Today in 1949, the Houston Cougars beat the Saint Louis Billikens on a Thanksgiving afternoon, 35-0. It was the last game of the season for the Coogs, but the last game ever for Saint Louis.
UH finished the year 5-4-1, the school’s first-ever winning season.
Houston was 3-1-1 before losing three straight road games. But the Cougars won the home finale vs. Trinity before taking the trip north. Forty-four players and Shasta traveled to Saint Louis.
UH scored in all four quarters. UH back Max Clark scored in the first quarter from five yards out. Aubrey Baker ran it in from the four, and Mike Jinks caught a 29-yard touchdown pass in the second. After a third-quarter SLU fumble on their own four-yard line, Gene Shannon ran it in on the first snap to put UH up 28-0. Quarterback Alan Neveux scored the final touchdown on a five-yard run.
“The boys played some of the best ball of the season,” Coach Clyde Lee said afterward. “If we had gotten some of the breaks in the other games that we got today, we would have a mighty impressive record.”
Neveux finished second in passing percentage in the MVC in 1949. After completing 6 of 17 passes in the cold and wind at Walsh Stadium in Saint Louis, he ended the year with a completion percentage of 44%.
All 44 players who made the trip got into the game. Some of them flew home Friday afternoon on a chartered Pioneer Air flight, while others returned to Houston Saturday on a Missouri Pacific train.
Days after the game, SLU permanently dropped football. Mounting debt from football – about $100,000 a season – had crippled the small Jesuit school. SLU only averaged 7100 fans that last season.
