Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

Award Date

1974

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department / School

Physical Education

First Advisor

Paul Brynteson

Second Advisor

Glenn E. Robinson

Abstract

American football has undergone many significant changes since its first recorded game between Rutgers and Princeton in 1869.1 It has been proclaimed by many to be the number one spectator sport in the United States over the last decade. The main objective of football is to win. Winning is accomplished by one group of eleven players moving a football across a goal line at one end of a field, or moving it close enough to the goal posts to kick the ball over the crossbar and between the uprights.2 If one group of eleven players does this and prevents the other team from doing it as often, that group will win. Why is it that one team has the ability to move the football across the goal line more often than an opponent of equal ability? The methods and factors involved in winning football games have been analyzed in many different ways. Football coaches. sports broadcasters, and sportswriters are constantly bombarding their teams and fans with statistics, explanations and ideas of the most crucial factors and phases involved in winning football games. What are really the most important factors in winning football? Are they yards gained, interceptions, fumbles lost or are they pass completions, field goal percentage, third downs converted to first downs? The direction of this study was to investigate the relationship of selected objective factors of playing football to the winning of games. It is hoped that this study will be of significance to the football coaching profession. It should give the coach some evidence as to what factors are most related to winning games. Also there could be intense concentration placed on those factors in practice sessions and less concentration on factors which are not significantly related to team success. Statement of the Problem The purpose of this investigation was to study the relationship between team success in North Central Intercollegiate Athletic Conference football games and sixty-eight selected objective factors occurring in those games. Hypotheses 1. There is no significant relationship between any of the sixty-eight independent variables and team success in North Central Conference football. 2. A regression equation to significantly predict team success from the independent variables cannot be developed.

Library of Congress Subject Headings

Football
Physical education and training

Format

application/pdf

Publisher

South Dakota State University

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