Remembering Super Bowl XI

During this week you will likely see a lot of updates about the 51st Super Bowl, which will be played Sunday night in Houston.

Watching the game has become quite a tradition in America, and as a part of all the attention surrounding the annual game, we hear a lot about the heroics from previous Super Bowls.

I have quite a few memories myself.

Super Bowl XI, which I watched 40 years ago as a teenager, is one of many I recall, and it took place during a time when professional football was having a golden age of sorts (from 1970-1980).

While I became a fan of the Dallas Cowboys when I was 8 years old, I followed all of the games closely, and never missed a Super Bowl on television.

Super Bowl XI did not involve Dallas, but featured the Minnesota Vikings and the Oakland Raiders.

From 1970 (when I was in the second grade) through 1980 (when I graduated from high school) I watched every televised game I could and read a lot about the players in the newspapers and in magazines.

There was no ESPN, no NFL Network, and no internet in those days, but a young football fan in Arkansas could still keep up in a variety of ways.

I read a monthly periodical called Football Digest (which ceased publication in 2005, probably because fans started getting most of their football information from the internet), and I also ordered paperbacks at school about my favorite players or teams.

We could get one of those for 60 cents, or maybe 75 cents if it was a thicker volume.

Super Bowl XI was played on Jan. 9, 1977, in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena and I recall it for a couple of reasons.

One was that during the pre- game discussions on NBC they talked extensively about how both teams had been very successful for many years with many playoff appearances, but neither had won an NFL championship. On that day, one of the two would finally win it all.

Another reason is that I charted every play of the game with different symbols on a paper diagram of a football field. I recorded the Viking drives in purple ink and the Raider drives in black.

I got the idea for how to chart a game from an article in Football Digest.

In the 1976 season, the Raiders had a record of 13-1 (something almost unheard of) and were coached by John Madden. The Vikings were extremely respectable in their own right, with a regular season record of 11-2-1.

But as it turned out, the Raiders were the super team on that day, jumping out to a 16-0 halftime lead on their way to a 32-14 win.

I mention all of this today because major sporting events are extremely important to the participants, and they often remain in the memory banks of fans, sometimes even 40 years later.

In addition, the Super Bowl has become bigger than a sporting event, now established as a part of traditional Americana.

Four decades ago, many Oakland players contributed to their Super Bowl win.

Wide receiver Fred Biletnikoff was named the Most Valuable Player, Clarence Davis carried the football for 137 yards, and quarterback Ken Stabler provided solid and steady leadership at the helm.

Madden said he told his team afterwards, “We did it, and it’s forever. They can never take it away from you!”

Then he added, “I get shivers when I think about it to this day.”

Stabler, who died in 2015, always spoke very fondly of the Super Bowl win.

“I carry Super Bowl XI with me every day,” he once said, “and I get a great deal of joy out of sharing it in whatever way I can.”

The April 1977 issue of Football Digest commemorated the game with a cover photo of Oakland’s Davis running with the ball against Minnesota. The caption read, “Clarence Davis runs through the Vikings.”

The price on the cover was 75 cents but today it is about five bucks on Ebay.

Super Bowl moments will unfold again this Sunday and the memory of them will last for decades. That’s true whether we are talking about a former player or an impressionable ninth-grade kid.

Like I was in 1977.

DAVID WILSON, EDD, OF SPRINGDALE, IS A WRITER, CONSULTANT AND PRESENTER, WHO GREW UP IN ARKANSAS BUT WORKED 27 YEARS IN EDUCATION IN MISSOURI. YOU MAY E-MAIL HIM AT DWNOTES@HOTMAIL.COM. THE OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE THOSE OF THE AUTHOR.