They Pick Only the Best of the Roses

Memorable moments and anecdotes from Rose Bowl games past, with some help from “The Tournament of Roses” by Joe Hendrickson.

*

It has been 64 years since California’s Roy Riegels ran the wrong way in the 1929 game against Georgia Tech, but the legend endures.

Riegels, a Cal center, became disoriented after picking up a fumble at the Georgia Tech 35-yard line and headed toward his goal line, with teammate Benny Lom in pursuit.

Lom finally caught up with Riegels and swung him around before he was tackled by a Georgia Tech player at the one-yard line. Lom’s subsequent punt was blocked out of the end zone for a safety.

Final score: Georgia Tech 8, California 7.

*

Add Riegels: Amos Alonzo Stagg, a famous coach at the time, commented, “What did you expect? After all, football centers are always looking at the world upside down.”

*

Trivia time: Name the only year that the Rose Bowl game was not played in Pasadena.

*

In your face: Woody Hayes, the Ohio State coach, was known for his temper tantrums--even before a game.

During pregame warm-ups of the 1973 game between USC and Ohio State, Hayes shoved Times photographer Art Rogers’ camera back into the photographer’s face. Rogers was hospitalized.

After the game, won by USC, 42-17, Hayes was asked about the incident. He exploded, cursing the reporter who asked the question before storming out of the interview tent.

*

Add Hayes: In 1955, Hayes made his first appearance as Ohio State’s coach in the Rose Bowl game against USC. Ohio State won, 20-7. Afterward, Hayes complained about the USC band tearing up the turf on a rainy day and also slighted the Trojans.

“The bands should have been required to stay on the sidelines instead of putting on the show where we were going to play,” he said. “I think bands are a fine thing, but they owe their popularity to football, not the other way around.”

And of USC, he said: “There are four, possibly five teams in the Big Ten that could beat USC. Big Ten teams are raised on tougher competition.”

Not anymore, apparently. Pac-10 schools have won 20 of the last 26 games with the Big Ten.

*

Gutty little Bruin: Underdog UCLA was clinging to a 14-12 lead over Michigan State in the 1966 game.

Bob Apisa, the Spartans’ 212-pound All-American running back, seemed likely to tie the game on a two-point conversion try in the fourth quarter when Bob Stiles, a 175-pound UCLA defensive back, leaped on Apisa’s shoulders and spun him back inches from the goal line.

Stiles knocked himself out on the play, but UCLA held on to win in a major upset.

*

Heroic Husky: Virtually blind in one eye, Washington quarterback Bob Schloredt led the Huskies to victories in 1960 over Wisconsin, 44-8, and in 1961 over top-ranked Minnesota, 17-7. Schloredt was the first two-time most valuable player of the Rose Bowl.

*

Famous play: Columbia’s Al Barabas scored on the hidden-ball trick, a 17-yard run for the only score of the game in 1934 as the Lions upset Stanford, 7-0.

*

Trivia answer: 1942, when the game was moved to Durham, N.C., because of blackout restrictions imposed by World War II. Oregon State defeated Duke, 20-16.

*

Quotebook: An anonymous sportswriter before the underdog Eastern school tied California in the 1922 game, 0-0: “All I know about Washington and Jefferson is that they’re both dead.”