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By MATT KELLY
YOUTH CORRESPONDENT
T IS MID-JANUARY, and the NFL playoffs have brought amazing finishes and upsets.
While only two teams remain now to play in the Super Bowl on Feb. 4 in Miami, fans for each of the 12 qualifying teams have stories of successes, near misses or devastating losses during the postseason.
The home teams went 4-0 in the wild-card round and 2-2 in the divisional round. In Sunday's conference championship games, the home teams, the Chicago Bears and the Indianapolis Colts, again dominated 2-0.
No matter how close the match-ups were, though, the one advantage home teams had was their 12th man.
A fan takes the fieldThe 12th man is how football lovers refer to their team's home crowd, the noise they bring and their willingness to support their team week in and week out.
It can be an important factor in football games, too, as it was in the recent playoffs. You frequently see players on defense and the sidelines telling the crowd to make some noise by raising their hands during the opponent's offensive drive, making it hard for them to hear, which often leads to penalties such as "false start" and "delay of game."
The term "12th man" traces its origin to Texas A&M University. According to the A&M Web site's aggietraditions.tamu.edu, the 1922 Dixie Classic (which was eventually renamed as the Cotton Bowl) had the Aggies of Texas A&M facing off against reigning NCAA champions Centre College.
The game's first half went exactly the way they didn't want it to. The Aggies encountered many injuries. Then coach D.X. Bible looked up into the stands for a familiar face: E. King Gill.
Gill originally had played on that 1922 Aggie team as a reserve, but decided at the end of the regular season to leave the team in order to play basketball. Gill was called upon to suit up for the Aggies in the second half. Of course he did, but all he did was stand on the sideline for the second half as a reserve. From that specific event came the 12th man, because of the fans' willingness to support their team en route to victory.
When teams including the Chicago Bears, Buffalo Bills, Seattle Seahawks, Green Bay Packers and Denver Broncos began using the term, Texas A&M got upset, because they had copyrighted it for their usage only. Though A&M did not file a lawsuit against any of the teams, they requested that they stop using the phrase.
The response was what the Aggies had hoped for: They all said they would stop using it, except for the Seahawks. The Seahawks and Aggies eventually reached an agreement that the Seahawks could continue using the term as long as they recognize that the origin of the saying came from Texas A&M.
Make some noiseThe most recent playoffs have brought exciting and close games, which may have been decided by the support they received from the 12th man. For example, two weeks ago, the Philadelphia Eagles played the New Orleans Saints in the Saints' Super Dome.
The Eagles, with about two minutes left, faced a fourth-and-10 at their 44-yard line and were trailing by 3. Eagles quarterback Jeff Garcia dropped back to pass and hit Hank Baskett for a first down all the way down inside the Saints' 40-yard line. However, the play would be called back for a false start by Scott Young, one of the Eagles linemen.
The noise that the fans in New Orleans made had caused Young to misinterpret the snap count and jump early. The penalty forced the Eagles to punt, and they were not able to stop the Saints before the clock ran out.
Yet another "W" for the 12th man.
MATT KELLY is a freshman at Massaponax High School.
