The 1918 Rose Bowl, known at the time as the Tournament East-West Football Game, was a

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 ...

played on January 1, 1918, at

Tournament Park Tournament Park is a park and athletics venue in Pasadena, California, United States, northeast of Los Angeles. Currently maintained by the California Institute of Technology, it was simply known as the "town lot" before being renamed "Tournament ...

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

. It was the 4th

Rose Bowl Game The Rose Bowl Game is an annual American college football bowl game, usually played on January 1 (New Year's Day) at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. When New Year's Day falls on a Sunday, the game is played on Monday, January 2. The Rose ...

. With America at war, the game was played with players from the

Mare Island Mare Island (Spanish: ''Isla de la Yegua'') is a peninsula in the United States in the city of Vallejo, California, about northeast of San Francisco. The Napa River forms its eastern side as it enters the Carquinez Strait juncture with the eas ...

Marines Marines, or naval infantry, are typically a military force trained to operate in littoral zones in support of naval operations. Historically, tasks undertaken by marines have included helping maintain discipline and order aboard the ship (refle ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

and the Camp Lewis

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

from American Lake,

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

Game summary

Since the Rose Bowl game became so popular and most of the college football players were fighting overseas during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, the

Pasadena Tournament of Roses The Rose Parade, also known as the Tournament of Roses Parade (or simply the Tournament of Roses), is an annual parade held mostly along Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, California, United States, on New Year's Day (or on Monday, January 2 if New ...

decided to stage the game with military units, with the approval from President

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

. The Camp Lewis football team represented the

US Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

Scoring

Game notes

According to the Tournament of Roses, "Within weeks of the 1918 Rose Bowl Game, the majority of the players from both teams were scheduled to go overseas. John Beckett, left tackle for Mare Island, acknowledged this fact and said that “this would be the last battle that we would fight in the name of sports."

Hugo Bezdek Hugo Francis Bezdek (April 1, 1884 – September 19, 1952) was a Czech American athlete who played American football and was a coach of football, basketball, and baseball. He was the head football coach at the University of Oregon (1906, 1913– ...

was the coach to lead two separate schools (

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

in 1917 and Mare Island in 1918) to victories. He also led

Penn State #Redirect Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campu ...

to an appearance in the 1923 Rose Bowl.

Dick Romney Ernest Lowell "Dick" Romney (February 12, 1895 – February 5, 1969) was an American football, basketball and baseball player and coach, track and field, track athlete, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach and ...

, who had been a football star at

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, played halfback for the Camp Lewis team, scoring the team's only touchdown.

References

{{Rose Bowl navbox Rose Bowl Rose Bowl Game Mare Island Marines football Military competitions in American football 1918 in sports in California January 1918 sports events