Maryland Terrapins
An unofficial football team composed of Maryland Agricultural College students played games against local high schools in 1890 and 1891. The following year, the school lent its support, which marked of the Maryland football program in 1892. The football team has continued to the present day with the exception of a brief hiatus in 1895. In 1894, former Maryland coach and player William W. Skinner spearheaded the formation of the Maryland Intercollegiate Football Association, which served to award the state football championship. Maryland hired D. John Markey as its first paid football coach in 1902. H. C. "Curley" Byrd, who eventually served as the university president from 1936 to 1953, began his playing career on the team in 1905. In 1911, Byrd was appointed as the head football coach, and he served in that position through 1934. During his tenure, Byrd was instrumental in growing support of the program, and in 1915 successfully requisitioned funding for the school's first stadium. In his position as university president, he was also responsible for building the school's current football facility, Maryland Stadium.
List of Maryland Terrapins football honorees
The College Football Hall of Fame has commemorated many of the sport's most outstanding and most innovative personalities. Among them are six former Maryland players and four former Maryland head coaches. In 1980, Bob Ward became the first Maryland player in the College Football Hall of Fame. At 5 feet, 9 inches (1.75 m) and 185 pounds (84 kg), Ward was nicknamed the "watch-charm guard", but consistently outplayed much larger opponents. He also served as the team's head coach in 1967 and 1968, but without much success. In 1983, the Hall of Fame inducted former quarterback Jack Scarbath, who led Maryland to a school-record 22-game winning streak and an upset victory over first-ranked Tennessee in the 1952 "Game of the Century". That season, Scarbath was named a first-team All-American by unanimous consensus and finished as the runner-up in the Heisman Trophy vote. Tackle Dick Modzelewski, inducted in 1993, won the 1952 Outland Trophy as the nation's best lineman and later had a 14-year career in the National Football League (NFL). Center Bob Pellegrini was inducted in 1996. Named the ACC's best blocker in 1955, Pellegrini was a starter on the 1953 national championship team, the AP Poll eighth-ranked 1954 team, and the third-ranked 1955 team.