Oct. 15, 2008

By Jim Sumner
theACC.com

Like many other programs, the University of Virginia has had its "ups and downs" on the football field over the years. The season 40 years ago definitely qualifies as one of those "ups". Senior halfback Frank Quayle led the Cavaliers to its best season in a generation, setting conference records along the way.

It would be poetic if Quayle had arrived in Charlottesville determined to turn around Virginia's football fortunes. Certainly, the need was there. Virginia wasn't very good in football during the early days of the ACC. It posted an 8-48-1 record in conference games through 1964, had a pair of winless seasons in 1959 and 1960 and three other one-win seasons. In all, it was 16 years without a winning season. The university spent much of the 1950s debating the proper relationship between academics and athletics, paying the price on the field.

But this was all news to Quayle. "I had no idea about Virginia's sorry past. It was an eye opener to learn. Sixteen years without a winning season became a remarkable hurdle."

Quayle grew up on Long Island, where he became a football and lacrosse star at Garden City High School. Quayle had his heart set on Dartmouth but they told him he needed a year of prep school to bolster his academic credentials. During his year at Cheshire Academy in Connecticut, Quayle had a change of heart. "We played a lot of Ivy League freshmen teams and I realized I wanted a higher level of football."

Back to the drawing board. His parents wanted him to attend a Catholic school, Notre Dame, maybe Boston College. Quayle also looked at Duke and Northwestern. But he landed at Virginia. "It offered me everything I was looking for," Quayle recalls. "It was within driving distance of home, had great academics, a beautiful campus, and competitive football and lacrosse programs."

Yes, Virginia was becoming competitive. The school was putting resources into the football program and Bill Elias got the Cavaliers to 5-5 in 1962 and 1964 before leaving to become coach at Navy. Elias was replaced by assistant coach George Blackburn. Blackburn wasn't just any assistant coach. He had been a head coach at Miami (Ohio) and Cincinnati, both times replacing Sid Gilman, whom he had assisted. Gilman still is regarded as one of the great offensive innovators in football history and Blackburn was an avid learner.

Quayle says of Blackburn, "He had an exceptional offensive mind. He did things offensively that you didn't see until the `80s - middle screens, backs catching the ball out of the backfield. His philosophy of spreading the field was unique for that time."

Quarterback Gene Arnette adds, "He was an amazing coach. He looked at the talent he had and built an offense around the talent. He knew all kinds of offenses and was very effective at using game film. We always felt like we had the right game plan. We just had to execute it. He wanted consistency. His attitude was if we pick up three-and-half yards every play, then we'd score every time we had the ball."

All-ACC lineman Chuck Hammer gives an example of Blackburn's versatility. "We didn't have a lot of size on the line. But we were quick. So Blackburn came up with schemes that allowed us to use that speed... lots of misdirections, angle blocks, pulling linemen."

Blackburn didn't insist that his players specialize in just his sport. Quayle continued his lacrosse career at Virginia and was a standout player. Hammer and other football players also played the spring sport, while finding time for at least a portion of spring football.

Still, Quayle makes no bones about where his priorities lay. "I enjoyed lacrosse. But football was my passion. Lacrosse was more of a social thing."

Quayle arrived on the varsity in 1966. Senior quarterback Bob Davis was the undisputed star of the team but Quayle made quite an impact. He led the team with 727 rushing yards, 11 touchdowns, and 28 receptions. Quayle's 66 points led the ACC. He rushed for 221 yards in a 41-17 win over Maryland, the second-best single-game mark in Virginia history at the time and still tied for third best. Quayle also returned kicks and would lead the ACC in all-purpose yards three times. Virginia went 3-3 in the ACC, 4-6 overall.

The next year was more of the same. Quayle made first-team All-ACC for the first time, rushed for 755 yards, caught 25 passes, and scored 10 touchdowns. The Cavs won their last three games to finish 5-5, missing that elusive winning season only because of a perplexing early-season loss to VMI.

Quayle's first two varsity seasons at Virginia were very good but he achieved greatness his last go-around in 1968. He was motivated in large part by the needs of the team. "That long streak without a winning season was beginning to grate," he recalls. "We heard about it all the time."

Asked what made Quayle so good, Arnette answers, "First he was an unbelievable competitor. He had great hands. I don`t think I ever threw the ball at Virginia over 30 yards on the fly. We depended on short passes, pitches, hand-offs in close quarters to get the ball to Frank. Once he had it in his hands, it stayed there."

Arnette argues that Quayle carried his lacrosse skills to the gridiron, "Lacrosse players are always stopping and starting. Frank had great acceleration. He was at full speed in one step. Lacrosse players also have that ability spin and avoid contact. Defenders just couldn't get a good hit on him."

Hammer adds another dimension. "Frank was a very hard worker. We didn't have the kind of conveniences programs have now. Our weight room was about 20 feet by 20 feet. But Frank was always in there. He even lifted during the season, which was unheard of in those days."

Virginia opened the 1968 season at top-ranked Purdue and got pounded, 44-6. The Cavaliers avenged that VMI loss with a 47-0 shutout and followed with a 41-14 win over Davidson. Pretty much what anyone would have expected.

