On Sept. 6, 1915, young men who had spent the summer working in fields or on farms were bussed into the rather young community of Liberty Lake. This assembled group that would be remembered in history books forever was the 1915 Washington State College football team (now known as Washington State University). The team was led by Carlisle Indian Industrial School standout Coach William "Lonestar" Dietz, who was known as an ever-exquisite dresser (for the nature of his profession) and an incredible tactician of the game. With the dreams of reaching Pasadena in January, the team's road first began in Liberty Lake.

Coach Dietz wanted a training camp to be held away from the W.S.C. campus, so he sent one of his colleagues, Captain-elect Clark, to scout out lake resorts suitable to host a two-week training camp a month before the official season began. Looking for a good field and the necessary accommodations, Clark's search led him to Liberty Lake Park which he deemed more than exceptional for what the head coach desired. Clark recommended the 35-acre resort on Liberty Lake's west side to the trainer, Fred Bohler, who then relayed the findings to Coach Dietz. Dietz was pleased with his staff's recommendation, and the team set out for Liberty Lake to begin their preseason training.

The team rented out 10 cottages at the park and hired a special cook to make healthy meals for the team each day to produce maximum ability from the players. The focus of the two-week camp according to Coach Dietz was, "…to perfect the basic rudiments of the game. I will be giving special attention to body-blocking and charging." The team had a little over a month before the Oct. 9 season opener at home against Oregon. The preseason training was of the utmost importance, so the team knew it was time to get to work in Liberty Lake if they wished to achieve something worth remembering years from then.

Coach Dietz made a strict training regimen for the players to go through during their time in Liberty Lake. Although the focus was football, Dietz made sure to include a plentiful amount of cross-training to ensure the players were fit in all aspects. The activities outside of football that players were required to do included tennis, rowing, swimming, hiking, etc. Any concern of overexertion is quickly dismissed when one looks back in the records and finds that through the intense training and the daily scrimmages that ended practices, not one player suffered an injury while in Liberty Lake. Considering the nature of the sport and the lack of safety equipment back in those days, this was a very impressive thing to accomplish. The training staff, headed by Fred Bohler, was on-hand every day during the camp to take care of the players. His job was obviously well done then and over the years since Fred Bohler was later inducted into the Washington State University Athletic Hall of Fame, in part for his duties w

ith the football team. After the camp had concluded, Dietz announced that the result of the camp in Liberty Lake produced "…as good material as I ever saw." That statement would later prove to sum up the Cougars' magical season.

The Cougar football team consisted of mostly young farmers who lived and worked in the fields surrounding the Pullman area. The average height of the offensive and defensive lines was 6'0 with the average weight being between 190 to 200 pounds. The heaviest lineman was 210 lbs. This gives you an idea of how tough these boys were not only for their size, but also simply as football players. In that 1915-16 season, only 10 points were scored on the Cougar defense (a statistic that we could probably use these days). The only touchdown scored on them in the whole season occurred in a bizarre play when they had blocked a field goal and the offense caught the rebound in the back of the end zone. Meanwhile, on the other side of the ball, the offense kept up the pressure by putting up 204 points that season. With those sorts of statistics, the team from Pullman was bound to go beyond what was expected from them.

With an undefeated record throughout the season (most wins were shutouts), the W.S.C. team rolled into Pasadena on Jan. 1, 1916, ready to win the "granddaddy of them all." Their opponent was the powerhouse, Brown University. The Cougar team doused any power that Brown had planned on bringing into the Rose Bowl by holding the Brown offense to only 99 yards in the game while successfully converting two touchdowns and 329 yards of offense on the ground. The Cougars won the Rose Bowl in an impressive shutout over Brown with a final score of 14-0. The game was not televised, nor was it on the radio, as neither existed at the time. Instead, game updates were sent to the Pullman campus through telegrams that were five minutes delayed from actual game time. Nonetheless, students were ecstatic with their team's accomplishment.

That incredible 1915-16 season that began in Liberty Lake for preseason training produced a team that accomplished something every college football team dreams of. From that team, three players were later inducted into the WSU Athletics Hall of Fame along with the trainer, Fred Bohler. Also inducted was none other than the eccentric head coach, William Dietz. The College Football Hall of Fame also recognized Dietz, though Dietz was not inducted until 2012 nearly 48 years after he passed away. There is no doubt, however, that Dietz is smiling down proudly upon the Cougars and all their fans. Who would have thought that a small team from Pullman would come to Liberty Lake to get in their training that would later produce a Rose Bowl victory in Pasadena?