The 1967 NFL Championship Game was hosted by the Green Bay Packers on the famous frozen ground known as Lambeau Field. The game was scheduled to take place on New Year’s Eve day and the Dallas Cowboys were the poor opponents that had to leave their much warmer Texas home to travel to the frigid Wisconsin city. The weather forecast was not pretty for game time, in fact the actual temperature at kick off was -13 degrees fahrenheit.
Players, fans, coaches and officials all scrambled to the local stores and bought just about every piece of cold weather gear they could find according to the game’s Referee, Norm Schachter in his 1981 book, “Close Calls, Confessions of an NFL Referee.” Schachter went on to give a great idea just how cold it was. He recorded that they used metal whistles back in those days, and after the initial tweet from the officiating crew for the opening kick off, not another whistle was heard. Evidently it was so cold that the whistle froze to the officials lips ( much like the boy licking the flagpole in the movie, “A Christmas Story”). Later reports said that the peas used in the whistles of that era froze to the inside of the device as well making them useless to provide the shrill tweet they were designed to make.
The game has lived on in the history books aptly known as the “Ice Bowl”. Please watch short video on it by clicking here <ICE BOWL>.
The Cowboys played an inspired game, despite the frigid temperatures. Their vaunted defense harassed Packers QB Bart Starr all game, registering 8 sacks on the Green Bay signal caller. In fact the Dallas squad held a narrow 17-14 lead with less than five minutes remaining in the contest. The Pack had possession of the ball at their own 32 yard line and this could be their last chance at a methodical scoring drive. Starr and company did just that after finding that with the Cowboy linebackers playing off a bit, short dump passes to backs would provide nifty little gains each time. This all led up to a climactic ending as Packers faced a 3rd down and less than a yard to paydirt with a mere 16 ticks of the clock remaining so Starr called his team’s last timeout to talk it over with legendary Coach Vince Lombardi.
Everyone watching assumed the next play would be a pass so that if they failed to score the Packers would surely have 4th down to try again. These thoughts played right into the plan schemed up by Lombardi and Starr. The linemen were able to get traction for leverage on the icy turf but the backs were sliding all over, so the plan was for Starr to keep the ball and punch it in. Starr called a running play for the full back but didn’t tell any of his team mates that it was going to be a keeper. Now every person watching was surprised when Starr ran it in for the go ahead except for the savy QB and his wiley Head Coach.
The Packers held on and defeated the Cowboys 21-17. The weather and this last play strategy were indeed game changers and are still celebrated to this day.
