November 27, 1954: The 1st Grey Cup Under the CFL Banner

Jackie Parker

November 27, 1954: The first Canadian Football League season comes to a conclusion, with the Championship of Canadian football, the Grey Cup, being played, on neutral ground at Varsity Stadium in Toronto – in effect, Canada’s national stadium at the time. (From 1909 to 1953, the governing body was the Canadian Rugby Union.) It was broadcast nationwide over CBC, the 1st time the Grey Cup was on television.

The Montreal Alouettes were the Champions of the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union. The Edmonton Eskimos were the Champions of the Western Interprovincial Football Union. The game was played on a very muddy field, which contributed to some sloppy play.

Varsity Stadium

In the 1st quarter, the Eskimos, or "Esks" for short, opened the scoring on a 4-yard touchdown pass from Rollie Miles to Earl Lindley. At the time, the CFL awarded 5 points for a touchdown, not 6. The Alouettes, or "Als," tied the game when Sam Etcheverry threw a 90-yard touchdown pass to Red O'Quinn.

The Eskimos retook the lead on a 1-yard run by Bernie Faloney, but, this time, Bob Dean missed the point-after-touchdown. Early in the 2nd quarter, he kicked a field goal to make it 16-7 Edmonton. But Montreal took an 18-14 halftime lead on a 14-yard touchdown pass from Etcheverry to O'Quinn and an 8-yard touchdown run by Chuck Hunsinger. 

The only score of the 3rd quarter came when Ray Poole missed a 17-yard field goal attempt, and the Eskimos did not return it. Under the rules of Canadian football, this is called a "single" or a "rouge," and is worth 1 point. Therefore, the Als ended the 3rd quarter up 19-14. And in the 4th quarter, Etcheverry threw a 13-yard touchdown pass to Joey Pal. The Als led, 25-14.

The Eskimos' next drive ended with a Glenn Lippman reverse-field dash, 14 yards for a touchdown. With 1st & 10 on the Eskimos' 10-yard line and 3 minutes remaining, Etcheverry handed the ball off to Hunsinger, who was almost immediately corralled about 5 yards behind the line of scrimmage. In the game's most famous and controversial play, he apparently fumbled, and Jackie Parker recovered the ball on the 20-yard line, and ran 90 yards for the touchdown, with Etcheverry in full but futile pursuit. With Dean's conversion, the Eskimos led, 26-25.

Many Montreal fans believed that the "fumble" was actually a forward pass attempt, to an ineligible receiver, in which case it would not have been a touchdown for Edmonton, as the pass would have been incomplete.

There were still 3 minutes left in the game, and Etcheverry moved his team downfield. He passed to O'Quinn at the Eskimos 35-yard line, but he was hit, and the result was another fumble recovered by the Eskimos. The 26-25 lead held, and the Eskimos had won the Grey Cup for the 1st time.

It was the 1st of 3 straight titles for them. They went on to win the Grey Cup in 1954, 1955, 1956, 1975, 1978, 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1987, 1993, 2003, 2005 and 2015. In 2021, due to racial concerns, the name "Eskimos" was dropped, and the team changed its name to the Edmonton Elks, allowing them to keep the initials and their "EE" logo.

Parker, a Tennessee native, was later voted the Number 3 player in CFL history. He lived until 2006. Etcheverry, from New Mexico, was voted 26th, and coached the Alouettes to the Grey Cup in 1970. He lived until 2009.

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November 27, 1954 was a Saturday. Actress Patricia McPherson, best known as KITT's mechanic Bonnie Barstow on Knight Rider, was born.

Baseball was out of season. Among the college football games played that day were these:

* Number 1 Ohio State had completed their regular season the week before, defeating then-Number 12 Michigan. This won them the Big Ten Conference title, and sent them to the Rose Bowl.

* Number 2 University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) had completed their season the week before, defeating their intracity rivals, the University of Southern California (USC). This won UCLA the Pacific Coast Conference title. However, the PCC's no-repeat rule meant that they could not go to the Rose Bowl for the 2nd straight season, preventing a de facto National Championship game.

* Rivalry: Number 3 Oklahoma beat Oklahoma A&M, 14-0 at Lewis Field (now Boone Pickens Stadium) in Stillwater, Oklahoma. This was during Oklahoma's 47-game winning streak, still a college football record. They won the Big Seven Conference, which had a no-repeat rule, so 2nd-place Nebraska were invited to the Orange Bowl instead. In 1958, when A&M was renamed Oklahoma State, they joined the league, making it the Big Eight.

