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It was after the first football game of the senior year , against Seattle Prep, which was a great win, that U of W football friends of Coach Hemstad arrived in the locker room. They told this story on their friend Alf: Alf was a back up quarterback at the U. At the end of the first half of a game, with the ball on the Uof W 20 yardline, they sent Alf in with strict instructions to run three plays and kick. He ran three plays , was close to a first down, so on the fourth he ran a pass play which failed. In the second half, they again sent Alf in with the same instructions. He ran three plays, got to the opponents 20 yard line, and punted. Monday morning he was a guard, and by the way made all PAC guard.

Alf allowed me to call all of my offensive plays, but there was little input about the other team, in prep. I remember a night game, cold and wet, and the worst wind I had ever experienced in a game. Nothing was working. Dennis Carlson and several of the other linemen had an intestinal virus. I wasn't even sure we were going to make it back on the field after half time. We had substiutes on the line that I hardly knew. In the huddle several kept asking "what do I do on this play?". I was out of ideas and I called time out to get direction from Coach Alf. I ran over to the side lines but no mater where I looked, I couldn't find the coach. Finally I went back in and tried a long pass. It was a "hail Mary", directly into the wind. The wind caught it and it dropped like a rock. It came back so far I even thought I might be able to even catch it myself.

I was told later by teammates that Coach was hiding from his quarterback, as he wanted no part of the mess we were in. There are other great memories, where in addition to Coach Hemstad, great teachers like Coach Mac Malone and Birdie Davis helped keep my ship afloat and in the correct direction. But not that night.