UPPER DARBY, Pa., Dec. 1 — As Upper Darby High played its annual Thanksgiving Day football game, a northeaster raked the Philadelphia suburbs, turning the field into a muddy pudding. The last thing any player needed was protection from the sun’s glare. And because the game began in late morning, no one bothered turning on the stadium lights.

Still, the dreariness did not keep many Upper Darby players from spreading eye black on their cheeks. Some dabbed a line of grease under the eyes. Some wore adhesive antiglare patches that resembled Morse code for the face. Others smeared the stuff like shaving cream.

“It’s just the look,” Brandon Murray, an Upper Darby halfback, said after his team had been upset, 20-8, by its archrival, Haverford High. “Most kids think it’s intimidating or it looks good. No one uses it to block out the light.”

That is not necessarily the case in the National Football League. Jerricho Cotchery described a scene in the Jets’ locker room before a game last Sunday, when he and his fellow receiver Laveranues Coles applied eye black as if they were showgirls applying false eyelashes.