The 1941 Sun Bowl was a

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

postseason

bowl game In North America, a bowl game is one of a number of post-season college football games that are primarily played by teams belonging to the NCAA's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). For most of its history, the Division I Bowl Subdivis ...

between the Arizona State Bulldogs from Arizona State Teachers College at Tempe in

Tempe, Arizona , settlement_type = City , named_for = Vale of Tempe , image_skyline = Tempeskyline3.jpg , imagesize = 260px , image_caption = Tempe skyline as se ...

, and the

Western Reserve Red Cats The Case Western Reserve Spartans are the varsity intercollegiate athletic teams of Case Western Reserve University, located in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Case Western Reserve University competes at the NCAA Division III level. The Spartans ...

from

Western Reserve University Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

, known today as

Case Western Reserve University Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) is a private research university in Cleveland, Ohio. Case Western Reserve was established in 1967, when Western Reserve University, founded in 1826 and named for its location in the Connecticut Western Reser ...

Background

The Bulldogs were champions of the

Border Intercollegiate Athletic Association The Border Conference, officially known as the Border Intercollegiate Athletic Association, was an NCAA-affiliated college athletic conference founded in 1931 that disbanded following the 1961–62 season. Centered in the southwestern United State ...

for the second straight year. The Red Cats were 48–6–2 in the six-year tenure of Coach Bill Edwards, as they made their first ever bowl game. The Red Cats were champions of their regional Ohio league, Big Four Conference, six of the last seven seasons.

Game summary

Steve Belichick Stephen Nickolas Belichick (January 7, 1919 – November 19, 2005) was an American football player, coach, and scout. He played college football at Western Reserve University, now known as Case Western Reserve University, from 1938 to 1940 and ...

(father of

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major ...

head coach

Bill Belichick William Stephen Belichick (; born April 16, 1952) is an American professional football coach who is the head coach of the New England Patriots of the National Football League (NFL). Additionally, he exercises extensive authority over the Patri ...

), ran for the first touchdown of the game to give the Red Cats a 7–0 lead. Joe Hernandez threw a touchdown pass to Wayne Pitts to narrow the lead, though the extra point was no good. Arizona State would take the lead on a record setting run. Backed at one point into his endzone while rushing, Hascall Henshaw soon broke free and went 94 yards to the endzone, to give the Bulldogs a 13–7 lead at halftime. Henshaw's run was the school record for longest run from scrimmage until 1968. The Red Cats jumped back into the lead when Willis Waggle recovered a blocked punt and returned it to the endzone for a touchdown. In the fourth quarter,

Richard Booth Richard George William Pitt Booth (12 September 1938 – 20 August 2019) was a British people, British bookseller, known for his contribution to the success of Hay-on-Wye as a centre for second-hand bookselling. He was also the self-proclaimed ...

and Johnny Ries both scored a rushing touchdown to make the score 26–13. The Bulldogs only seriously threatened again once, when they drove all the way to the 14-yard line of the Red Cats, but they failed to convert on 4th down at the 12, as the Reserve held on to win the game. In a losing effort, Henshaw had 147 yards rushing.

Aftermath

Howell left the Bulldogs after the game to join the Navy after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

started. It would not be until 1971 that the team, renamed the Sun Devils in 1946, won a bowl. Edwards left the team to coach the

Detroit Lions The Detroit Lions are a professional American football team based in Detroit. The Lions compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) North Division. The team play their home games at Ford ...

, and later become the coach at Vanderbilt and

Wittenberg Wittenberg ( , ; Low Saxon language, Low Saxon: ''Wittenbarg''; meaning ''White Mountain''; officially Lutherstadt Wittenberg (''Luther City Wittenberg'')), is the fourth largest town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Wittenberg is situated on the Ri ...

. The Red Cats de-emphasized athletics during the 1950s and, in 1970, merged with their longtime rivals, the Case Rough Riders. The new team, the

Case Western Reserve Spartans The Case Western Reserve Spartans are the varsity intercollegiate athletic teams of Case Western Reserve University, located in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Case Western Reserve University competes at the NCAA Division III level. The Spartan ...

, became part of

NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that choose not to offer athletic scholarships to their stu ...

when it was created in 1973.

References

Sun Bowl The Sun Bowl is a college football bowl game that has been played since 1935 in the southwestern United States at El Paso, Texas. Along with the Sugar Bowl and Orange Bowl, it is the second-oldest bowl game in the country, behind the Rose Bowl. ...

Sun Bowl Arizona State Sun Devils football bowl games Case Western Reserve Spartans football bowl games January 1941 sports events

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