With one game left in the regular season, the Philadelphia Eagles have the best record in the NFL and are just two home playoff wins away from the Super Bowl. But with star quarterback Carson Wentz sidelined by a knee injury, they’re still long shots to win their first championship in almost six decades.
The Eagles are the oldest NFL franchise never to win a Super Bowl in their current city, and they haven’t won a championship of any kind since beating the Green Bay Packers for the 1960 NFL title. That football game carries special meaning for me because it was the first one I ever saw in person, and it took place 57 years ago today.
I was 8 years old at the time and a huge Eagles fan growing up in Levittown, a new postwar Philadelphia suburb. My father got tickets from a business associate and I was hyped up to finally see my heroes in the flesh.
The game took place Dec. 26 at Franklin Field on the University of Pennsylvania campus in Philadelphia. It was held on Monday instead of Sunday because, hard as it is to believe today, the NFL had this quaint notion that football shouldn’t be played on Christmas. There also was an unusually early kickoff (at noon) because Franklin Field had no lights and the NFL was worried that another overtime game, like the famous Giants-Colts matchup two years earlier, might drag past dusk.
A capacity crowd of 67,325, including 7,000 in temporary bleacher seats, packed the stadium for the showdown between the Eastern Division champion Eagles (10-2) and the Western champion Packers (8-4). It was a crisp, clear day with a comfortable kickoff temperature of 40 degrees, but after a week of frigid weather the field was still ringed with patches of snow left over from a storm several days earlier.
My dad and I sat in the upper deck near the 30-yard line. I remember borrowing a pair of binoculars from a man sitting next to us so I could get a clearer look at the players who, while small by today’s standards, seemed like giants to me then. I especially wanted to get a close-up of my favorite Eagles — crafty veteran quarterback Norm Van Brocklin, bantam receiver Tommy McDonald and ferocious lineman Chuck Bednarik, the last of the NFL’s “60-Minute Men’’ who played regularly on offense and defense.
Philadelphia was coached by Buck Shaw, a former Notre Dame star under Knute Rockne who had taken over a moribund Eagles team in 1958 and quickly turned them into a championship contender. Packers coach Vince Lombardi had pulled off a similar turnaround in Green Bay after taking over in 1959 following the worst season in franchise history. Both teams were trying to return to their glory days – the Eagles had won consecutive NFL titles in 1948-49, while the Packers had won five championships during a decade of dominance from 1929-1939.
It was a back-and-forth game. After the Packers went ahead 6-0 on a pair of short field goals by Paul Hornung, the Eagles rallied for a 10-6 halftime lead on a 35-yard touchdown pass from Van Brocklin to McDonald (who was shoved into a snow bank after crossing the goal line) and a 15-yard field goal by Bobby Walston.
Late in the third quarter, facing fourth-and-10 from his own 20, Green Bay’s Max McGee faked a punt and raced 35 yards for a first down. McGee then skulked to the sideline and tried to avoid Lombardi, who hated trick plays and had previously told McGee that in those situations, “We punt the ball, we don’t run the ball.’’ Still, the play set up a 7-yard TD throw from Bart Starr to McGee that put the Packers in front 13-10 early in the fourth quarter.
Rookie Ted Dean returned the ensuing kickoff 58 yards to the Packers’ 39-yard line and finished off the drive with a 5-yard TD run that put the Eagles ahead 17-13 with a little over five minutes left in the game.
The Packers had one last chance, driving deep into Eagles territory in the closing minute. On the final play, Starr threw a short pass to fullback Jim Taylor, who broke a tackle and reached the Eagles’ 9-yard line before being stopped by Bednarik and defensive back Bobby Jackson. Bednarik sat on Taylor and refused to let him get up until the final seconds had ticked off. Then Bednarik growled, “You can get up now, Jim, this (expletive) game is over.’’
The game was noteworthy on several counts. First, it was the only playoff game Lombardi ever lost. He would go on to lead the Packers to five NFL championships over the next seven years, including victories in the first two Super Bowls. Also, it was the Eagles’ only NFL championship in my lifetime – at least so far.
What I remember most, though, was spending the day with my dad watching my beloved Eagles in person, gorging on hotdogs and popcorn, and feeling like Franklin Field was the coolest place on earth.
