Scorecard

DOUBLE SUB TROUBLE

By midseason it has become apparent that this year's NCAA football substitution rules, so confusing that neither coaches nor officials can understand or enforce them, are being pretty much disregarded in some areas. Still, it was a shocker the other night when Cliff Shaw, No 1 football referee of the Southwest Conference, blandly told a television audience: "A few ineligible players aren't going to hurt, anyone. At least they shouldn't change the outcome of a game."

The rules, said another Southwest official, are being "grossly violated. We are told in our pregame conferences that we are not to let the sub rules keep us from working a good football game."

Shaw said the trouble comes on fourth down and when the ball changes hands, occasions when only two substitutes are permitted.

"These are the busiest downs for the officials," he explained. "We can't risk a mistake on marking the ball and carrying out other duties by keeping a constant watch on the benches. I doubt that there has been one game played in our league in which there hasn't been at least one violation."

There will be more. Officials are resistant to proposals that, for the rest of the season, substitutes be required to report and be recorded on two-man substitution downs. Like the coaches, they are playing out the string—and pining for the free-substitution amendment that is likely to come in 1964.

POOL HALL IN THE SKY

In thoughtful concern for the city man's physical fitness we have sometimes pondered the feasibility of converting the rooftops of our space-starved cities into playing fields by sodding and lime-lining them. With the question still unresolved, we have put it aside to consider another puzzler, one that has to do not so much with space problems in recreation as recreation problems in space. In the weightlessness of out there, chin ups would have no effect. So what to do for those men soon expected to inhabit space stations circling the earth?

The solution is to use weightlessness instead of fighting it. As a recent Scientific American points out, the game of pool would adapt splendidly to three-dimensional play. Set up a rectangular room. Cover walls, ceiling and floor with green felt and have cushions run around the edges where floor meets wall and wall meets ceiling. Have your pockets in each of the eight corners. The balls, numbered from 1 to 35, would be racked in a tetrahedron (a four-sided pyramid) instead of a triangle. What with all the bending that is required in pool and climbing those walls and walking on the ceiling, the spacemen would get plenty of exercise.

CHALLENGE FOR THE CHAMP