1944 Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets football team (right halfback, Minnesota), Jim Mello (fullback, Notre Dame), Don Lesher (halfback), Don Manglold (Indiana), Bob Hanlon, and Ara Parseghian (Miami (OH)), ends Cecil Souders and George Young (Georgia), and linemen Pete Krivonak (guard), Jesse Hahn (guard), and Carmen Izzo (center). 1944 Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets football team The 1944 Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets football team represented Great Lakes Naval Training Station during the 1944 college football season. The team compiled a 9–2–1 record, outscored opponents by a total of 348 to 134, and was ranked No. 17 in the final AP Poll. In April 1944, Paul Brown, who coached at
Paul Brown when Brown traded star halfback Bobby Mitchell for the rights to Ernie Davis, a Heisman Trophy-winning running back who broke all of Jim Brown's rushing records at Syracuse. Paul Brown did not inform Modell of the move, and Modell only heard about it after getting a call from Washington Redskins owner George Preston Marshall. Davis, however, was diagnosed with leukemia before the 1962 season. He came to Cleveland to train after the cancer went into remission, but Brown would not allow him to play. Modell, however, wanted to give Davis a chance to play before he succumbed to the disease.