Frank Thomas held the reins of the Alabama football program from 1931 through World War II and retired after the 1946 season. Alabama had been the first southern team to ever play in the Rose Bowl following the 1925 season under coach Wallace Wade and Thomas, Wade's successor, then had the distinction of coaching the last southern team to play in the "Granddaddy of  the bowl games" as it became a Pacific Conference vs. Big 10 annual affair. His 1945 team handily defeated USC after an undefeated season and when 1946 resulted in a mediocre 7-4 slate, his declining health pushed him to pass the torch to Harold "Red" Drew. Thomas' high blood pressure would result in his death in 1954 after serving as Bama's athletic director but he hand-picked Drew, a former assistant who had been head coach at Ole Miss. Loaded with many of Thomas's post-War veterans, his first squad made it to the Sugar Bowl, losing to Texas 27-7. With the introduction of the Riddell plastic RT helmet, a white shell with crimson center stripe, Drew's teams managed to participate in a number of historical outings in Bama football lore. His 1948 squad resumed the long-dormant series with hated Auburn, a 55-0 dismantling of the Plainsmen. The 1952 team buried Syracuse 61-6 in the 1953 ('52 season) Orange Bowl, the most one-sided contest ever in bowl history. This was also the first televised bowl game as all four major bowls were broadcast nationally. The 1953 season brought perhaps Drew's most famous game. Graduation losses had Drew feeling good that the team could compile a 6-2-3 record and only Bobby Luna's fourth-quarter field goal which won the Auburn game10-7 allowed them to face off against Rice in the Cotton Bowl of January 1, 1954. Soph QB Bart Starr had thrown for 879 yards and was a fine punter, while Tommy Lewis, Luna, and Cecil "Hootie" Ingram (Alabama's future AD) provided the backfield speed and power. With Rice ahead 7-6. the Owls' All Everything HB Dickey Moegle sprinted around his right end with a handoff and streaked up field. As he passed the Tide bench, Lewis, who later explained his unspeakable action as "I'm too emotional, I'm just too full of Alabama" leaped off the bench and bare-headed, dove at Moegle's legs, knocking him to the ground. Awarded the TD, Moegle finished a tremendous day with 265 yards on only eleven carries and no ill will towards Lewis but even to this day, the dramatic sequence of events is often shown during the football season. The 28-6 Rice victory and Drew's inability to recruit top talent led to a 4-5-2 decline in the 1954 record with losses Southern Miss, Mississippi State, Georgia Tech, and Miami, not the teams Tide fans were used to losing to. This led to his "reassignment" as a full time professor of physical education and the hiring of former Bama player J.B. "Ears" Whitworth as head coach for the 1955 season.