* Rivalry: Number 4 Notre Dame beat Number 17 University of Southern California, 23-17 at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana. Notre Dame did not accept bowl bids at the time, so an early-season loss to Purdue cost them the National Championship. Since USC finished 2nd to UCLA in the PCC, they got the PCC's Rose Bowl berth. Ohio State beat them, to win the National Championship.

* Rivalry: Number 6 Navy beat Number 5 Army, 27-20 at Municipal Stadium (later John F. Kennedy Stadium) in Philadelphia. The Air Force Academy fielded its 1st varsity football team the next season. Navy were invited to the Sugar Bowl.

* Rivalry: Number 7 University of Mississippi beat Mississippi State University, 14-0 at Hemingway Stadium (now Vaught-Hemingway Stadium) in Oxford, Mississippi. This clinched the Southeastern Conference title for "Ole Miss," and earned them the accompanying berth in the Sugar Bowl, where they lost to Navy.

* Rivalry: Number 8 Wisconsin beat Number 20 Minnesota, 27-0 at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin.

* Number 9 Baylor were upset by Rice, 20-14 at Baylor Stadium in Waco, Texas.

* Two days earlier, on Thanksgiving Day, Number 10 Maryland beat Missouri, 74-13 at Byrd Stadium (now SECU Stadium) in the Washington suburb of College Park, Maryland.

* Rivalry: Number 11 University of Miami beat Florida, 14-0 at Florida Field (now Ben Hill Griffin Stadium) in Gainesville, Florida.

* Rivalry: Number 12 West Virginia beat Virginia, 14-10 at Scott Stadium in Charlottesville, Virginia.

* Number 13 Arkansas beat the University of Houston, 19-0 at Rice Stadium in Houston. This clinched the Southwest Conference title for Arkansas, and earned them the accompanying Cotton Bowl berth.

* Rivalry: Number 20 Duke beat North Carolina, 47-12 at Kenan Stadium in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. This clinched the Atlantic Coast Conference title for Duke -- a tie with Wake Forest cost Maryland the title -- and they were invited to the Orange Bowl, where they beat Nebraska.

* Rivalry: Georgia Tech beat Georgia, 7-3 at Sanford Stadium in Athens, Georgia. Tech were invited to the Cotton Bowl, where they beat Arkansas.

* Rivalry: Boston College beat Holy Cross, 31-13 at Fenway Park in Boston.

* Rivalry: Vanderbilt beat Tennessee, 26-0 at Dudley Field in Nashville.

* Rivalry: Louisiana State University (LSU) beat Tulane, 14-13 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

* Rivalry: Southern Methodist University (SMU) beat Texas Christian University (TCU), 21-6 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

* While these 2 Catholic schools in the Northeast weren't exactly rivals, their game was the biggest college football game in New York City that Thanksgiving Weekend: Philadelphia-based Villanova beat Fordham, 41-0 at the Polo Grounds. Both teams had a bad season: This was 'Nova's only win, and Fordham had only beaten Rutgers. Just under 10,000 fans attended.

* And both New Jersey teams, Rutgers and Princeton, finished their seasons the week before.

There were 3 games in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Syracuse Nationals 80-74 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The Rochester Royals beat the Boston Celtics, 107-101 at the Edgerton Park Arena in Rochester, New York.

* And the Fort Wayne Pistons beat the Minneapolis Lakers, 97-81 at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

There were 2 games in the NHL. The New York Rangers lost to the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-1 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. And the Montreal Canadiens beat the Detroit Red Wings, 4-1 at the Montreal Forum. The Boston Bruins and the Chicago Black Hawks were not scheduled.

And in English soccer, Arsenal welcomed the defending Football League Champions, Birmingham-area team Wolverhampton Wanderers, to the Arsenal Stadium, known as Highbury for its North London neighborhood, and played "Wolves" to a 1-1 draw.

November 27, 1948: The 1st Western Team to Win the Grey Cup

November 27, 1948: For the 1st time, a team from Western Canada wins the Grey Cup, the championship of professional football in the country.

The Western Interprovincial Football Union (WIFU) featured several teams in Calgary, including the Bronks -- not "Broncos" -- but the onset of World War II ended that. In 1945, the Calgary Stampeders were founded named for the Calgary Stampede, the world's largest annual rodeo. They played their home games at Mewata Stadium, which opened in 1906, and remained there until the opening of McMahon Stadium in 1960. Mewata Stadium was demolished in 1999.

