Few teams play the entire regular season without being scored on, but the 1939 Duke Blue Devils were such a team. And by scoring at least 6 points in each of those games, they ended the regular season with a 9-0 record and an invitation to play in Pasadena on January 2, 1939. (January 1 was a Sunday, which the Rose Bowl honored by playing the following day.)
The fact that Wallace Wade’s team shut out nine teams tells you something about their defense, and the fact that they scored seven or fewer points in 5 games tells you something else about their offense. Sure, they had a few multi-touchdown games, but their backfield was comprised of tortoises rather than hares, so they won ugly. Dick Hyland, a Los Angeles Times columnist, called them “unbeaten, untied, unscored upon and uninteresting.” Still, they were interesting in at least one respect, the Blue Boys followed the unusual practice of having their center, All-American Dan Hill, call their plays on offense and defense.
Of course, some thought the Blue Devils were not a top team. That group included an unknown California-based United States Postal Service customer who mailed the Blue Devils a pair of women’s panties, suggesting that the USC Trojans would depants the Blue Devils early in the New Year. The package got the Blue Devils’ panties in a bunch until they applied the old reverse psychology by hanging the panties on the front of the train that sped them 2,500 miles to the west. Their fans joined in the fun, waving silk panties in the stands at the Rose Bowl.
USC also had a strong defense and mediocre offense, losing its opener to Alabama and another to Washington. After beating Cal to tie them for the PCC championship, USC invited Duke as their opponent.
In a game dominated by defense, neither team scored through the first three quarters, but Tony Ruffa kicked a 23-yard field goal early in the fourth quarter to give Duke a 3-0 lead, so it seemed likely that Duke would finish the season undefeated and unscored upon.
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But that was not to be the case. With a few minutes left in the game, Duke punted to USC, with the ball being fair caught at USC’s 39-yard line. USC ran the ball five or six times, moving to Duke’s 34-yard line, at which point USC called one more timeout than allowed, resulting in a 5-yard penalty.
With only two minutes left in the game and the ball on the 39 and no timeouts, USC coach Howard Jones made a most unusual move, inserting fourth-string quarterback Doyle Nave into the contest. Nave had played only 28 1/2 minutes all season, which was not enough to qualify for a letter. Nave’s primary claim to fame heading into the Rose Bowl game came when he fell in the shower following practice in New Year’s Eve and needed stitches to close a cut in his forehead.
Jones instructed Nave to throw the ball and look for sophomore end Al Krueger, their best receiver. Nave listened to his coach and called four successive pass plays. He completed the first to Al Krueger for 13 yards to the 26. He completed the second to Al Krueger for 9 yards to the 17. He completed the third to Al Krueger, losing a yard on the play. Then, he completed the fourth to Al Krueger, connecting with him in the left corner of the end zone for a touchdown. The extra point conversion gave USC a 7-3 lead with 40 seconds left and, perhaps, the unlikeliest Rose Bowl victory of all.
Nave and Krueger were later named co-MVPs, and Nave earned another bonus when USC ignored the letter of the law and awarded him a monogram for which he did not qualify. Oddly, despite never earning the starting spot at USC, the Detroit Lions used the sixth pick in the 1940 NFL Draft on Nave, though he never played a down for them.
USC returned to the Rose Bowl in 1940 and won the national title, while Duke returned in 1942, though they played the game in Durham due to fear of a Japanese attack on the 100,000 people who would gather in Pasadena. While both teams and others enjoyed future Rose Bowl glory, few players have replicated the performance of Doyle Nave, who was not expected to play, but was ready and performed when called upon as the sun set on the San Gabriel Mountains and Pasadena.
Love the story, especially the columnist description of undefeated... uninteresting. Lol