The year was 1968. I remember it like yesterday.
The Tet Offensive turned the war in Vietnam upside down and pushed American casualties to their worst peak. 16,000 killed. War protests grew in step. Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, and riots erupted nationwide, except in Indianapolis, where presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy addressed a crowd about his own brother’s shooting death. Two months later, he was killed, too.
The world of sports offered some distractions. Raised black fists stood out at the Mexico Olympics, while the world champion St. Louis Cardinals again ran away from the National League with Bob Gibson throwing 13 shutouts. The Baltimore Colts were succeeding Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers as the NFL’s dominant team, headed for a Super Bowl date with Broadway Joe Namath and the AFL’s New York Jets. Los Angeles ruled basketball with the Lakers in the NBA and Johnny Wooden’s UCLA Bruins in the NCAA adding to their title runs.
And Leroy Keyes graced the cover of Sports Illustrated’s college football issue, visible inside the No. 1 for Purdue as the nation’s consensus top team, a status lasting from preseason through mid-October. Purdue spent over five weeks atop the polls with Mike Phipps rocking the Cradle of Quarterbacks and 64-year-old head coach Jack Mollenkopf earning a tip of the nation’s fedoras, two years after winning the Rose Bowl.
The topper came on September 26th, when No. 1 Purdue visited No. 2 Notre Dame and administered a 37-22 pounding that wasn’t that close. Sports Illustrated again featured Keyes with the game report headlined “Leroy on the Loose.”
Dan Jenkins’ words placed college football’s crown firmly on Purdue, a story covering six full pages and still able to warm the heart of any good Boilermaker.
“Maybe the Vatican ought to consider banning Purdue instead of the Pill. Maybe Purdue is the hugest, fleetest, calmest, most skilled football team that ever tromped through the Indiana sycamores. Maybe Leroy Keyes is the greatest quadruple threat since Mt. Rushmore. And maybe Notre Dame would be better off trying to win one for Ara Parseghian instead of the Gipper. These and other sinister thoughts are to be weighed now that the Boilermakers have put it on the Irish twice in a row in a great big Poll Bowl that brings out the Rockne in everybody.”
https://vault.si.com/vault/1968/10/07/40890#&gid=ci0258bfd5b010278a&pid=40890---034---image
Two weeks later, the Boilermakers’ glorious reign as No. 1 ended as Woody Hayes and Ohio State jacked Purdue’s jaw 13-0 en route to their own unbeaten national championship. Purdue later took a second loss because … well, who can ever really get up for the Minnesota Golden Gophers?
Now, nearly 55 years later, Notre Dame is finally getting its revenge. A Domer has held Purdue’s football program hostage without a leader for over a week while paying a cool million of Purdue’s dollars to his hand-picked coach just to leave and take our staff and our recruits with him.
From “Leroy on the Loose” to Bobo’s Circus and Brohm’s Lull-a-bye.
Thank goodness for this week’s No. 1 in basketball and the true Boilermakers who are responsible for it.
The Tet Offensive turned the war in Vietnam upside down and pushed American casualties to their worst peak. 16,000 killed. War protests grew in step. Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, and riots erupted nationwide, except in Indianapolis, where presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy addressed a crowd about his own brother’s shooting death. Two months later, he was killed, too.
The world of sports offered some distractions. Raised black fists stood out at the Mexico Olympics, while the world champion St. Louis Cardinals again ran away from the National League with Bob Gibson throwing 13 shutouts. The Baltimore Colts were succeeding Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers as the NFL’s dominant team, headed for a Super Bowl date with Broadway Joe Namath and the AFL’s New York Jets. Los Angeles ruled basketball with the Lakers in the NBA and Johnny Wooden’s UCLA Bruins in the NCAA adding to their title runs.
And Leroy Keyes graced the cover of Sports Illustrated’s college football issue, visible inside the No. 1 for Purdue as the nation’s consensus top team, a status lasting from preseason through mid-October. Purdue spent over five weeks atop the polls with Mike Phipps rocking the Cradle of Quarterbacks and 64-year-old head coach Jack Mollenkopf earning a tip of the nation’s fedoras, two years after winning the Rose Bowl.
The topper came on September 26th, when No. 1 Purdue visited No. 2 Notre Dame and administered a 37-22 pounding that wasn’t that close. Sports Illustrated again featured Keyes with the game report headlined “Leroy on the Loose.”
Dan Jenkins’ words placed college football’s crown firmly on Purdue, a story covering six full pages and still able to warm the heart of any good Boilermaker.
“Maybe the Vatican ought to consider banning Purdue instead of the Pill. Maybe Purdue is the hugest, fleetest, calmest, most skilled football team that ever tromped through the Indiana sycamores. Maybe Leroy Keyes is the greatest quadruple threat since Mt. Rushmore. And maybe Notre Dame would be better off trying to win one for Ara Parseghian instead of the Gipper. These and other sinister thoughts are to be weighed now that the Boilermakers have put it on the Irish twice in a row in a great big Poll Bowl that brings out the Rockne in everybody.”
https://vault.si.com/vault/1968/10/07/40890#&gid=ci0258bfd5b010278a&pid=40890---034---image
Two weeks later, the Boilermakers’ glorious reign as No. 1 ended as Woody Hayes and Ohio State jacked Purdue’s jaw 13-0 en route to their own unbeaten national championship. Purdue later took a second loss because … well, who can ever really get up for the Minnesota Golden Gophers?
Now, nearly 55 years later, Notre Dame is finally getting its revenge. A Domer has held Purdue’s football program hostage without a leader for over a week while paying a cool million of Purdue’s dollars to his hand-picked coach just to leave and take our staff and our recruits with him.
From “Leroy on the Loose” to Bobo’s Circus and Brohm’s Lull-a-bye.
Thank goodness for this week’s No. 1 in basketball and the true Boilermakers who are responsible for it.
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