| Bill Neely | |
| Birth Date: | 22 June 1887 |
| Birth Place: | Smyrna, Tennessee |
| Death Place: | Smyrna, Tennessee |
| Height Ft: | 5 |
| Height In: | 11 |
| Weight Lb: | 156 |
| Currentposition: | End/Halfback |
| School: | Vanderbilt Commodores |
| Pastschools: | Vanderbilt (1908 - 1910) |
| Class: | Graduate |
| Highlights: |
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William Daniel Neely Jr. (June 22, 1887 – May 16, 1965) was a college football player.
William, Jr. was born on June 22, 1887, in Smyrna, Tennessee, to William Daniel Neely, Sr. and Mary Elizabeth Gooch.[1] His father William died of sunstroke in 1900. His brother Jess Neely was a College Football Hall of Fame coach and captain of the undefeated 1922 Vanderbilt Commodores football team.
He was a prominent end and halfback for Dan McGugin's Vanderbilt Commodores football teams. Bill also lettered for the Vanderbilt basketball team.[2]
He was captain of the undefeated and SIAA champion 1910 team, led as well by the likes of W. E. Metzger and Ray Morrison. That team managed a scoreless tie with defending national champion Yale. Neely recalled the event: "The score tells the story a good deal better than I can. All I want to say is that I never saw a football team fight any harder at every point than Vanderbilt fought today - line, ends, and backfield. We went in to give Yale the best we had and I think we about did it."[3] Neely was selected for the College Football All-Southern team.[4] [5]
He was a schoolteacher, a member of the board of directors of the Rutherford County Creamery and manager of the Production Credit Association of Springfield.[6]