The Xavier Musketeers football program, formerly known as the St. Xavier Saints, 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 wit ...
program that represented
Xavier University
Xavier University ( ) is a private Jesuit university in Cincinnati and Evanston (Cincinnati), Ohio. It is the sixth-oldest Catholic and fourth-oldest Jesuit university in the United States. Xavier has an undergraduate enrollment of 4,860 stud ...
of
Cincinnati
Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state lin ...
in
college football from 1900 to 1943 and 1946 to 1973. Xavier discontinued its participation in intercollegiate football following the 1973 season, citing the escalating cost of the sport and resulting deficits.
History
The program began in 1900 when the school was known as St. Xavier College and the team as the Saints. In its earliest season, the football team competed against both colleges and high schools, but gradually improved their schedule. In 1907, the school began a rivalry against the
University of Dayton
The University of Dayton (UD) is a private, Catholic research university in Dayton, Ohio. Founded in 1850 by the Society of Mary, it is one of three Marianist universities in the nation and the second-largest private university in Ohio. The uni ...
, then named St. Mary's Institute.
Joseph A. Meyer
Joseph A. Meyer (December 10, 1893 – July 14, 1970) was an American football, basketball, and baseball coach. He served as the head football coach at Xavier University from 1920 to 1935 and at the University of Cincinnati from 1938 to 1942. M ...
was the head coach for 16 years from 1920 to 1935. During the Meyer era, the football teams compiled a record of 85–44–6 (.652), including eight one- or two-loss seasons (1920-1922, 1925-1928, and 1934). The team name became known as the Musketeers at the beginning of the
1925 season. In 1929, the school built
Corcoran Stadium.
The program's success continued under head coach
Clem Crowe
Clem F. Crowe (October 18, 1903 – April 13, 1983) was an American gridiron football and basketball player and coach. He served as the head football coach at Saint Vincent College (1926–1931), Xavier University (1936–1943), and the Unive ...
from 1935 to 1943. The
1941 team compiled a compiled a 9–1 record and outscored opponents by a total of 257 to 47.
After a temporary hiatus in the program during
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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
,
Ed Kluska
Edward L. Kluska (1917 – April 20, 1996) was an American football coach. He served as the head football coach at the Xavier University from 1947 to 1954, compiling a record of 42–33–4. He died following a stroke on April 20, 1996, at Good S ...
took over as head coach and posted a 35–12–2 record between 1947 and 1951. The
1949 team went 10–1 and defeated
Arizona State, 33–21, in the
1950 Salad Bowl
The 1950 Salad Bowl was a college football bowl game played between Xavier University and Arizona State College at Montgomery Stadium in Phoenix, Arizona. Xavier entered the game with a 9–1 record, best in the state of Ohio, and favored over ...
. The
1950 team compiled an 8–1 record and defeated the otherwise unbeaten
1950 Miami Redskins football team
The 1950 Miami Redskins football team was an American football team that represented Miami University during the 1950 college football season. In their second and final season under head coach Woody Hayes, the Redskins compiled a 9–1 record, o ...
that was coached by
Woody Hayes
Wayne Woodrow Hayes (February 14, 1913 – March 12, 1987) was an American football player and coach. He served as the head coach at Denison University (1946–1948), Miami University in Oxford, Ohio (1949–1950), and Ohio State University (19 ...
and
Ara Parseghian
Ara Raoul Parseghian (; hy, Արա Ռաուլ Պարսեղյան; May 21, 1923 – August 2, 2017) was an American football player and coach who guided the University of Notre Dame to national championships in 1966 and 1973. He is noted for b ...
and that featured
John Pont at halfback and
Bo Schembechler at tackle. The
1951 team was undefeated and outscored opponents by a total of 305 to 46. Seven players from the 1950 and 1951 teams later played in the
National Football League
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 ma ...
.
Xavier declined an invitation to the 1952 Salad Bowl.
From the 1920s through the 1960s, Xavier scheduled regional and national opponents, including
Haskell (1919-1920, 1922-1934),
Kentucky
Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virgini ...
(1935-1942, 1946-1949, 1956-1962),
Marshall (1926, 1938-1940, 1942, 1946-1947, 1949, 1955-1958, 1961-1962, 1967-1968, 1971-1973),
Louisville (1926, 1948-1953, 1955-1956, 1959-1962),
Villanova (1952-1953, 1959-1960, 1962-1969),
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
(1936, 1957-1964),
Boston College
Boston College (BC) is a private Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. Founded in 1863, the university has more than 9,300 full-time undergraduates and nearly 5,000 graduate students. Although Boston College is classifi ...
(1952-1955),
Loyola (1930-1933),
UTEP (1963, 1965, 1969),
Navy
A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and related functions. It include ...
(1922-1923), and
South Carolina
)'' Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no)
, anthem = "Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind"
, Former = Province of South Carolina
, seat = Columbia
, LargestCity = Charleston
, LargestMetro = G ...
(1936, 1938).
The program declined in the late 1960s and early 1970s, experiencing consecutive 1-9 seasons in 1969, 1970, and 1971. On December 19, 1973, the Xavier University Board of Trustees voted 15 to 3 to discontinue the school's intercollegiate football program, effective immediately. The university's president, Rev. Robert W. Mulligan, attributed the decision to the "spiraling costs of intercollegiate football" which had led to a $200,000 deficit in 1973 despite the team having its most successful season in five years.
As recently as 2013, Xavier fielded a
club football team in the
National Club Football Association.
Head coaches
Stadium
The Musketeers played their games in
Corcoran Stadium, which opened in 1929 after a $300,000 fundraising drive led by future
Governor of Ohio
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
Myers Y. Cooper
Myers Young Cooper (November 25, 1873 – December 6, 1958) was an American Republican politician and businessman from Ohio. Cooper was the 51st governor of Ohio.
Born In St. Louisville, Ohio, the youngest of eleven children, Cooper had a pub ...
. The stadium could seat 15,000 spectators. Xavier demolished the stadium in 1988.
Notes
References
*
{{Xavier Musketeers football navbox
American football teams established in 1901
American football teams disestablished in 1973
1901 establishments in Ohio
1973 disestablishments in Ohio