Football History on 3rd of January

January 3, 2003, Fiesta Bowl was the scheduled Bowl Championship Series National Championship Game for the 2002 NCAA season. This contest featured the top-ranked Miami Hurricanes of Head Coach Larry Coker pitted against the number 2 Ohio State Buckeyes of Coach Jim Tressel. Both rosters were loaded to the hilt with talent. Miami featured the talents of Antrel Rolle, Sean Taylor, Willis McGahee, Ken Dorsey, Andre Johnson, Kellen Winslow Jr., Jonathan Vilma, D.J. Williams, William Joseph, Kelly Jennings, Roscoe Parrish, and Jerome McDougle. The Buckeyes countered with their star-studded lineup, including Maurice Clarett, Craig Krenzel, Chris Gamble, and Michael Jenkins. The Hurricanes struck first blood in the first quarter via a Roscoe Parrish 25-yard pass from Ken Dorsey. OSU countered with two rushing TD in the next frame via Krenzel and Clarett. The game went back and forth until Miami's Mike Nugent nailed a 40-yard field goal as time expired to send the game to overtime. The teams traded TD in the first OT session. However, in the second extra period, Ohio State's defense held the Hurricanes scoreless, and then on the Buckeye's turn Clarett pushed the pigskin over the goal line on a five-yard run to win the game 31 to 24. ESPN calls this the 25th Top college football game of all time.

On this episode of the Football History Headlines, we discuss Head Coach Hank Stram and the Conference Championships the season right after the Merger Realignment as well as many more HOF Legendary stories. 

January 3, 1924 - Chicago, Illinois - Hank Stram, the former head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, was born. Hank got his feet wet in coaching as an assistant at the University of Miami. His bio on ProFootballHOF.com tells how Lamar Hunt, the owner of an AFL start-up team, and the Dallas Texans hired Stram to lead the new franchise. The Texans played only one year in Dallas and then moved to Kansas City, where they changed their nickname to the Chiefs. Stram was an offensive innovator, and he is remembered for his development of such items and the moving pocket to utilize the talents of his mobile Quarterback Len Dawson. The legendary coach also established the two tight end sets and, on the other side of the ball, introduced stacking linebackers behind defensive linemen in the “stacked defense” principle. Stram led the Chiefs into two Super Bowl games. In Super Bowl I, his team fell to the mighty Packers of Vince Lombardi, but his team won Super Bowl IV against the Vikings. The Pro Football Hall of Fame enshrined Hank Stram into their famous Canton, Ohio museum in 2003. He played college football at Purdue University, where he was a two-way player. After graduating from Purdue, Stram served in the United States Army during World War II. After the war, Stram began his coaching career as an assistant at Purdue. He then served as an assistant at Notre Dame and Miami (Florida) before being hired as the head coach of the Dallas Texans in 1960.