Clifford Ellsworth "Biff" Hoffman (1904 – January 29, 1954) was an American football player.

Early life

Hoffman attended Petaluma High School in

Petaluma, California Petaluma (Miwok languages, Miwok: ''Péta Lúuma'') is a city in Sonoma County, California, Sonoma County, California, located in the North Bay (San Francisco Bay Area), North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Its population was 59,776 a ...

, and then went on to attend

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

Track and field

At Stanford, Hoffman was on the track and field team, where he threw the discus. He set an

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...

discus record in 1925 with a throw of , helping Stanford win the

1925 NCAA Men's Track and Field Championships The 1925 NCAA Track and Field Championships was the fourth NCAA Men's Outdoor Track and Field Championship, NCAA track and field championship. The event was held at Stagg Field in Chicago, Illinois in June 1925. Stanford University won the team ...

Stanford football

Hoffman was also a fullback on Stanford's football team under legendary coach

Pop Warner Glenn Scobey Warner (April 5, 1871 – September 7, 1954), most commonly known as Pop Warner, was an American college football coach at various institutions who is responsible for several key aspects of the modern game. Included among his inn ...

. The 1926 Stanford football team went undefeated in the regular season, outscoring its opponents 268–73, and then faced also-undefeated

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...

in the

1927 Rose Bowl The 1927 Rose Bowl Game was a college football bowl game held on January 1, 1927, in Pasadena, California. The game featured the Alabama Crimson Tide, of the Southern Conference, and Stanford, of the Pacific Coast Conference, now the Pac-12 Confere ...

. The teams played to a 7–7 tie and were named co-national champions by most media. In 1927, Hoffman was named team captain and helped lead the team to the

1928 Rose Bowl The 1928 Rose Bowl Game was a match between Stanford (7–2–1) and the Pittsburgh Panthers (8–0–1). Usually, the Rose Bowl was played on January 1, but in 1928, that fell on a Sunday, so the game was played on January 2, 1928. At this time ...

, facing the

Pitt Panthers The Pittsburgh Panthers, commonly also referred to as the Pitt Panthers, are the athletic teams representing the University of Pittsburgh, although the term is colloquially used to refer to other aspects of the university such as alumni, facu ...

. Behind 6–0 in the third quarter, Hoffman caught a screen pass and raced toward the end zone, but fumbled short of the goal line; another Stanford player, Frankie Wilton, picked up the fumble and ran the ball in for the touchdown. Hoffman then kicked the extra point and the score held, giving Stanford a 7–6 victory, its first Rose Bowl win in four attempts. Hoffman was retroactively named the game's most outstanding player when the award was created in 1954.

After football

In 1930, Hoffman married fellow Stanford graduate Claire Giannini, daughter of

Bank of America The Bank of America Corporation (often abbreviated BofA or BoA) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered at the Bank of America Corporate Center in Charlotte, North Carolina. The bank w ...

founder

Amadeo Giannini Amadeo Pietro Giannini (), also known as Amadeo Peter Giannini or A. P. Giannini (May 6, 1870 – June 3, 1949) was an American banker who founded the Bank of Italy, which became Bank of America. Giannini is credited as the inventor of many modern ...

. Hoffman worked as an investment banker in San Francisco, and died in 1954 of complications related to an ulcer in his

esophagus The esophagus (American English) or oesophagus (British English; both ), non-technically known also as the food pipe or gullet, is an organ in vertebrates through which food passes, aided by peristaltic contractions, from the pharynx to the ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hoffman, Biff 1954 deaths Stanford Cardinal football players Players of American football from San Francisco 1904 births