Virginia made the first of its three trips to North Carolina on October 12, to play 2-1 Duke. Virginia was a slight underdog but Blackburn's offense worked to perfection. Mr. Inside, fullback Jeff Anderson, rushed for 183 yards, one more than Quayle picked up on the outside. Quayle had a 44-yard-run, a 62-yard run, a one-yard scoring run and totaled his 182 yards in only 15 carries. Virginia piled up 603 yards of total offense in a 50-20 rout. Quayle says Duke "was a formidable opponent and this was a big win. It showed we had arrived."

Virginia came back to North Carolina a week later, to play NC State. A tropical system brought torrential rain and gale-force winds to Raleigh. Quayle says, "You couldn't even see the bench from the middle of the field. Our offense relied on movement and we couldn't move. We couldn't do what we needed to do."

Quayle was held to 67 yards and State won 19-0.

Virginia got back on the winning side a week later, shutting out Navy, 24-0. This was the school's first victory over Navy since 1909. Elias was still the Navy coach, giving some extra zing to the win. Quayle supplied one of the scores, a six-yard run.

The Virginia defense couldn't sustain that level of success. In the next game, South Carolina's Tommy Suggs threw five touchdown passes and Virginia went down 49-28.

At this point Virginia was 4-3, with three games left. An interesting sidebar was developing. Clemson running back Buddy Gore was a contemporary of Quayle's. Gore led the ACC in rushing in 1966 and 1967, setting a conference record with 1,045 yards in 1967.

But Quayle began to eat into Gore's career lead in 1968 and it became apparent that one would end the season as the ACC's career rushing leader. Arnette says, "Frank never talked about this but we did. We wanted the record for him."

Playing in another North Carolina rain, Quayle rushed for 148 yards and two touchdowns to lead Virginia past North Carolina 41-6.

It could have been more. Quayle had 140 yards at intermission. But he had some nagging injuries, the game was safely in hand, and the weather was awful. Blackburn played it safe sat Quayle down for most of the second half.

Tulane was next, in one of the more entertaining games in Virginia history. The Cavaliers never trailed, piled up 597 yards total offense, and scored 63 points - the most since 1946 - and still had to hold on to win. Hammer remembers, "A lot of tension on the sidelines. The offense kept telling the defense to stop somebody."

It was 49-47 early in the fourth quarter before Quayle scored twice and the defense finally got some stops. The final was 63-47, as Quayle rushed for 121 yards.

The win was Virginia's sixth, clinching the school's first winning campaign since the 1952 team went 8-2 in the pre-ACC era. Quayle says, "This was a huge win, a weight lifted off our backs."

Quayle finished his Virginia career at home against rival Maryland. Arnette gives some insight into the rivalry. "We both recruited the same geographic area. Maryland was a very physical team, lots of hard hits. There were hard feelings. There wasn't much love lost."

Quayle had a spectacular finale. He scored from 48 yards out to give Virginia a 7-0 lead. His eight-yard run made it 14-10. His third touchdown, from the Maryland six, put Virginia up 28-23 with only four minutes left.

Virginia got a stop and got the ball back with a chance to run out the clock. Quayle had long since shattered Gore's ACC single-season record and had opened up a sizeable lead in career rushing over Gore, who was hampered by injuries. Quayle was only a few yards short of John Papit's 1949 school record but says "for some reason, I just didn't want the school record. It seemed like too much." He refused the chance to pad his stats and the game ended 28-23.

He finished the game with 216 yards on 29 carries, the season with 1,213 yards and 14 touchdowns, his career with 2,695 yards. Quayle was a single yard shy of Papit's Virginia single-season record but over 100 yards ahead of Gore's career total.

Hammer shares a vivid memory of the Maryland game's aftermath. "Frank was the last player to get dressed, the last one to leave the locker room. I remember him sitting quietly on the bench, just taking it in. He just didn't want it to be over."

Virginia's season ended at 7-3, 3-2 in the ACC. There was some talk of the Liberty Bowl but Virginia bowed out when they found out they couldn't use anyone who had graduated; several key fifth-year seniors were in graduate school.

Quayle was voted ACC Player of the Year and the next spring was awarded the McKelvin Award as the ACC's top athlete. He played in the North-South all-star game but suffered an ankle injury that kept him out of the Senior Bowl. Virginia retired his number 24.

Denver selected Quayle in the 1969 NFL draft. The Broncos had all-star Floyd Little at running back, so Quayle wasn't a pressing need. Still, he rushed for 183 yards in 1969.

He spent a few more years on the NFL periphery before getting into business. Quayle had some uncles who had worked on Wall Street and he gave that some thought. But Charlottesville kept calling. "I thought I would graduate, move away, and only come back for homecoming," he laughs. "But I discovered it was more than just a college town. I've been back for 26 years."

Quayle is the owner of a realty company in Charlottesville that specializes in upper-bracket residential real estate. He also is the color commentator for his alma mater's football radio network.

Quayle and his wife Peggy have been married 37 years. Each of their three children played on an NCAA championship lacrosse team, Jay and Kelly at Princeton, Will at Virginia.

Gene Arnette still lives in the Charlottesville area and regularly plays golf with Quayle. "I'm just looking for some fresh air and exercise," laughs Arnette. "But Frank wants to crush me. But that drive is what made him great. We knew what Frank meant to us. We wouldn't have traded him for anybody. He did everything we asked that year and more."

Quayle's fondest memory of 1968 was posting a winning record. "At that moment in time, it was that mountain that we had to climb." And Frank Quayle led the climb.

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