New 'John Pont System' Has Undergone Revisions

When coach John Pont moved from Miami, Ohio, to New Haven this fall, Yale's sports publicity office burst into near-rapturous descriptions of the All-New John Pont Offensive System. The System seemed to be something of a hush-hush affair.

All that could be gleaned from the sportswriters who waste their time covering the Elis was that the System involved "Dynamic Football," featuring a "Wide-Open Offense."

All this presumably meant that Pont intended to liven up Yale's offense by instituting a new passing game, more wide running, and a flashier overall attack.

The desire to take to the air was understandable; back at Miami Pont had the services of an all-Midwest end named Bob Jencks, who caught just about everything in sight. Pont has found no Jenckses at New Haven, and as the year has worn on the Dynamic New Offense has come to bebar a suspicious resemblance to the system used by the man Pont replaced, Jordan Olivar.

Football coaches are basically pragmatists, making the most of their best available talent. Given the Elis' two first-rate fullbacks and a mammouth line, it was almost inevitable that the Dynamic System would give way to grind-it-out football. This is just what's happened.

The new Undynamic System depends basically on the hard running of fullbacks Chuck Mercein and Pete Cummings. The Elis' bread and butter plays this year have been simple fullback dives, quick-openers through the holes made by the two big tackles. These are All-Ivy Perry Wickstrom, and a 240-pounder named Abbott Lawrence, who sounds like he came from an Old Harvard family even if his home is Portland, Ore.

The power of Mercein, who also happens to be the Heptagonals shotput champion, is complemented neatly by the running of halfbacks Randy Egloff and Jim Howard.

Howard was supposed to be a permanent flanker under the Dynamic System. One day Pont made a running back out of him and made the pleasant discovery that the 165-pounder can run with the ball.

If Howard was a surprise, everyone always knew that Egloff was a fine back. Second-team All-Ivy two years ago, his absence in the Harvard game last year was one of the key factors in the sluggishness of the Yale attack.

A team that depends on its ground game as much as Yale does has to have a fine line; the Elis do. It will be much better today than it might have been last week because captain George Humphrey has had time for his injured knee to heal.

His absence would have been a serious blow to coach John Pont's 6-2-3-defense, which has held five Ivy opponents to 905 yards on the ground so far. Humphrey, an agile linebacker, is a key man in the setup.

The two 205-pound guards, Ralph Van- dersloot and Chuck Benolt, will have the tough job of stopping the Crimson's up-the-middle ground game this afternoon. But even more difficult will be the task of the ends, Steve Lawrence and Tony "Fireplug" Hubbard, who will be called on to contain Harvard's end sweeps.

This will probably be the key to the game, as far as Yale's defense is concerned. If the line can contain Harvard's ground attack, the Elis' serial defense should prove strong enough.

But for the Yale offense, the big question will be Brian Rapp's passing. The Dynamic System called for Rapp to take to the air often; he did at the beginning of the year, but he completed under 40 per cent of his tosses.

But if Rapp stays on the ground as Princeton did, the Crimson line should be able to hold the Elis. He will probably have to pass fairly often to keep the defense loose. If he does, his main targets will be Howard, Egloff, and, especially, Steve Lawrence, the big split end who is the team's top receiver