Banquet Night

After yesterday's lesson on the history of Florida State University, TigerBlog starts today with Les Horvath.

Raise your hand if you know who he is? He was the first Heisman Trophy winner in Ohio State football history.

Les Horvath was born in South Bend, Ind., which probably bothered at least one Notre Dame fan once he started lighting it up in Columbus before winning the 1944 Heisman.

The only problem, of course, is that Horvath was a 1942 graduate of Ohio State. So how did he end up winning the Heisman two years later?

In the World War II years, especially in 1943 and 1944, college teams had trouble putting together rosters because of the numbers of players who were overseas fighting. As a result, the NCAA passed a rule that said that graduate students could compete, regardless of how many years later it was, as long as they hadn't played four years prior to that.

As a result, Horvath, then an Ohio State dental student, was able to come back and play another year, since he had not played as a freshman. He then won the Heisman in 1944 before going on to a career as a dentist (first in World War II and then in California) with a few years of professional football mixed in.

The point?

The 1944 football season was barely a football season in many ways. Princeton managed to play seven-game schedules in 1943 and 1945 but only played three games in 1944 - against Muhlenberg, Swarthmore and the Atlantic City Naval Air Station.

There was still a Heisman Trophy winner though. Now, when you look at the historical record, it runs continuously from when it was first given in 1936 (including in 1951, when Princeton's Dick Kazmaier was the winner).

TigerBlog brings this up because tonight would have been the announcement of the Tewaaraton Award winners for men's and women's lacrosse. There will be no 2020 winners, though, because the season was cancelled in mid-March, way less than halfway through.

What would TB have done? He sees both sides, but he would have gone with awarding the trophy for two reasons. First, it creates the same continuous record. Second, a Princeton player would have walked away with it in a landslide.

TigerBlog attended last year's ceremony in Washington, D.C., and it was an awesome event. It also came on the same night as another awesome event, the Gary Walters ’67 PVC Awards Banquet.

The same conflict would have come up tonight had this been a normal year. Instead, there will be no Tewaaraton ceremony.

There will, however, be a Gary Walters banquet. It won't be in person in Jadwin Gym, but it will be held nonetheless, with all of the elements that make the regular one such a hit.

There will be the top senior awards. There will be student voices. There will be videos celebrating the entire senior class. There will be some laughs.

It all begins at 8 Eastern time tonight, and anyone anywhere can watch it. To view, simply click HERE.

For the first time, there have been finalists announced for the Art Lane Award (outstanding contribution to sport and society) and the Class of 1916 Cup (highest academic standing). There are, again, nominees for the von Kienbusch Award (top senior female athlete) and Roper Trophy (top male athlete).

You can see the finalists here: von Kienbusch, Roper, Art Lane, 1916.

The Class of 1967 Citizen Athlete Award winner will also be honored. This year's recipient is Wyc Grousbeck of the Class of 1983, a lightweight rower who has gone on to become the owner of the Boston Celtics and a very active civic leader in the Boston community.

The banquet has been an annual tradition for more than 20 years now. As with everything else in this  crazy spring, improvisations had to be made.

And so they have been, thanks to a large part by the hard-work of many of TB's colleagues. And because of them, the show will go on.

That's an 8 pm start tonight. It's another chance to celebrate Princeton's great class of 2020, a class whose careers did not end in a manner any of them could have foreseen not that long ago - and a class who will be even stronger down the road for having gone through this.

Before any of that, though, they all deserve the recognition that awaits them tonight.