1889 Princeton Tigers football team

The 1889 Princeton Tigers football team was an American football team that represented Princeton University as an independent during the 1889 college football season. The team compiled a perfect 10–0 record, shut out six of ten opponents, and outscored all opponents by a total of 484 to 29.^[1] The team captain and quarterback was Edgar Allan Poe, the second cousin of his namesake, the writer Edgar Allan Poe.^[2]

1889 Princeton Tigers football
National champion
Conference	Independent
Record	10–0
Head coach	None
Captain	Edgar Allan Poe
Seasons ← 1888 1890 →

1889 Eastern college football independents records

v t e	Conf.							Overall
Team	W		L		T			W		L		T
Princeton			–					10	–	0	–	0
Massachusetts			–					2	–	0	–	0
Yale			–					15	–	1	–	0
Harvard			–					9	–	2	–	0
Franklin & Marshall			–					5	–	1	–	1
Dickinson			–					4	–	1	–	1
Navy			–					4	–	1	–	1
Tufts			–					3	–	1	–	0
Lehigh			–					8	–	3	–	2
Cornell			–					8	–	4	–	0
Penn			–					7	–	6	–	0
Brown			–					2	–	2	–	0
Penn State			–					2	–	2	–	0
Wesleyan			–					5	–	7	–	1
Bucknell			–					2	–	3	–	1
Lafayette			–					3	–	4	–	2
Columbia			–					2	–	7	–	2
Fordham			–					1	–	3	–	0
Rutgers			–					1	–	4	–	0
NYU			–					0	–	2	–	0

There was no contemporaneous system in 1889 for determining a national champion. However, Princeton was retroactively named as the national champion by the Billingsley Report, Helms Athletic Foundation, Houlgate System, National Championship Foundation, and Parke H. Davis.^[3] It was Princeton's 15th national championship.^[4]

Five players from the 1889 Princeton team were selected by Caspar Whitney for the first All-America college football team: quarterback Edgar Allan Poe; halfback Roscoe Channing; fullback Knowlton "Snake" Ames; tackle Hector Cowan; and center William George.^[5] Three more Princeton players—guard Hugh Janeway, end Ben "Sport" Donnelly, and halfback J. S. Black—were among Whitney's eight "substitute" selections.^[6] Ames and Cowan were later inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.^[7][8]

Schedule

Date	Time	Opponent	Site	Result	Attendance	Source
October 5		Lehigh	Princeton, NJ	W 16–0		[9][10]
October 10		at Lehigh	Bethlehem, PA	W 16–4		[11]
October 19	2:40 p.m.	Stevens	Princeton, NJ	W 49–0	1,000	[12]
October 26	3:05 p.m.	at Penn	Philadelphia, PA (rivalry)	W 72–4		[13]
November 2	3:00 p.m.	vs. Wesleyan	Berkeley Oval New York, NY	W 98–0	Several hundred	[14]
November 5	3:00 p.m.	at Columbia	Berkeley Oval New York, NY	W 71–0		[15][16]
November 16	2:45 p.m.	at Harvard	Jarvis Field Cambridge, MA (rivalry)	W 41–15		[17][18][19]
November 23		Orange Athletic Club	Princeton, NJ	W 54–6		[20]
November 28	2:30 p.m.	vs. Yale	Berkley Oval New York, NY (rivalry)	W 10–0	>25,000	[21][22]
November 30		vs. Columbia Athletic Club	Capitol Park Washington, DC	W 57–0	2,500	[23]

Roster

• Knowlton Ames, HB
• Beach, HB
• J. S. Black, HB^[24]
• Brown, G
• Casement, T
• W. S. Cash, T
• Roscoe Channing, HB
• Hector Cowan, T
• Ben "Sport" Donnelly, E
• R. Furness, E
• William George
• Hale, T
• Sheppard Homans Jr., HB
• Hugh Janeway, G
• P. C. Jones
• Lewis, FB
• Lilly, QB
• Edgar Allan Poe, QB
• Jesse Riggs, G
• James Robinson
• J. G. Symmes, C
• J. N. Thomas, C
• Wagenhurst, T
• Ralph Warren, E
• Clinton Wood, T