The 1940 SMU Mustangs football team was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

team that represented

Southern Methodist University , mottoeng = "The truth will make you free" , established = , type = Private research university , accreditation = SACS , academic_affiliations = , religious_affiliation = United Methodist Church , president = R. Gerald Turner , prov ...

(SMU) in the

Southwest Conference The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference included schools from Oklahoma an ...

(SWC) during the

1940 college football season The 1940 college football season was the 72nd season of college football, intercollegiate football in the United States. Competition included schools from the 1940 Big Ten Conference football season, Big Ten Conference, the Pacific Coast Conferen ...

. In their sixth season under head coach

Matty Bell William Madison "Matty" Bell (February 22, 1899 – June 30, 1983) was an American football player, coach of football and basketball, and college athletics administrator. He played for Centre, captain of its 1918 team. He served as the head footbal ...

, the Mustangs compiled an 8–1–1 record (5–1 against conference opponents), tied for the SWC championship, outscored opponents by a total of 142 to 75, and was ranked No. 16 in the final

AP Poll The Associated Press poll (AP poll) provides weekly rankings of the top 25 NCAA teams in one of three Division I college sports: football, men's basketball and women's basketball. The rankings are compiled by polling 62 sportswriters and broadca ...

. Fullback Preston Johnson was selected by both the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...

(AP) and the

United Press United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th c ...

as a first-team player on their

1940 All-Southwest Conference football team The 1940 All-Southwest Conference football team consists of American football players chosen by various organizations for All-Southwest Conference teams for the 1940 college football season. The selectors for the 1940 season included the Associate ...

s. Tackle Joe Pasqua was named to the second team by the AP. Will Mullinweg and Raymond Pope were the team captains.

Schedule

References

SMU SMU Mustangs football seasons Southwest Conference football champion seasons

SMU Mustangs football The SMU Mustangs football program is a college football team representing Southern Methodist University (SMU) in University Park in Dallas County, Texas. The team competes in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) as a member of the American ...

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