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The lead of the game story -- 49 years ago -- said it was an “astronomical” score: Louisiana Tech 77, Lamar 40.
Even today, in this era of wide-open spread sets, no-huddle, fast-paced offensive football, it is unmatched in Louisiana Tech University history.
The night game of Nov. 15, 1969, remains the highest-scoring game ever at Joe Aillet Stadium (then, in its second season, called the new Tech Stadium). It was the seventh game played there; there have been 220 others.
(The only challengers were 107-point games: Tech 76, Rice 31, in 2014; Tech 55, Western Kentucky 52, in 2016.)
“I vaguely remember it,” said Mickey Slaughter, Tech’s offensive backfield coach that night and now 77, residing in Ruston. “They couldn’t stop us; we couldn’t stop them.”
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| Terry Bradshaw, La. Tech's superstar QB in 1968-69, set all sorts of passing records, but he could run, too. |
It was a crazy enough game that Tech QB Terry Bradshaw’s touchdown pass total was tripled by the opposing quarterback. Bradshaw had two TD passes; Lamar’s Tommy Tomlin had six.
Slaughter, who called Tech’s plays for the dozen years of the head coach Maxie Lambright era, recalled that “Bradshaw had a big night.” And of course he did -- 17-of-33 passing for 317 yards. Plus, he was Tech’s leading rusher -- eight carries for 57 yards.
Tomlin’s passing totals: 22-of-46, 308 yards, TD passes of 4, 11, 39, 9, 14 and 53.
Two Tech players from Texas recall it as a memorable game.
Senior wide receiver-kick returner Robbie Albright -- fastest Bulldog on the ‘69 team -- had some unique remembrances.
“Coach Lambright decided since we were playing a Texas team (the only one on Tech’s schedule that year], that the game captains should be from Texas,” said Albright, who was from Tyler and had come to Tech as a junior-college transfer in 1968 as an immediate long-ball threat in the Bradshaw-led offensive onslaught of that season. “So Larry Wright (defensive end) and I were the designated Texas seniors and game captains.”
“[It] was obviously a scorefest,” he said, looking back, and he started it (“opened the floodgates,” as he put it) -- with a (then-Tech record) 88-yard punt return for the first of the game’s 17 touchdowns.
Albright has a special memory -- and souvenir -- from the game. (See the last paragraph of this story.)
“That was a great game,” said Mark Graham, a junior defensive back in the first of his two all-Gulf States Conference seasons. And it was, he noted, “a grudge game for me.
“Lamar was in my backyard in high school,” he explained. Port-Neches [Graham’s school] is 13 miles from Beaumont [Lamar’s location] and “they did not offer me a scholarship. I had some high school buddies playing for the Cardinals.”
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It is not only the highest-scoring game at the stadium, it is the highest scoring game -- two teams -- in Tech football history. It was four more points than any single NFL game ever (113, Washington Redskins 72, New York Giants 41, Nov. 27, 1966) and, although Tech and Lamar were not “major” college teams in 1969, their score exceeded any of the 661 games listed as “major” scores that season.
(A Tech team did score 100 points one day in 1922 against something called Clark Memorial College, and 89 the same year against what would become Southern Arkansas University.)
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Considering the final score, Tech’s 542 yards total offense (to Lamar’s 493) and the winning margin, two remarkable facts: (1) Tech’s offense did not score in the first quarter; (2) Lamar actually had a 13-7 lead that almost lasted into the second quarter.
After Albright’s punt return TD, the Cardinals scored the next two touchdowns and had a chance for more. With 18 seconds remaining in the first quarter, David Brookings -- from Shreveport Byrd High -- intercepted a pass and returned it 18 yards for the tying score. The PAT kick made it 14-13 … and Tech never trailed again.
The Bulldogs poured on four touchdowns in the second quarter -- it was 42-21 at halftime, and four more in the last quarter, and -- somehow -- only one in the third.
It was a big game, points-wise, for Tech senior fullback Buster Herren (from Shreveport) -- a school-record four touchdowns, and he also became the school’s career scoring leader.
But it wasn’t like he dominated; his three TD runs totaled five yards (1, 2 and 2), his rushing totals were 15 carries, 53 yards. He caught a swing pass from Bradshaw and went 19 yards for his other score. [The scoring summary in The Shreveport Times the next morning did not list that play.]
The other Bradshaw TD pass that night was no surprise (and really the only Tech offensive score of much distance) -- a 38-yard connection with his favorite Woodlawn High-Tech target of six seasons, Tommy Spinks.
