This is a crazy piece of conference lore.
Did you know that in 1931 the Western Conference agreed to schedule a full slate of extra games? Indeed, they set up a +1 scheduled game to benefit the Depression-era unemployed workers. The league, which of course didn’t have a championship game yet, also agreed the games would count in the tight conference standings.
Check out this full unused ticket to the game between Michigan and its “plus one” selected opponent, Wisconsin, played on November 28, 1931:
The backdrop of the ticket features a football player tossing a bag of loot (“A Forward Pass”) to the mass of needy onlookers with arms outstretched.
It’s actually not a shock that this ticket appears to be unused given the story of this one. Charity be damned, barely 9,000 fans (some reports say only 7,000) bothered to show up for the game. This ticket sold for $1, others went for $2. Regular season ducats went for between $2-$3 that season.
Why the poor turnout?
Well, it seems that early in the process of determining the match-ups for these special charity games, it was decided that Michigan would square off in the Big House against Northwestern. This made sense, as these teams had shared the conference crown in 1930 and were near the top of the standings again. But there was a change of plans as the date approached.
Believing they could raise more money by having Northwestern play their game at Chicago’s Soldier Field, a couple of weeks before the date the conference decided to pit the Wildcats against Purdue. Michigan was left with Wisconsin.
Everyone in Ann Arbor – from Fielding Yost to the editors of the Michigan Daily — went berserk. After the Badgers were assigned, director Yost told reporters, “This whole thing has been such mess that I won’t even venture a conservative guess on how many will turn out. It won’t be many.”
The Michigan Daily suggested a boycott. Students were quoted saying they “wouldn’t give a nickel” or even “cross the street” to see a weak Wisconsin squad.
Ironically the biggest benefactor of the whole event, which raised $154,000 for charity, might have been Michigan. Northwestern ended up losing to Purdue 7-0, so those who bothered to watch Michigan defeat Wisconsin 16-0 actually saw the Wolverines earn a share of the league title!
The Wisconsin win propelled Michigan into the next two championship seasons when Kipke and crew won back-to-back national titles in 1932 and 1933.
