The Ivy League has a long history of making college football safer for the athletes, dating back to the early 1900s and continuing today.
At the turn of the 20
th century, college football was in trouble. The game was incredibly dangerous, with minimal protective equipment or rules governing the sport. According to the Chicago Tribune, there were 18 deaths due to football in 1904 alone, along with 159 serious injuries. President
Teddy Roosevelt, who was a fan of the sport and whose son in fact played football at Harvard, brought representatives from Harvard, Princeton and Yale to the White House to discuss what could be done. A year later, the following rule changes were implemented:
- Legalized forward pass and added the wide receiver position
- Abolished mass formations and created a rule that the game would stop when a player went to the ground
- Created a neutral zone between the offense and defense
- Doubled the first down distance to 10 yards
The Ivy League has continued to be a leader with regards to student-athlete welfare. In 2010, the League began an overall review of concussions with football, which resulted in
a number of policies to improve the safety of the game, and in 2016, the Ivy League put into place an experimental rule to
move kickoffs to the 40-yard line and touchbacks to the 20-yard line in an effort to reduce concussions.
That
experimental rule was successful, with zero concussions on kickoff plays in 2016 after an average of six per year the previous three seasons. The results of the experimental rule were published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association and led to changes on the national level. For the 2018 season, the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Committee approved legislation allowing the receiving team to call for a fair catch inside the 25-yard line that would automatically be considered a touchback, with the ball placed at the 25-yard line. The Ivy League will use the same rule, with the modification that kickoffs will continue from the 40-yard line.
The Ivy League expanded its concussion review to include eight other sports to date (men’s and women’s lacrosse, men’s and women’s ice hockey, men’s and women’s soccer, wrestling and rugby). As a result of this comprehensive review of concussions, the League began an all-sports concussion data collection and study in 2013.
Throughout the 2019 season, the Ivy League will celebrate the 150th anniversary of college football (CFB150) with 150 consecutive days of original content illustrating the League’s storied tradition, modern success and continued impact on the game. Follow
@IvyLeague or visit
ivylg.co/Ivy150 for daily content updates through regional rivalry weekend on Saturday, Nov. 23.