December 24, 1892 - Charleston, South Carolina - The University of South Carolina Gamecocks played the school’s first football game. The outcome unfortunately for USC was a loss to Furman 0-44 according to a correspondence from the SC Athletic Department.
December 24, 1950 - Cleveland Municipal Stadium - The NFL Championship Game is played as the Los Angeles Rams faced the Cleveland Browns. This game had some extremely interesting storylines. The first one is that if you remember our December 16 edition of this series we talked about how the Rams played their last game calling Cleveland their home city as they won the 1945 NFL Championship there. I would venture to guess that there was some deep interest on one side of the fence or the other on the team returning a bit over 5 years later to vie for another NFL Title in the same stadium they once called home. The second interesting item of the game was that this was the first season that the Cleveland Browns participated in the NFL. They had spent the prior four seasons as the best team in the All America Football Conference or AAFC, and in fact they won all four championships of the Leagues existence. At the end of the 1949 AAFC season the fledgling football conference disbanded but made an agreement with the NFL to absorb their three most successful franchises so Cleveland, the Baltimore Colts and the San Fran 49ers all joined the NFL for the 1950 season. The popularity of the Browns success had probably healed any unrest the fans had of when the Rams moved to the West Coast. The contest was evenly matched on the slick turf of Cleveland stadium. It all came down to Cleveland’s final drive. There was 1:48 left in regulation with LA up by a single point and the game rested in the hands of veteran Browns signal caller Otto Graham. Using both his legs and short passing game, Graham engineered a drive down the field as the Rams defenders had to sit back due the slippery conditions. With 20 seconds remaining Cleveland kicker Lou Groza nailed a 16 yard field goal to put the Browns up by two. The Rams gave everyone a scare on the kick off as return man Jerry Williams took the Groza kick and weaved through traffic to race 35 yards before Groza tackled him to secure the victory. The Cleveland Browns in the game went on to defeat the LA Rams, 30-28 per the website story on GoldenRankings.com. Cleveland’s defense provided five interceptions of the Rams offense often regarded as one of the most prolific in league history to that point.
December 24, 1961 - Balboa Stadium, San Diego - The AFL Championship Game took place as the San Diego Chargers entertained the Houston OIlers per the Medium.com website story. It was the second season in a row that the Stout defense of San Diego would battle against the offensive Juggernaut of the Oilers. Houston’s high flying offense was quite subdued by the Charger D for most of the contest. Houston’s defenders were no slouch though in the contest as they sacked quarterback Jack Kemp 6 times and intercepted four of his throws. It was a rough game all around as 13 players were assisted off of the field of play. The Oilers Billy Cannon scored the game's only touchdown on a 35 yard pass play from George Blanda as the Oilers outlasted the Chargers 10-3.
December 24, 1967 - The NFL Divisional Rounds were played and the Dallas Cowboys put a hurting on the Cleveland Browns 52-14 to advance. Pro-Football-Reference.com informs us that Dandy Don Meredith tossed 2 TD passes with 212 yards but the Cowboys ground game of Don Perkins and Craig Baynham with two touchdowns each powered the scoring for Dallas.
December 24, 1967 - The Green Bay Packers won their Divisional Playoff with the LA Rams 28-7. Travis Williams fueled the Packers scoring with his two rushing touchdowns and 88 yards that kept the Rams offense off of the field per the Pro-Football-Reference site.
