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FROM THE DISTAFF END OF THE BENCH (2010 edition) Notes and Comments from Rice's No. 1 Fan By Joyce Pounds Hardy '45

My last column

Dear Paul,

I guess I knew that this day would come, but still it's hard to give up something I have loved doing for (how many?) 13 or 14 years. The old girl has reached the end of the bench. I just don't have that feistiness anymore that has kept a little spark in my columns.

Remember in the beginning, Paul, you asked me to share some memories, and I reveled in comparing our present games to Rice football teams in the 40's.

I remember how few perks they had, how they played on muddy fields, so muddy that you couldn't see the yard markers? The old helmets that folded under their arms were not much protection , but certainly easier to carry than the ones worn today, that's for sure, but they looked good to us.

We used to play where the Track is now and many a splinter came off those old benches and still do. It's easy to remember crazy happenings, but I remember more about the players than the places, the smart ones and the intellectually- challenged ones of the day.

Kids who went to war, 17 or 18 years old and came back men who became bankers and doctors, but the great majority of them became teachers and coaches.

I do remember my girlfriends and I sitting in the rain watching the guys play, all the heartaches of war, my Rice rolling with the punches, rationing, the loss of friends, professors and athletes, especially football players, who joined the Marines en masse.

After the war, our guys came back for that degree and we had amazing teams and Southwest Conference Titles and Trophies. They were so grateful to be home that everything was fun. 70,000 fans were filling Rice Stadium every game.

Yes, I was there, but only in spirit. By then I had a Rice Navy doctor-husband and we were stationed far away. I finally came back to Rice, too, and finished my degree with twenty years and five children between my sophomore year and my junior year.

I know sometimes I fussed at our teams because I thought they didn't play with enough spirit. Football was a tough job and even though the Coach kept saying, " just go out there and have fun,." that was probably the farthest thing from their minds.Yeah, just don't make any mistakes that will cost us the game. Sure, no pressure there.

Still I believe that Rice can be the best at anything it wants to be. Even though our star sorta lost its shine lately, our athletes didn't, they pursue a Rice Degree as hard as they fight for a first down. After all, that's what it's all about..

Every generation has made Rice proud, we have a great history (going on 100 years) and sports have been a part of Rice's tradition from the beginning.

Lord knows I have been around for most of those years, well almost, and I'm beginning to feel like it. My energy is running on low and it seems as though I am a full time job all by myself. My children are surprised that I am finally trying to say no to some very special things in my life, and this is one of them..

Thank all of my readers for laughing with me, cheering with me, and understanding why I keep blathering on about Rice, Rice, Rice.. Simply put, I love it. It has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I know that in my columns through the years you have found out more about me and my family than you wanted to know, but You could have turned off the computer.

Thank Heavens you didn't.

Affectionately,
Joyce

Joyce, any mere inkling that you were anything else than Rice's number one fan, supporter, booster, lover of all things Owl,   is swept aside by the thought that you have come to  relinquish this particular role.  Sammy is crying, and we all cry with him. But we rejoice at the fact that you are still with us, and with the Owl teams, bubble gum, red hots and all, and hope and pray that your presence may continue for many years yet into the future. You are simply irreplaceable.

--P.T.H.

E-mail your thoughts, thanks and sentiments to Joyce....

Editor's note: Joyce Pounds Hardy graduated from the Institute in its athletics glory days. She sent a whole generation of Hardy children to Rice, as both students and student- athletes -- that familiarly-named classmate of yours was almost surely one of them. Joyce has been among Rice's most omnipresent, loyal, never-say-die fans since before most of you were born -- and you'd better believe she's managed to develop an opinion or two about Rice athletics over the years. We're extremely happy to be able to welcome her back to our pages.  And to those of you relative newcomers who haven't had the opportunity yet to sample her thoughts, be prepared for a treat -- and be ready, also, to learn some things you didn't know about our storied university and its rich history.

For more on Joyce, see The tradition lasts long after the flavor is gone, Rice News, July, 2007.

For previous years' Joyce Hardy columns, go here....

MORE OF JOYCE'S COLUMNS FROM THE 2010 SEASON...

What happened to team that battled Texas?

By Joyce Pounds Hardy, Class of 45, BA '67

HOUSTON (Sept. 27) --Normally, I love rain, but not in the middle of a ballgame. Lightning, thunder, storms... I want to be curled up somewhere reading a good book. But nature doesn't ask me when or where. And it surely didn't on Saturday night.

I would like to report that it was the weather that messed us up, but it wasn't. Off again, on again didn't hurt Baylor. Mostly as hard as I pushed and prayed we couldn't squeeze our first downs over the goal line . That one burst of  McGuffie's run for our lone touchdown was a surprise. Most of us had given up hoping that there would ever be a hole someone could run through for a touchdown. A little late but ever welcome.

Where were the plays that confused Texas? The first quarter held that same great promise,   we marched down the field  with confidence, and made every set of downs add up to one first down after another til we got to the promised land. In this game we seemed to doom our runners to a crushing wall of green and gold. And my Owls got smushed.

My observation has been that Fanuzzi gives himself away when he passes because he always looks at his primary receiver, making him an easy target, never looking for an alternative open man, which seemed to me like telegraphing his punches and setting his receiver up for a waiting crowd.  It's probably easy for us to follow the three or four receivers going out from way up in the stands, but it's tough to see an open man wasted when he breaks free.

