December 9, 1961:The Gotham Bowl

The Polo Grounds, set up for football.

Judging by the number of fans and the number of cars,

this is probably for a Titans (proto-Jets) game in the early 1960s.

Definitely not for the 1961 Gotham Bowl.

December 9, 1961: New York City, despite its status as a cold-weather city, tries to get into the college football bowl business. The Gotham Bowl is staged at the Polo Grounds.

The organizers had tried to stage the event the year before, with Syracuse University, defending National Champions and with future Heisman Trophy-winning running back Ernie Davis. But the school announced that it would not accept any bowl bids.

That was not unusual: There weren't so many bowl games in those days, and if you weren't invited to one of the "Big Four" games that were annually held on New Year's Day -- the Rose in Pasadena, the Orange in Miami, the Sugar in New Orleans or the Cotton in Dallas -- it seemed pointless. Notre Dame accepted a bid to the 1925 Rose Bowl, and didn't accept another bowl bid until the 1970 Cotton Bowl.

The organizers then invited the Air Force Academy, figuring that, as a new program -- the Academy had only been founded in 1954, and started playing football the next year -- they would jump at the chance to showcase their team in the Big Apple. But they insisted upon playing Army, since they hadn't played each other in the regular season, even though this would be, essentially, a home game for Army. (West Point is only 47 miles up the Hudson River from the site of the Polo Grounds.) But Army also declined: The Academy never accepted a bowl bid until the 1984 Cherry Bowl. (In contrast, Navy had accepted 8 bowl bids before that, including each of the Big Four at least once, and Air Force had already been to the 1958 Cotton Bowl before considering the Gotham Bowl.)

So the Gotham Bowl organizers invited Holy Cross, Colorado and Oregon State. Only Oregon State accepted, so there was no opponent for them, and the game was canceled.

They tried again in 1961. This time, they got an acceptance from Utah State, undefeated at 9-0-1, Champions of the Skyline Conference, and ranked Number 10 in the nation; and Baylor University, only 6th out of 8 teams in the Southwest Conference, and only 5-5 overall, but willing to go to a cold-weather city for a bowl game. But only 15,123 fans came out, leaving the Polo Grounds with over 40,000 empty seats. Baylor pulled the upset, winning 24-9.

They tried again in 1962. Instead of a Northeastern team going to Miami to play in the Orange Bowl game in the Orange Bowl stadium, the University of Miami, who played their home games in that stadium, came north to play in the Gotham Bowl. They were 7-3, and, while not a ranked team -- the Associated Press then only ranked the Top 10 teams, not the Top 20 -- they had beaten one, one of their rivals, then-Number 9 Florida State.

But the organizers had trouble finding an opponent. It took until December 4, 11 days before the game, for the University of Nebraska to accept a bid. In their 1st season under head coach Bob Devaney, the Cornhuskers started the sellout streak at Memorial Stadium which extends to this day -- the 2020 games with no tickets sold due to COVID restrictions are not counted against it -- and they went 8-2, although they were not ranked, and lost their only game against a ranked opponent, then-Number 10 Oklahoma.

The game was moved to Yankee Stadium, in the hopes that, being in better condition than the Polo Grounds, and then being in a better neighborhood, it would attract more fans. But, in those days before television saturation of college football, and the growth of alumni organizations for faraway schools in big cities like New York, there weren't very many Nebraska fans or Miami fans there. Nebraska and Miami have played each other in some famous games since, raising their relationship to the status of a quasi-rivalry. But, at the time, there was no reason to consider that particular matchup special.

And while ABC had agreed to televise the game live, as part of ABC Wide World of Sports, the New York newspaper workers' unions were on strike, so the papers weren't being published, and they weren't publicizing the game. It got more attention outside the New York Tri-State Area than inside. Advance ticket sales were minimal.

As if enough things hadn't gone wrong, the day before the game, at the airport in Lincoln, the pilot for the Cornhuskers' plane refused to take off until the bowl's check for expenditures cleared. Phone calls went back and forth, the check cleared, and the plane took off. In contrast, the Hurricanes got their promised $30,000 up front.

Finally, on the day of the game, it was damp, and only 14°F. Attendance at the 67,224-seat Bronx ballyard was just 6,166, with another 5,000 tickets given away. In spite of the game actually being a good one, with Nebraska winning, 36-34, the staging of the game was an embarrassment from announcement to final gun.

If there was any consideration of another Gotham Bowl for December 1963, it died with President John F. Kennedy on November 22: Few people would be in the mood to sit in a cold Yankee Stadium to watch two college football teams with whom they were not familiar.

There would not be another bowl game in the New York Tri-State Area until Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands hosted the Garden State Bowl, which lasted until 1981. In 2010, the Yankees began sponsoring the Pinstripe Bowl at the new Yankee Stadium, and it has been held every year since, except for the COVID-restricted 2020.

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December 9, 1961 was a Saturday. Actor Joe Lando was born.

There was 1 other college football game played that day, the Aviation Bowl, in the Wright Brothers' hometown of Dayton, Ohio. The University of New Mexico beat Western Michigan University, 28-12. The game was played at Welcome Stadium. Built in 1949, and seating 11,000, it is the home field of the University of Dayton, which plays in NCAA FCS (formerly Division I-AA), and some high school teams.

There were no games played in the NFL that day, but there was 1 in the American Football League: The Boston Patriots beat the Oakland Raiders, 35-21 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. (The Raiders played home games at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco in 1960, and Candlestick in 1961. Despite having the Oakland name, they took until 1962 to start playing home games in Oakland.)

Baseball was out of season. There were 4 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks lost to the St. Louis Hawks, 102-91 at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis. Bob Pettit scored 32 points and grabbed 21 rebounds.

* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Chicago Packers, 135-113 at the Philadelphia Civic Center. Yes, the Chicago Packers, named for the city's meatpacking industry. Having the same name as the football team that Chicagoans hate the most didn't help attendance. Being an expansion team didn't, either. Walt Bellamy scored 39 for them on this day. But, for the Warriors, Wilt Chamberlain scored 61 points and grabbed 36 rebounds. And that was only his 4th-best game of the season.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Syracuse Nationals, 106-102 at the Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium (now the Upstate Medical University Arena) in Syracuse.

* And Los Angeles Lakers beat the Detroit Pistons, 114-107 at Cobo Hall (now Huntington Place) in Detroit. Elgin Baylor scored 38 points.

And the NHL's entire "Original Six" were in action:

* The New York Rangers and the Montreal Canadiens played to a tie, 2-2 at the Montreal Forum.

* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Boston Bruins, 9-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* And the Detroit Red Wings beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 3-0 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.