Coach Morton was breathing hard.
Unless Gridley could hold the enemy's rush back effectively enough to get the ball once more on downs, the college boys seemed likely to rush it right over the High School goal line.
Had Cobber tried any kicks, Gridley would have had the ball, and would have known what to do with it.

But Captain Halsey knew that.
He depended, now, wholly on heavy mass rushes and plays.
Yet the Gridley boys were by no means asleep---or lazy.
"I won't tire our men all out in the first half," muttered Badger to himself.

"But I won't let them stroll through our line." Even the heavy Cobber men, though they advanced doggedly, did not make any too great progress.
Down at the Gridley fifteen-yard line the High School boys developed their greatest stubbornness and strength.

So well did they oppose the college boys that, by preventing progress in three successive plays, the home boys again got the ball.

They could not move it sufficiently far forward, however.