Bob Dudley (Richard Cromwell) is the wimpy son of Coach Dudley (Jack Holt), who is in charge of the local college’s football team.  Bob joins the team out of a sense of family obligation but he turns out to be a cowardly player who would rather fumble the ball than take a hard hit.  Coach Dudley is disgusted with his son.  Bob’s girlfriend (Joan Marsh) dumps him.  Bob drops out of school and disappears for two years and no one seems to care. Then, on the day of a big game, Bob reappears playing for another college.  Despite Coach Dudley’s team being led by All-American Dusty Rhoades (John Wayne!), Bob leads the rival team to victory.  He’s won Coach Dudley’s respect.  Coach Dudley is probably going to get fired.

This was one of the weirdest sports films that I’ve ever seen.  Usually, you would expect Coach Dudley to bring out the best in his son or to understand that his son is just not meant to be a football player.  Instead, Bob is forced to drop out of college!  Bob returns just so he can defeat his father.  The slight Richard Cromwell is not a convincing football player.  On the other hand, John Wayne is a convincing football player but his role is tiny.  The movie is a little over an hour long and 20 minutes of that running time is taking up with grainy footage of an actual football game.

The best thing about the film?  It reminds us that everyone, even John Wayne, had to start somewhere.