Among the Stampeders' players, under head coach Les Lear, were 2 nonwhite men, and this was rare in pro football at any level at this point. Woody Strode had starred as an end at UCLA, and with another former UCLA player, Kenny Washington, re-integrated the NFL with the 1946 Los Angeles Rams, before going north, and later becoming a renowned actor. And Norman Kwong, known as the China Clipper, was a star running back despite being only 5-foot-7. He would eventually play on 4 Grey Cup winners, and be elected to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame -- and to public office, eventually becoming the Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Alberta.

The "Stamps" marched through the 1948 regular season undefeated, though it should be noted that they had only 2 opponents: The Regina Roughriders, who became the Saskatchewan Roughriders in 1950; and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. They played each team 3 times at home, and 3 times away, and went 12-0. On 3 occasions, the Riders held them to wins of just 1 point. But it was enough to win the WIFU's berth in the Grey Cup, against the Champions of the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union.

That would be the Ottawa Rough Riders -- spelling the mascot name as two words, as opposed to Regina's one. They had only 3 opponents: The Montreal Alouettes, the Hamilton Wildcats and the Toronto Argonauts. They went 10-2, both losses dealt by Montreal.

The Final was held on neutral ground, at Varsity Stadium on the campus of the University of Toronto. There had been Grey Cup winners from Winnipeg, but no further west than that. Infamously, the Regina Roughriders lost the Final 5 straight years, from 1928 to 1932. This was the 1st time a team west of Regina had ever gotten there.

Varsity Stadium

And the visiting Calgarians played up their Western image. Between the ranches, the oil, and a conservatism tinged with libertarianism, Alberta is "Canada's Texas," and in November 1948, they reveled in that status, staging pancake breakfasts on the steps of City Hall, riding horses into the lobby of the prestigious Royal York Hotel downtown, and starting parades, dances and parties everywhere.

In other words, they would have ended up looking pretty silly had their team lost. The only score in the 1st quarter was a single by Ottawa. A single is awarded when the ball is kicked into the end zone by any legal means -- other than an extra-point conversion, successful or not, or not) or a successful field goal -- and the receiving team does not return or kick the ball out of its end zone. The Rough Riders led, 1-0.

But the Stampeders stopped 3 1st-half drives inside the 25-yard line, twice refusing to fall for fake punts. After regaining possession following the 2nd fake, the Stamps ran a "sleeper play": Norm Hill ran over to the far sidelines and flopped on the field, essentially hiding. Everybody in the stadium, except the Rough Riders on the field, saw this coming. Keith Spaith passed to Hill, who slipped before he had possession of the ball, but he fell on his back, and the ball dropped into his hands. Since he hadn't been touched, he was permitted to get up and run, and scored what is sometimes called the "sit-down touchdown." The Stampeders led, 6-1. (The CFL banned the sleeper play in 1961.)

Bob Paffrath scored a touchdown for the Riders in the 3rd quarter, putting them up, 7-6. But int he 4th quarter, Strode recovered a fumble from Pete Karpuk, and took it to the Ottawa 11-yard line. Pete Thodos scored a touchdown shortly thereafter, and the Stampeders won the game, 12-7. Canadian football had its 1st Western-based Champions.

Jim Coleman, who went on to become Canada's 1st nationally-syndicated print sports columnist, wrote this in the next day's Globe and Mail:

The football game for the Grey Cup was contested officially in the stadium and was continued unofficially in the hotel lobby. At 5:01 p.m. the goalposts were borne triumphantly through the front doors and were erected against the railings of the mezzanine. At 5:02 p.m. two platoons of bellboys circumspectly removed the potted palms, flower vases and anything that weighed less than three thousand pounds. The gaudily caparisoned Calgary supporters were boisterous and noisy but well-behaved and courteously declined to ride their horses into the elevators. Any minor untoward incidents were occasioned by youthful local yahoos who suffered from the delusion that the consumption of two pints of ale and the acquisition of a pseudo-western twang entitled them to ride the range astride any convenient chesterfield.

The Stamps went 13-1 in 1949, their 1 loss being 9-6 to Saskatchewan. They reached the Grey Cup Final again, this time losing to the Montreal Alouettes. It would take until 1971 for them to win another. They have since won in 1992, 1998, 2001, 2008, 2014 and 2018.

From further west than Calgary, the Edmonton Eskimos (now the Edmonton Elks) won their 1st Grey Cup in 1954. The BC Lions, the "BC" standing for British Columbia, with their base in Vancouver, won their 1st in 1964. Of the 9 teams that would make up the classic CFL -- from east to west, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton, Winnipeg, Saskatchewan, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver -- the Saskatchewan Roughriders were the last to win their 1st, in 1966.

