Today's Tidbit... Going Deep In The End Zone
From 1906 to 1911, forward passes crossing the goal line on the fly or a bounce resulted in a turnover. Looking to encourage forward passing, the 1912 rule-makers removed that restriction but had to make another change. Until 1912, football fields did not have end zones. The area behind the goal line, called "in touch," did not have a deep boundary, but the rule makers wanted to limit how far behind the goal line passes could be legally caught, so they added the end line ten yards behind the goal line and defined the area between the goal and end lines as the “end zone."
Adding 10-yard end zones to the existing 110-yard field meant the field would be too long to fit in some stadiums, so they eliminated the center or 55-yard line, reducing the field of play by 10 yards. The new field fit in most stadiums, though it was tight quarters in a few.
As football increasingly embraced the forward pass over the decade or two, it became clear that the passing game became constrained as teams approached the goal line due to defenses having less space to cover. This is an obvious point to us in 2024, but it was a new realization in the 1920s, so it became an issue for those wanting more scoring in football.
Still, the passing game remained restricted in several ways at the end of the 1920s. Passes had to be thrown from at least five yards behind the line of scrimmage, eliminating the possibility of a quick passing game, and teams were penalized five yards for the second incompletion in a series of downs. In addition, incomplete passes in the end zone resulted in a touchback or turnover.
The restrictions resulted in offenses often choosing not to throw into the end zone. Also, football did not have hash marks until 1933, so teams down deep tended to run it up the middle to ensure they could kick a field goal on a future down. All these factors meant red zone scoring was far more difficult than today.
The 1920s also saw coaches around the country tossing out rule change ideas after each season and before the rule-making process began, leading Marquette coach Frank Murray to suggest in 1930 that the end zones should be 20 yards deep. Murray reasoned that the extra space would give receivers a better chance to get open and, by loosening up the defenders, make it easier to score on runs. His idea was questioned, in part, because the 20-yard end zones attached to 100-yard fields might not fit in some stadiums. Another question concerned where to locate the goal posts. Should they stay on the end line, further reducing scoring, return to the goal line, or find a spot somewhere in between?
The 20-yard end zone idea hibernated for a few years but popped up again in 1933 when Slip Madigan, the coach of national power St. Mary's, argued for 20-yard end zones and a field that was 10 yards wider. USC's Howard Jones wanted a fifth offensive down inside the 25-yard line, while Stanford's Tiny Thornhill wanted to allow forward passes from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage, a change college football did not adopt until 1947.
The 20-yard end zone idea popped up again in 1936 when Litz Rusness, Northwestern’s freshmen coach and scout, raised it, but it did not go anywhere that time either.
Slip Madigan went off the deep end in 1937, and Frank Murray, who left Marquette for Virginia after Marquette’s 1936 Cotton Bowl appearance, doubled down in 1940. Of course, WWII came, so new rules were hard to come by, and the idea of 20-yard end zones faded away, never to be seen again until the CFL entered the U.S. in 1993.
The 20-yard end zone was an idea whose time never came, at least south of the border. Of course, other than the need to fit within the confines of the built football infrastructure, there is no inherent reason for 10, 15, or 20-yard end zones. Any depth would do, and the game would adjust accordingly. Nevertheless, the 1930s idea of deepening the end zone appears to be the last time serious football minds suggested changing the field's dimensions. That situation is unlikely to change due to the billions of dollars invested in stadiums today.
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CFL games played at the Liberty Bowl show why 20-yard endzones never caught on: https://www.reddit.com/r/CFL/comments/10kc6f1/cfl_us_expansion_quirks_memphis_mad_dogs_unique/