Homer Woodson Hargiss
Hargiss from The Beaver, 1920
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| Sport(s) | Football, basketball, track and field |
|---|---|
| Biographical details | |
| Born |
September 1, 1887 Cherokee County, Kansas |
| Died | October 15, 1978 (aged 91) Lawrence, Kansas |
| Alma mater | Kansas State Normal |
| Playing career | |
| Football | |
| 1905–1909 | Kansas State Normal |
| Position(s) | Fullback (football) |
| Coaching career (HC unless noted) | |
| Football | |
| 1910–1912 | College of Emporia |
| 1913 | Kansas (assistant) |
| 1914–1917 | Kansas State Normal |
| 1918–1919 | Oregon Agricultural |
| 1920–1927 | Kansas State Normal/Teachers |
| 1928–1932 | Kansas |
| Basketball | |
| 1918–1920 | Oregon Agricultural |
| Head coaching record | |
| Overall | 102–53–16 (football) 10–25 (basketball) |
| Accomplishments and honors | |
| Championships | |
| Football 1 Big Six (1930) |
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Homer Woodson "Bill" Hargiss (September 1, 1887 – October 15, 1978) was an American football and basketball player, and track and field athlete, and coach in Kansas and Oregon. He was an early innovator in football and was known to be one of the first coaches to use the forward pass and the huddle.
Hargiss participated in sports at Kansas Normal College, now Emporia State University. He was a standout at the college in football, baseball, basketball, gymnastics, boxing, and track & field. Emporia State honored him in 1982 by inducting him into their "Athletic Hall of Honor"—the first year the honor was available, as a distinguished alumni in 1970, and for the all-Centennial Team in 1997. Hargiss would later return to the college as a coach.
Hargiss' first coaching job came as the head coach of the College of Emporia (C of E) in Emporia, Kansas. The school had a well-developed rivalry with Kansas State Normal School, where Hargiss played quarterback the previous year, and would later coach.
At C of E, Hargiss developed plays using talented quarterback Arthur Schabinger that most had never seen before, namely the forward pass and the option pass.
In the team's 1910 game at Washburn, Arthur Schabinger has been credited by some to have thrown the first legal forward pass in college football history. While this claim is widely disputed by other colleges (there are multiple claims dating back to 1906), College of Emporia most certainly was one of the first innovators of the play particularly to throw "overhand" forward passes instead of the more common "underhand" passes. The school was using the forward pass as a regular play three years before Knute Rockne and Notre Dame.
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