“You didn’t know if he was going to beat you with his feet or with his arm,” Scales said. “You had to respect every aspect of [his game]...[so] we were running against six-man boxes for the majority of the season. That’s easy money for me and the offensive line. We love that.”
And as Chapple improved as a player, he blossomed as a leader as well.
“This year he was an extraordinarily confident quarterback, and because of that, he wasn’t afraid to hold his teammates to the same high standard he holds himself,” Murphy said.
“He expects the absolute best out of everybody on every single rep,” Scales explained. “If you slack off, he will call you out; he has no problems doing it. He’s not going to, like, be a jerk to you or anything like that...but he’s going to let you know, ‘hey, I need you to give everything you’ve got.’”
Scales said that attitude gave the team an enormous amount of confidence this season.
“He’s good at keeping us on our toes, keeping the mood light to the point where we can just relax and play ball,” Scales said. “He takes control of that huddle. You can look into his eyes and know, alright, it’s time to go win this thing. And when he says that, you know we’re good to go, we’re going to win it then. He makes it seem so simple. Execution is nothing for him, it’s another order of business.”
The relationship that Chapple began building with Scales over the summer four years ago continued to flourish this season, when Chapple, according to Scales, was a “film rat.”
“All the running backs and the offensive line used to sit down together watching morning game film,” Scales explained. “And he’d always be right there with us, asking questions.”
“His football IQ was outstanding,” Murphy added. “He was like having a coach on the field.”
That intelligence will be put to good use in Chapple’s next pursuit—working as a player scout for the Cleveland Browns.
And as Chapple moves onto the next chapter in his life, it was that final Game, in which the quarterback refused to throw a screen, that capped a record-breaking season that the quarterback will never forget.
“[All the] hard work during the offseason, during the previous three years we’ve been here, kind of came to fruition [against Yale],” Chapple said. “Walking off that field with 25 other seniors who I got to share that experience with is something I’m always going to remember.”
—Staff writer Scott A. Sherman can be reached at ssherman13@post.harvard.edu.