The Virtue of Revenge

Revenge can be an ugly thing.  Pretty much every major religion preaches against it, and it can consume a good person’s mind in a very bad way.

But it can be a great motivating tool in sports. And nothing motivates players to seek vengeance like a blowout loss.

Two very important victories in Columbia history were motivated by revenge after blowout losses to those same opponents the year before.

The first was the 1947 21-20 historic win over Army, which ended the Cadets’ record-breaking unbeaten streak. Columbia had a very solid team in 1946, but the Lions lost at West Point 48-14 and the defeat really stuck in their collective craw for a year.

On the 50^th anniversary of that great win in ’47, Sports Illustrated profiled a few of the living players of that game. The highlight was the story of Hank O’Shaughnessy, a decorated WW II veteran who took just a bit too much ribbing from an Army officer after the ’46 loss. Read the whole story to find out how it ended even more happily for O’Shaughnessy than most of his teammates.

The second monumental triumph was the 31-29 win over Dartmouth at a rainy Baker Field in 1971. The previous year, a dominant Indians team wiped out the Lions by 55-0 in Hanover.

It’s not that losing to Dartmouth was anything to be ashamed of in 1970 --- the Indians went 9-0 that season with six shutouts and were ranked 14^th in the nation at season’s end --- it was just the way Dartmouth poured it on over and over as the game went on that angered the pride of the young Columbia team.

When Paul Kaliades’ ugly kick just barely cleared the crossbar to seal a Columbia victory the following year, the jubilation on the sidelines and in the stands was fueled greatly by the memory of what had transpired the year before.

Revenge isn’t solely the province of CU players.

Penn's great QB Gary Vura often tells the story of how he and a close teammate traveled up to Boston during the summer of 1982 just to sit and think outside of Harvard Stadium.  Vura remembers how he and his friend kept thinking about how badly the Crimson had embarrassed the Quakers the previous fall in a 45-7 loss, and how great it would be to beat Harvard at Franklin Field that coming November.

Sure enough, not only did Penn win that game in miraculous fashion, but that 23-21 victory was the turning point for the entire program. The Quakers have been the dominant Ivy football team ever since.

I like the idea of facing failures instead of just forgetting them, especially if they can be used to motivate a team to get some healthy revenge.

You know what I’d do if I were Head Coach Pete Mangurian?

At some point during training camp, I’d get the team on the bus and drive all the way to Harvard Stadium. When they got there, I’d get them to sit and think about how humiliating that 69-0 loss was last year and how great it would feel to beat the Crimson this November in New York.

Then I’d drive the bus down to Franklin Field and have the team contemplate that agonizingly close loss to Penn last October. They should remind themselves of what it was like to let that game fall through their fingers and vow never to lose like that again.

“Moving on” was a rallying cry for the new coaching staff last season, and I can totally understand that.

But as of Jan. 2012, the team’s history started to belong to these guys here now and they have to own this.

Forgetting is not an option.

Fixing it is.