And Spinks -- also no surprise -- was the Tech’s top receiver, with five catches totaling 180 yards.
Lamar’s Pat Gibbs caught one more pass (six) than Spinks, for much less yardage (106), but for three touchdowns.
The other Tech touchdowns: another punt return (59 yards by fullback-tight end John Adams, from Jennings); a 3-yard run by fullback Mike Lord (Winnsboro); a 1-yard sneak by Bradshaw; and a late 5-yard run by backup QB Ken Lantrip (Lake Charles).
“We gained a substantial lead going into halftime, but the Cardinals kept coming … and scoring,” Albright recalled. And he and a teammate remember that Coach Lambright -- despite the big victory -- was not happy with a leaky defense.
“Although we maintained a three-touchdown lead,” Albright said, “Lambright would get upset every time they scored, and put the first team [offense] back in. I had never seen him so upset over such a convincing win.”
Senior defensive tackle Johnny Richard, from Church Point and an all-conference player that season, remember that “the first-team defense did not play much in the fourth quarter.
“We knew [the Tech coaches] were trying to get the returning players some experience,” added Richard, who is still working in the onshore/offshore well control industry in Houston, “but the first-team players were trying to completely shut down their offense. The second team couldn’t hold them and let them score.”
Graham said it was a tough defensive assignment that day, and not even an unusual Tech plan helped.
“Lamar had a prolific passing attack,” Graham said. “To counter that, we went to a spy coverage, the only time in my 41 games [at Tech] that the secondary used it. I was assigned their No. 1 target, man on man; the other guys were in zone coverage. Their attack was three- and five-step dropback and throw to a spot. They had a design that we had never seen in those days.
“They had a good night passing, but I broke up several of their attempts, and intercepted one.”
That was not unusual. Two weeks earlier, in Tech’s devastating, last-second loss at home (and homecoming) to Southern Mississippi 24-23 -- the only loss of an 8-1 regular season -- Graham had broken the school record with his 12th career pass interception.
Another unusual aspect of the game was the placekickers. Jorgen Gertz, an import from Denmark that season, went 11-for-11; he was Tech’s first soccer-style kicker. Ronnie Baird of Lamar kicked only two PATs … barefooted.
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During the game, Bradshaw became the first Louisiana college quarterback to surpass 6,000 yards total offense in a career.
And yet his per-game output in 1969 was some 60 yards per game fewer than in 1968, the season he blossomed into a college superstar and Tech’s program recovered from three subpar seasons to a 9-2 bowl-game winner.
Slaughter was not immediately aware of his head coach’s displeasure. “I didn’t know about the defense,” he said. “I was in the press box and had my hands full trying to get our offense to score points.”
Thinking back on the game, the old QB/play-caller coach reflected, “I thought to myself -- a quarterback [he came close to recalling the Lamar star’s name] throws for six touchdowns and his team loses by 37 points. That’s pretty tough.”
It was Thomas Aswell, the Ruston News Bureau writer covering the game for The Shreveport Times, who used the “astronomical” adjective and wrote “both teams scored at will in the game defense forgot.”
Robbie Albright, though, did not forget -- he has a visible memento.
“I got the game ball,” said that night’s co-captain, “and had the team autograph it. I still have it. Terry, of course, signed it big and bold, right on the front! We see it, Terry, we see it.”
Albright is still laughing about it. It is an astronomical memory.
From Ed English: One thing underappreciated about Tech is that the state logo with a giant T is one of the best-looking helmets in college football. ... For me, it’s always been a top five.
ReplyDeleteFrom Glenn Theis: What great memories of such a great game. I did not remember many of the details you wrote about, but I am glad you told all that you did. Whenever I think about that game, I first think of them scoring 40 points and losing to us by 37.
ReplyDeleteSo many young ones don’t know about that game or even much of the history, and I think it is great that you are telling things they would be glad to know.
I hope you keep on providing great memories for all of us.
From Dillon Murchison: And I was there! Amazing game. The crowd went crazy. Terry was unstoppable!
ReplyDeleteFrom Gerry Robichaux: A great read, as usual. Glad I didn't get the call -- the deadline would have given me a stroke!
ReplyDeleteFrom Skipper Morgan: I was at that game watching my idol, Tommy Spinks.
ReplyDeleteFrom Glenn Murphy: Terry threw a touchdown pass to Robbie Albright that must have gone 75 yards in the air. It looked as though the ball went as high as the lights. I have yet to see a pass like that one.
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