The “dissatisfaction with the quality and the geographic and social make-up of the Harvard student body” led to the development of recruiting, according to the 1953 report of the Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid.  The College feared it was losing ground to its Ivy League rivals—and to the private and public institutions that had sprung up in the West, like Stanford and the University of Michigan.

But the futility of the 1949 season and the apparent lack of interest in athletics among Harvard’s veterans of World War II, as seen in low attendance and participation rates, presented visible evidence that the College was not competing with its peers.

According to Bayley F. Mason ’51, editor of a history of Harvard sports and a former Crimson editor, Harvard feared losing its “competitive edge.”

“[There were] 40,000 people at the Harvard-Yale game every year, grumbling. That was a visible symbol of the lack of competitiveness,” Mason says.

Debate raged about whether the University would follow the lead of the University of Chicago, which abolished football—along with the rest of intercollegiate athletic competition—in 1939.

The following fall, the football team again notched only a single victory.

The College, then as now, struggled to find a compromise between the excesses of professionalized intercollegiate competition and “the way of Chicago.”

“Not that anyone was pushing big time football,” Mason says. Instead, administrators were determined to finding a “niche” for Harvard athletics.

According to Mason, College administrators asked themselves, “If we’re going to be in the Ivy League, then we’ve got to be competitive.”

On March 11, 1950, Buck settled the question at a special press conference.

“We shall continue to play the game of football,” he said. “We are not going the road of Chicago.”  

Buck saw the problem with athletics as one of many issues plaguing the college, Mason said. Buck sought not only a wider variety in the geographical and socioeconomic makeup of the class, but also a variety of personalities and interests.

Changes in Athletics, 1950-52

Changes in four major areas—financial aid, administration of the athletic program, intramurals and admissions—characterized shifts in athletic policy at the time.

In March 1950, the University consolidated management of scholarships, student jobs and loans under the auspices of the Financial Aid Center.