1906 Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season

{{Use mdy dates|date=August 2023}}

{{Infobox sports season

|title=1906 Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season

|sport=College football

|league=NCAA

| season = Regular Season

| season_champs = Vanderbilt
Clemson

| no_of_teams = 18

| duration = September 29, 1906
through December 2, 1906

| seasonslistnames = Football

| prevseason_year = 1905

| nextseason_year=1907

}}

{{1906 SIAA football standings}}

The 1906 Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season was the college football games played by the member schools of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association as part of the 1906 college football season. The season began on September 29.

At the end of 1905 football looked about to be abolished due to all of the reoccurring violence during games. Football was a sport that had degenerated into dangerous tactics such as: the flying wedge, punching, kicking, piling-on, and elbows to the face. Almost any violent behavior was allowed. Fatalities and injuries mounted during the 1905 season.{{refn|group=n|Union College halfback Harold Moore died of a cerebral hemorrhage after being kicked in the head while attempting to tackle an NYU runner. The Chicago Tribune referred to the 1905 football season as a "death harvest", as it resulted in 19 player deaths and 137 serious injuries.{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303003452/http://muckrakerfarm.com/1905/11/football-years-death-harvest-record-shows-that-nineteen-football-players-have-been-killed-in-1905/|archive-date=March 3, 2016 |url=http://muckrakerfarm.com/1905/11/football-years-death-harvest-record-shows-that-nineteen-football-players-have-been-killed-in-1905/|title=Football Year's Death Harvest: Record Shows That Nineteen Football Players Have been Killed in 1905|date=November 26, 1905}}}}

As a result, the 1906 season was played under a new set of rules.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lmkmAQAAIAAJ&q=editions:sbKkc|author=Vanderbilt University|page=49|title=Vanderbilt University Quarterly|year=1907|volume=7}} The rules governing intercollegiate football were changed to promote a more open and less dangerous style of play. An intercollegiate conference, which would become the forerunner of the NCAA, approved radical changes including the legalization of the forward pass, allowing the punting team to recover an on-side kick as a live ball, abolishing the dangerous flying wedge, creating a neutral zone between offense and defense, and doubling the first-down distance to 10 yards, to be gained in three downs.{{cite news|url=http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85058130/1906-04-02/ed-1/seq-7/#words=RULESMADE|work=Salt Lake Herald|date=April 2, 1906|page=7|title=Football Rules Made At Last}}

According to Fuzzy Woodruff, Davidson tossed the first legal forward pass in the South in the win over Georgia.{{Harvnb|Woodruff|1928|page=187}}

Clemson and Vanderbilt tied for the SIAA title,{{cite web|url=http://www.clemsontigers.com/ViewArticle.dbml?ATCLID=209529170|title=Clemson Vault: A Measure of Success|publisher=}}{{Dead link|date=August 2019 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} but few writers chose the Tigers over the vaunted Commodores.{{cite web| url = http://homepages.cae.wisc.edu/~dwilson/rfsc/champs/Southern.txt| title = David Wilson's Homepage}} Coach Dan McGugin called the Carlisle victory "the crowning feat of the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association season."{{cite journal|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Vws7AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA49|journal=The Official National Collegiate Athletic Association Football Guide|title=Football In Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association|author=Dan McGugin|date=1907|pages=49}} For some, Vanderbilt's eleven was the entire All-Southern team.{{cite journal|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WjToAAAAMAAJ&q=%22all+southern%22|title=Daniel Earle McGugin|journal=Coach & Athlete|volume=28|date=1965|page=42|via=Google books}} {{Open access}} Running back Owsley Manier was the first Southern player chosen third-team All-American by Walter Camp.