Fielding Yost

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Fielding Yost

Date of birth	April 30, 1871
Place of birth	Fairview, West Virginia, USA
Date of death	August 20, 1946
Place of death	Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
Sport	Football
Title	Head coach
Overall Record	190-34-11
Bowl Record	1-0
Championships   won	6 National Championships 10 Big Ten titles
Coaching Stats	College Football DataWarehouse
Coaching positions
1898 1899 1900 1901-23, 1925-26	University of Nebraska University of Kansas Stanford University University of Michigan
College Football Hall of Fame, 1951 (Bio)

Fielding Harris Yost (April 30, 1871–August 20, 1946) was an American football coach best known for his long tenure at the University of Michigan and is considered by many to be one of the greatest coaches in college football history. He was born in Fairview, West Virginia. Yost was a successful lawyer, author, and businessman -in addition to being a legendary coach and football visionary.

Contents 1 Coaching career 2 Legacy 3 Coaching record 4 External links

[edit] Coaching career

After three single-season stints at Nebraska, Kansas, and Stanford, Yost served as the head football coach for the Michigan Wolverines football team from 1901 through 1923, and again in 1925 and 1926. He was a resounding success at Michigan, winning 165 games, losing only 29, and tying 10 for a winning percentage of .833. Under Yost, Michigan won four straight national championships from 1901-04 and two more in 1918 and 1923.

Yost's first Michigan team in 1901 outscored its opposition by a margin of 550-0 en route to a perfect season and victory in the inaugural Rose Bowl on January 1, 1902 over Stanford, the school Yost had coached the year before. From 1901 to 1904, Michigan did not lose a game, and was tied only once in a legendary game with the University of Minnesota that led to the establishment of the Little Brown Jug, college football's oldest trophy. Before Michigan finally lost a game to Amos Alonzo Stagg's University of Chicago squad at the end of the 1905 season, they had gone 56 straight games without a defeat, the second longest such streak in college football history. During their first five seasons under Yost, Michigan outscored its opponents 2,821 to 42, earning the nickname "Point-a-Minute."

[edit] Legacy

After retiring from coaching, Yost remained at Michigan as the school's athletic director, a position he held until 1942. Under his leadership, Michigan Stadium and Yost Fieldhouse, now Yost Ice Arena, were constructed. Yost invented the position of linebacker, co-created the first ever bowl game, the 1902 Rose Bowl, with then legendary UM athletic director Charles Baird, invented the fieldhouse concept that bears his name, and supervised the building of the first on-campus building dedicated to intramural sports.

Arguably no one has left a larger mark on University of Michigan athletics and college football itself than Fielding Yost. A longtime football coach and athletic director, his career was marked with great achievements both on and off the field. He reportedly has the most defensive shutouts of any coach in collegiate history and is thus responsible for the Michigan tradition of solid swarming defenses that have made the Wolverines famous and the winningest team in college football history. Yost was also a successful business person, lawyer, author, and a leading figure in pioneering the explosion of college football into a national phenomenon. A devout Christian, he nevertheless was among the first coaches to allow Jewish players on his teams, including star Benny Friedman and Bennie Osterbaan.

Yost, along with coaches like Alonzo Amos Stagg, and Walter Camp were accused by the Carnegie Foundation of numerous recruiting violation during their tenures at their respective colleges.However, this was mostly an unfounded accusation due to jealousy of UM's success. Indeed, that same year , a more accurate report named Yost and UM as the most honest program in the nation. Yost was instrumental in exposing Notre Dame and Knute Rockne for the rampant cheating that occurred at that school. He initiated, and was a part of the influx of professional coaches, near the turn of the century. The professionalization of coaches that started with Yost and Walter Camp at Yale symbolized how seriously college football was becoming, and Yost symbolized this more so than any of his peers. It was Yost who first articulated the now accepted premise about student-athetes in the sport that: "Football builds character." Yost was also known for a series of admonitions to his players beginning with the words, "Hurry up," for example, "Hurry up and be the first man down the field on a punt or kick-off." This inclination earned him the nickname, "Hurry up" Yost. A native of West Virginia, Yost's unusual pronunciation of the school's name, "MEE-she-gan," is affectionately carried on by many Michigan football fans and often referenced by ESPN sportscaster Chris Fowler.

Yost died at age 75 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and was among the inaugural class of inductees to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951.

[edit] Coaching record

Nebraska
Year	Overall
1898	8-3
Total	8-3 (.727)

Kansas
Year	Overall
1899	10-0
Total	10-0 (1.000)

Michigan
Year	Overall	(Big Ten/place)
1901	11-0*	(4-0/1st)
1902	11-0*	(5-0/1st)
1903	11-0-1*	(3-0-1/1st)
1904	10-0*	(2-0/1st)
1905	12-1	(2-1/2nd)
1906	4-1	(1-0/1st)
1907	5-1	N/A
1908	5-2-1	N/A
1909	6-1	N/A
1910	3-0-3	N/A
1911	5-1-2	N/A
1912	5-2	N/A
1913	6-1	N/A
1914	6-3	N/A
1915	4-3-1	N/A
1916	7-2	N/A
1917	8-2	(0-1/8th)
1918	5-0*	(2-0/1st)
1919	3-4	(1-4/7th)
1920	5-2	(2-2/6th)
1921	5-1-1	(2-1-1/5th)
1922	6-0-1	(4-0/1st)
1923	8-0*	(4-0/1st)
1925	7-1	(5-1/1st)
1926	7-1	(5-0/1st)
Total	165-29-10 (.833)	42-10-2 (.778)

*Claimed national championship.

Note: Michigan did not compete in the Big Ten Conference (then called the Western Conference) from 1907-1916.

[edit] External links

• College Football Hall of Fame
• Profile at University of Michigan Athletics History

Preceded by Wylie G. Woodruff	University of Kansas Head Football Coach 1899	Succeeded by Charles Boynton
Preceded by Langdon Lea	University of Michigan Head Football Coach 1901-1923	Succeeded by George Little
Preceded by George Little	University of Michigan Head Football Coach 1925-1926	Succeeded by Elton Wieman