularity both as a game to be played and as a contest to be watched. (1949)
No one ever gets used to losing. (1934)
The Link Lonk
November 21, 2020 at 03:52AM
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Football Focus on Lou Little - Columbia University Athletics - Columbia University Athletics
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