Oct. 3, 2008
Homecoming is exactly what it sounds like. It is your student roots calling out to you to come on home. It is a high school thing and it is a college thing and the tradition of this lure to return to the good old days grew to be centered around a football game.
Harvard and Yale put on alumni football games in the 1870s. Michigan had an alumni game in 1909. At Baylor, in the fall of 1909, three professors sent out invitations asking Baylor graduates to return to the school to “renew former associations and friendships, and catch the Baylor spirit again.”
Of course, there was a football game that Thanksgiving weekend of 1909. The Bears won.
The conference that probably pushed the homecoming tradition the best and the furthest is what’s now called the Big Ten. Illinois and Indiana had their annual call-to-home centered around a football game in 1910. Wisconsin did the same thing in 1911.
Homecoming became a week, or a weekend, of various events designed to show and renew spirit for the school and the team. The roots of the University of Florida’s homecoming began in 1907 as “Dad’s Dad,” a celebratory day for the fathers of the then all-male Florida student body.
The University of New Mexico jumped on the homecoming wagon in the fall of 1925 when UNM President David Spence Hill invited alumni back to the campus to celebrate their UNM roots.
That event began on the evening of Friday, Nov. 14, 1925 when a bonfire over 20-feet high was ignited and UNM faculty, alumni and students gathered to open the two days of reunion.
The next day a parade of floats weaved its way through Albuquerque’s downtown. On campus, the UNM fraternities and sororities decorated their houses.
Of course, the climax of the weekend festivities was a football game. It was Lobos vs. Arizona. The Wildcats won 24-0, but for the first time in several years the stands were packed enough so the UNM athletics department made a profit. At halftime, snake dancers entertained the crowd.
In 1929, UNM reorganized its homecoming events trying to expand the ceremonies and the interest. That year homecoming still had the bonfire, the floats, the fraternity and sorority decorations, but a dinner and a dance were added to the festivities. Freshmen women placed green ribbons in their hair and put their dresses and coats on backward. The undergraduate men students held a pajama parade.
The Great Depression that hit America didn’t dampen alumnispirits at UNM. Instead, the call home gave alumni a chance to celebrate and remember better times. UNM held class reunions in 1932 for specific graduating classes. In 1935, UNM added another tradition: the Lobos named their first homecoming queen.
Another tough time in America – World War II – hurt homecoming events across the war-torn country. At UNM, the alumni association kept records of students missing or killed in war. The association also tracked the actions of UNM alumni still active in the war. Homecoming attendance in those years took a hit, but the main traditions – house decorations, the parade, dinner, the crowning of a queen, the football game – continued. According to the Mirage, UNM’s yearbook, homecoming games between 1925 and 1941 were played against New Mexico State or Arizona.
A first for UNM homecoming events came in 1947 when Duff Whitman and Virginia Strike tied for homecoming queen, each with 623 votes.
In 1948, the UNM student body approved “New Mexico Hymn” by Craig Sommers and his father, HN Sommers, as the new alma mater song, replacing the Cornell hymn.
The Jimmy Dorsey Orchestra played for the Homecoming Ball in 1959, when Ione Zimmerman was crowned homecoming queen.
A blow to tradition was struck in 1960 when the UNM Student Council voted unanimously to end the homecoming parade, calling it “too much work and not worth the effort.”
In 1968, Mary Sue Gaines was crowned UNM’s first black homecoming queen.
Tradition took another hit, of sorts, in 1970 when Sam Taggart, a male ran for homecoming queen. Taggart won. Ten years later, in 1980, UNM actually crowned its first homecoming king, pre-med student Steven F. Cordero.
The “game” is now the centerpiece for homecoming events and the results of the game is important to the success of the weekend. The Lobos are at an interesting juncture in today’s homecoming game with Wyoming. The Lobos are 40-40-3 in homecoming games and 2-2 against Wyoming in homecoming games. Dead even.
The Lobos have lost three straight homecoming games after winning six straight. The Lobos have had many key homecoming wins, but arguably the best UNM win came on Nov. 5, 1994 when the No. 9 ranked Utah Utes stepped into University stadium boasting an 8-1 overall mark and a 5-1 conference mark.
The game was supposed to be kind of a ho-hum win for the powerful Utes. They came to Albuquerque averaging 39 points on offense and UNM was 4-6 overall and 3-3 in the Western Athletic Conference standings. The Utes used their second possession ofthe game to drive 82 yards and take a 7-0 lead. Utah scored again in the first quarter to take a 14-0 lead into the second stanza.
The Lobos appeared to be in trouble, but it was homecoming and there were 30,743 fans in the stands looking to put a little icing on the homecoming weekend. The Lobos came back slowly. A 44-yard field goal in the second quarter by Nathan Vail made it 14-3. That scored seemed to fire up the Utes. They marched 80 yards in 11 plays on their next possession to take a commanding 21-3 lead.
Again, the Lobos were in trouble. Again, the Lobos responded. UNM scored on a 5-yard run by tailback Eric Young at the 3:49 mark on the second quarter. Lobos QB Stoney Case found Zack Wesley on the right sideline for a 2-point conversion. It was 21-11 Utah at the half.
The second half was all Lobos. The high-powered Utes never again reached the scoreboard. UNM got a 22-yard field goal from Vail in the third quarter and entered the final quarter down 21-14.
The Lobos appeared set to tie the game after Case hit freshman tight end Roy White on a 2-yard TD at the 14:56 mark of the fourth quarter. Disaster then struck as Case couldn’t handle a low snap on the PAT and Vail’s kick was pushed wide right.
The UNM defense rose to the occasion, held Utah, and gave UNM one final shot at victory with about three minutes left on the game clock. A huge play came on fourth-and-three at the UNM 27-yard line. Case came out in the shotgun and completed a 56-yard pass to senior Gavin Pearlman. The Lobos had the ball on the Utah 17-yard line. UNM went conservative, ran the ball up the middle, and gave Vail good position with 32 seconds left to play. Vail, showing no sign that he remembered the missed PAT, drilled a 22-yard field goal, kicked out of Case’s sure hands.
Utah managed to attempt a 68-yard field goal as the clock expired, but the kick, like the Utes, came up short.
It was a great homecoming win, maybe the Lobos’ greatest ever. But the most important homecoming game never really changes. It’s the one about to be played.
Editor’s note: Richard Stevens is a former Associate Sports Editor and sports columnist for The Albuquerque Tribune. You can reach him at rstevens50@comcast.net. Previous articles are available at The Richard Stevens Corner