And just once I would like to see our receivers run past the first down marker before turning to receive the pass. We haven't had to suffer "three yards and a cloud of dust" in a long time. Of course Fanuzzi didn't have a lot of time to think about it, he was so busy looking at the sideline to see who was waving his arms to tell him what to do and then hurry-up and tell the team what they are supposed to do and then do it before time ran out. If that seems like a run-on sentence, it is.

.I am not in favor of the hurry-up offense, I like the ofd fashion huddle like the pros use. At least they know what the play is going to be all at the same time, get set and think about what their jobs are. All of that arm waving and head tapping--reading the zone, changing the play at the line, moving the ends from one side to the other---doesn't seem to be confusing the opponents as much as it is us.

I hurt for the guys who got hit over and over by those tackles, never did just one man bring a runner or a receiveer down, but tons of them. Baylor's linemen were not only 40 pounds heavier than our heaviest, but they were faster. Their speed was the killer. I noticed that our receivers ran straight patterns, never seeming to zig or zag or stop and curl back to get the defenders off their backs and give the passer an open shot.
 
But what do I know? I'm in charge of bringing Red Hot Tamales to the team at practice every Thursday afternoon, and I let them down this week. So, forgive me, guys. But sometimes ordinary people like me have to make choices, and I chose to attend the $1000 Black Tie Dinner that raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in support of Rice Athletics. It was not my first choice, but somebody's got to pay the bills.

Any time you beat the odds and win it’s sweet
Now, about that radio station....

By Joyce Pounds Hardy, Class of 45, BA '67

That has never happened before, but it did. I will be so glad to be back in Rice Stadium again Saturday where I know the team can hear me yelling as can my fellow boxmates. No one doubts that those red Hot Tamales have fired up the team, and I’ll be there Saturday to light the fire.

'A fun team to watch'
Owls didn't let us down

By Joyce Pounds Hardy, Class of 45, BA '67

HOUSTON (Sept. 6) -- Saturday was extra- ordinary. Our Rice Owls battled to the end, they were fired up the whole game, they were exciting to watch because they played hard for 60 minutes; and for the first time in a lonnnnnng time we were in the game the whole way. A little repetitious, but that was sweet.

That first quarter, I was about as stunned as the Longhorns. Not that I don't believe in our team, it's just that I had gotten used to being smothered right off the bat by the Mighty Longhorns. They had gotten used to it too, evidently, because they came right out, squared up their burnt orange jerseys, and were surprised that we didn't fall over dead.

Instead, Rice marched down the field, using 14 plays for 7 whole minutes, until the red zone stacked UT on the goal line, and they held us to a field goal.  It was a new feeling for an old Owl. I was yet again a student here in '94 when we beat Texas the last time. I remember the students tore down the goal post and carried it around the field for a delirious celebration. The University made the students pay for a new goal post, but the coach was so overcome with joy that he paid for it.

Now back to that First Quarter. I had sons on both sides of me, they jumped up, but for some reason, I was glued to my seat. Larry, the Owl, said, " that was a victory for Rice, they marched 70 yards on the opening possession and got a field goal. The game is already better than I thought it would be." But the Owls didn't let up. They fought for four whole quarters, showing no fatigue, no lessening of enthusiam, no fear of the Number 5 Texas Longhorns.

It doesn't take much to make me proud of my Owls, or should I say, prouder than I already am. But that remark by Lou Holtz on the half-time show made me like him even more than I already did. He said with an appreciative smile on his face, "Rice is a fun team to watch!" And so we were.

Taylor McHargue shrugged off the freshman jitters, made some ill-timed reverses, some unfortunate passes, and a few "he who hesitates gets sacked." but the good news is that he hung in there and proved that he was going to be a great quarterback who just happened to start his college career against the University of Texas. He went down but bounced right back up, nothing broke.

Sam McGuffie made some great runs, and against slower teams, he might have better luck going forward. I don't think that I have ever wanted a running back or a quarterback to just fall down. There certainly would have been fewer negative yards. But they were hustling, they started us out with new expectations and they didn't let us down.

So many heroes who made our team so competitive, 11 tackles by Bradshaw (he was everywhere,) great punts by Martens, Smith's and Turner's run-backs and run through's, Randolf's and Kitchen's timely catches (especially the freaky touchdown,) Yelovich's interminable pooch kicks, and all the guys in between who made the offense and the defense a mountain for Texas to climb.

I'll admit that I was in the middle of an orange crowd even on the Rice side and I didn't like it. However, I did enjoy the subdued Longhorns during those seven minutes of relative quiet. Rice was yelling but it was swallowed up by 70,000 Longhorns inhaling. I had the misfortune of sitting directly behind a young woman (presumably a freshman or a sophmore,) who never sat down, was resplendant in burnt orange, and who never put her right arm down, shaking those horns incessantly. By the end of the game, she was still standing like the Statue of Liberty hailing a cab in New York. I probably will never see her again, but she'll have a torn rotator cuff by the time she's a senior, and won't be able to spoil my view of my Owls giving her Longhorns a real run for their money.

Again.

(more to come)

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