and unscored upon record in 1902, outscoring opponents by a combined 168 to 0. His 1903 team at North Dakota Agricultural College finished with five wins and one loss. In January 1904, the University of Wisconsin athletic board voted to select Cochems to serve as the school's assistant football coach at a salary of $800. Cochems returned to Madison in 1904 as both assistant football coach and assistant athletic director. In December 1904, the selection of a new head coach at Wisconsin was put to a straw vote with Cochems running against Phil King and two other candidates. King received 215 of the 325 votes cast. Having lost his bid for the head coaching job, Cochems signed in February 1905 to become the head football coach at Clemson. In the 1905 football season, Cochems led Clemson to shutout wins over Georgia (35–0), Alabama (25–0), and Auburn (6–0), but closed the season with consecutive losses to Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech, for a 3–2–1 record. St. Louis University Preparation to play under the new rules In February 1906, Cochems was hired as the head football coach at St. Louis University. The 1906 college football season was played with new rules, which included legalizing the forward pass. Cochems had reportedly long been an enthusiast of the forward pass. At St. Louis, Cochems rejoined fellow Wisconsiner and former Badger halfback Bradbury Robinson. They had met in the pre-season of 1905 when Robinson, who had already transferred to St. Louis, was working out with his former Wisconsin teammates. Cochems was an assistant coach with the Badgers that year. Like Cochems, Robinson was fascinated by the potential of the forward pass. Robinson was introduced to the forward pass in 1904 by Wisconsin teammate, H.P. Savage, who threw the ball overhand almost as far as Robinson was punting it to him. Savage taught Robinson how to throw a spiral pass, and the forward pass thereafter became Robinson's "football hobby." To prepare for the first season under the new rules, Cochems convinced the university to allow him to take his team to a Jesuit sanctuary at Lake Beulah in southern Wisconsin for "the sole purpose of studying and developing the pass." Newbery Medal winning author Harold Keith wrote in Esquire magazine that it was at Lake Beulah in August 1906 that "the first, forward pass system ever devised" was born. Football's first legal forward pass On September 5,