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November 27, 1948 was a Saturday. It was a college football gameday in America, with some major rivalries being played:

* Number 1 Michigan had ended its season the week before, beating arch-rival Ohio State, who had been ranked Number 18. Michigan thus won the Big Nine Conference title. (The Big Ten had lost the University of Chicago, and would soon regain their name by admitting Michigan State.) Since the league's rules prevented them from going to back-to-back bowls, and from going to any other bowl, their season was over, and they went on to be proclaimed the National Champions.

* Number 5 University of California and Number 7 Northwestern were also idle. Cal won the Pacific Coast Conference title, and Northwestern finished 2nd in the Big Nine, so they played each other in the 1949 Rose Bowl. Northwestern won, and it remains their only appearance in the game except for a loss to USC in 1995.

* Two days earlier, on Thanksgiving Day, the rivalries included a 23-14 upset by Cornell of Number 19 Pennsylvania at Franklin Field in Philadelphia; Missouri beating Kansas, 21-7 at what became Faurot Field in Columbia, Missouri; and Texas A&M holding Texas to a 14-14 tie at Texas' Memorial Stadium in Austin.

* The day before, Kentucky beat the University of Miami, 25-5 at Burdine Stadium (later renamed the Orange Bowl) in Miami; and Brigham Young University (BYU) beat Arizona State, 27-25 at Goodwin Stadium in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe, Arizona.

* Number 2 Notre Dame beat the University of Washington, 46-0 at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana.

* Rivalry: Number 3 Army were held to a 21-21 tie by Navy at Municipal Stadium (later John F. Kennedy Stadium) in Philadelphia.

* Number 4 North Carolina beat Virginia, 34-12 at Scott Stadium in Charlottesville, Virginia.

* Rivalry: Number 6 Oklahoma beat Oklahoma State, 19-15 at Lewis Field (now Boone Pickens Stadium) in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Oklahoma went on to beat North Carolina in the Sugar Bowl.

* Rivalry: Number 8 Southern Methodist University (SMU) were held to a tie by Texas Christian University (TCU), 7-7 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. In spite of this, SMU still won the Southwest Conference title, and running back Doak Walker was awarded the Heisman Trophy.

* Number 9 Clemson beat Auburn, 7-6 at Ladd Memorial Stadium in Mobile, Alabama.

* Number 10 Oregon were idle, and went on to beat SMU in the Cotton Bowl.

* Rivalry: Number 12 Georgia beat Georgia Tech, 21-13 at Sanford Stadium in Athens, Georgia. Georgia went on to lose to Texas in the Orange Bowl.

* Rivalry: Number 14 Tulane beat Louisiana State University (LSU), 46-0 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

* Rivalry: Number 15 Vanderbilt beat Tennessee, 28-6 at Dudley Field (now FirstBank Stadium) in Nashville.

* Rivalry: Number 16 Mississippi beat Mississippi State, 34-7 at Hemingway Stadium (now Vaught-Hemingway Stadium) in Oxford, Mississippi.

* Rivalry: Fordham beat New York University (NYU), 26-0 before 26,000 at the Polo Grounds.

* Rivalry: Boston College beat Holy Cross, 21-20 before 46,000 at Braves Field in Boston.

* Rivalry: West Virginia beat Maryland, 16-14 at the old Mountaineer Field in Morgantown, West Virginia.

* New Jersey's teams, Rutgers and Princeton, had each ended its season the week before.

* In rivalry games played the following week, Alabama beat Auburn 55-0 at Legion Field in Birmingham; and Notre Dame were held to a 14-14 tie by the University of Southern California (USC) at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

Baseball was out of season. There were 5 games played in the Basketball Association of America, the league that became the NBA the following season:

* The New York Knicks beat the Fort Wayne Pistons, 80-70 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The Baltimore Bullets beat the Providence Steam Rollers, 91-71 at the Rhode Island Auditorium in Providence.

* The Washington Capitols beat the Indianapolis Jets at the Uline Arena (now the Washington Coliseum) in Washington.

* The Rochester Royals beat the Chicago Stags, 105-103 in double overtime at the Edgerton Park Arena in Rochester, New York.

* And the Minneapolis Lakers beat the St. Louis Bombers, 87-71 at the St. Louis Arena.

The NHL's entire "Original Six" were in action:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-0 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The Boston Bruins beat the Montreal Canadiens, 2-0 at the Montreal Forum.

* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Detroit Red Wings, 5-3 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

And in English soccer, Arsenal, the North London team I would one day support, traveled to Fratton Park in Portsmouth, Hampshire, on the South Coast, and lost to Portsmouth, 4-1. Arsenal were the defending Champions of the Football League, but "Pompey" won the next 2 titles, still their only 2.

