Coaching Career
Wade's first coaching job was at the Fitzgerald and Clarke Military School in Tullahoma, Tennessee. He went 16-3, winning a state prep-school championship in 1920. Among his players were future consensus All-Americans Lynn Bomar and "Hek" Wakefield. In 1921 Wade was hired as an assistant coach at Vanderbilt University. Vanderbilt posted an undefeated 15-0-2 with Wade, and shared conference titles both years he was there. After working as an assistant for Vanderbilt, Wade was hired as the head coach at the University of Alabama in 1923. Over the next seven years, Wade's team won three national championships after appearing in the Rose Bowl in 1925, 1926 and 1930. Prior to the ranking systems, the Rose Bowl determined the national champion.
Following his third national championship, Wade shocked the college football world by moving to Duke University, which had less of a football tradition than Alabama. Though Wade refused to answer questions regarding his decision to leave Alabama for Duke until late in his life, he eventually told a sports historian he believed his philosophy regarding sports and athletics fit perfectly with the philosophy of the Duke administration and that he felt being at a private institution would allow him greater freedom.
Wade continued to succeed at Duke, most notably in 1938, when his "Iron Dukes" went unscored upon until reaching the 1939 Rose Bowl, where they lost, 7–3, to the Southern California in Duke's first Rose Bowl appearance. Wade's Blue Devils lost the 1942 Rose Bowl to Oregon State. The game was held at Duke Stadium, the Blue Devils' home stadium in Durham, North Carolina, because the recent attack on Pearl Harbor made the event's organizers skittish of hosting the game in California. Wade entered military service after the Rose Bowl loss and the legendary Eddie Cameron filled in for him as head football coach from 1942 to 1945. Wade returned to coach the Blue Devils in 1946 and continued until his retirement in 1950. In 16 seasons, Wade's Duke teams compiled a record of 110 wins, 36 losses and 7 ties.
Read more about this topic: Wallace Wade
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