October 3, 1984: The Last North American Soccer League Game

October 3, 1984: Soccer Bowl '84 is played at Varsity Stadium in Toronto. Playing Soccer Bowl '83 in Canada (albeit all the way across the country in Vancouver) didn't help the Toronto Blizzard the year before, and playing on their actual home field doesn't help them now, as they lose 3-2 to the Chicago Sting.

The Blizzard -- who won the North American Soccer League title in 1976, as "Toronto Metros-Croatia" -- trailed 2-0 after 70 minutes, but scored twice in 3 minutes to equalize. But Patricia "Pato" Margetic, the Argentine striker who'd scored the Sting's 2nd goal, scores in the 82nd to win it.

Attendance at the 21,739-seat Varsity Stadium is just 16,842. No one knows it yet, but this is the last game that the original NASL will ever hold.

Varsity Stadium

The Sting, who had also won the title in 1981, had already announced that this would be their last season in the League, as they had already been admitted to the Major Indoor Soccer League -- which played soccer in arenas on hockey rinks covered with artificial turf, with the boards ensuring the ball wouldn't go out of bounds unless it went over the boards, resulting in higher scores. It was exciting, but it was a bastardized version of the sport, something that no one would have called "The Beautiful Game." Instead, it was called "pinball soccer." 

Clive Toye, who built the New York Cosmos' dynasty, and also the Sting's '81 champs, was now running the Blizzard, and made postgame comments that Sting coach Willy Roy and striker Karl-Heinz Granitza -- both Germans, and the latter would later honor his Chicago experience by running a bar in Berlin named State Street -- were "cheats," and that the Sting were "unworthy champions."

During the ensuing off-season, NASL President Howard Samuels died, and Toye was named interim President. Then the Cosmos folded, due to striker/part-owner Giorgio Chinaglia's mismanagement. Without the flagship franchise, the League was doomed, no matter what Toye did, and he did try.

But when the time came to prepare for a 1985 season, only 2 teams -- the Blizzard and the Minnesota (formerly Fort Lauderdale) Strikers -- were still interested in playing, and the League folded, after 17 seasons. North America was without a "first division" in soccer for 11 years, setting the sport in the United States back a generation. The damage was incalculable.

Another league named the North American Soccer League played from 2011 to 2017, but it was never more than a second division, behind Major League Soccer, founded in 1996. The Chicago Fire would win the MLS Cup in 1998; Toronto FC, in 2017.

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October 3, 1984 was a Wednesday. Singer Ashlee Simpson and actress Jessica Parker Kennedy were born.

Football was in midweek. The NBA and NHL were in their preseasons. But baseball's Playoffs were underway, and Game 2 was played in both the American League Championship Series and the National League Championship Series.

In the AL, the Detroit Tigers beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-3 at Royals Stadium in Kansas City. (It was renamed Kauffman Stadium for owner Ewing Kauffman, shortly before he died in 1993.) For the Tigers, Kirk Gibson hit his 1st postseason home run. It would not be his last. In the top of the 11th inning, Johnny Grubb doubled home 2 runs off Dan Quisenberry to win the game.

In the NL, the Chicago Cubs, playing in their 1st postseason series since the 1945 World Series, beat the San Diego Padres, playing in their 1st postseason series since their founding in 1969. The game, at Wrigley Field in Chicago, ended 4-2 in the Cubs' favor.

The Cubs now needed just 1 more win to win their 1st Pennant in 39 years. It would take them another 32 years to win that Pennant.

The fact that ABC got great ratings for this series in the Chicago area, but lousy ratings everywhere else, led to a decision from the new Commissioner of Baseball, Peter Ueberroth: From now on, all postseason games would have to be played at stadiums that had lights, because the team owners wanted the revenue that came from games on prime-time TV. And Wrigley was the last stadium that didn't have lights.

Ueberroth ruled that, the next time the Cubs made the Playoffs, they would have to play their "home games" at the next-closest stadium in the National League Eastern Division, which they were in. But that would have been Busch Memorial Stadium, home of the St. Louis Cardinals, their arch-rivals. Why not Comiskey Park, home of the crosstown Chicago White Sox? Ueberroth didn't say.

So the process for putting lights up at Wrigley Field began. In 1988, the 1st night game was played there. In 1989, the next time the Cubs won the NL East, they hosted night games in the NLCS. In 1990, they hosted the All-Star Game there, which they also wouldn't have been allowed to do without lights. Game 4 of the 1984 World Series remains the last World Series game to be played entirely in daylight.