1966 Season AFL All-Star Game

The 1966 Season
American Football League
ALL-STAR GAME

AFL

East 30

West 23

January 21, 1967
Oakland Coliseum

The 1966 season was glorious for the fledgling AFL. It had forced the NFL to merge with it. The first AFL-NFL World Championship game had been played and the AFL All-Star Game was held at Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, CA. Although the league was young, many of its players were storied veterans of Professional Football. The 1967 All-Star Game belonged to one such veteran, Vito “Babe” Parilli of the Boston Patriots. It rained four inches in Oakland in the 24 hours before the game, turning the field into a swamp and making for exciting, if not sloppy, play for the 17,876 in attendance. The format of the game was returned to the old East-West format for 1967. The coaches for the game were John Rauch of Oakland for the West and Boston’s Mike Holovak for the East.
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Early in the first period, Bobby Bell of Kansas City hit Paul Costa of Buffalo after a reception and Costa fumbled. The Chiefs’ E.J. Holub recovered on the East 31. From there, Len Dawson of the Chiefs found his K.C. teammate, Curtis McClinton alone at the eight yard line. McClinton took it in on a play that covered 31 yards. Moments later with Parilli back to punt, center Jon Morris of Boston snapped the ball over Babe’s head and into a puddle in the endzone resulting in a safety. The score was 9-0 at the end of the first period. Early in the second period, Boston’s Gino Cappelletti was short on a long field goal. Speedy Duncan of San Diego returned the kick 64 yards down the sideline only to fumble, which was recovered by Larry Grantham of the Jets. Later in the second period, Tom Flores of Oakland hit his Raider teammate, Hewitt Dixon for 28 yards and then 17 for a touchdown to move the score to 16-0.


	As I've noted previously, starting with the 1961 AFL season, the league's all-star games were played after each season, with the All-Star players from that season. So the game played by the 1966 AFL All-Stars was played in January 1967. The game ticket says only "American Football League All-Star Game", but the pennant reads "AFL All Star Game 1967."

Early in the third period, Dawson was dumped for a safety in the endzone. But, the West came back again a moment later when K.C.‘s Buck Buchanan recovered Buffalo quarterback Jack Kemp’s fumble and, led by the blocking of Oakland’s Ben Davidson and Ike Lassiter, roared into the endzone with the 39 yard return. The score was a seemingly insurmountable 23-2. But, the East responded when New York’s Verlon Biggs picked off a Dawson pass a returned it 50 yards for a touchdown. Seconds later, Oakland’s Clem Daniels fumbled and Miami’s Ed Cooke recovered at the West 23. Parilli hit Wray Carlton of Buffalo with a 4 yard touchdown pass two plays later and the score suddenly was 23-16 after three quarters. The momentum had turned. On the opening play of the fourth quarter, the Broncos’ Bob Scarpitto dropped to punt deep in his own territory. But, the punt was accidentally blocked by his own teammate, E.J. Holub’s long raised arm. The East recovered at the twelve and rookie of the year, Bobby Burnett of Buffalo, raced around right end to tie the game at 23-23. Late in the fourth, Parilli drove the East toward the winning touchdown when he hit Cappelletti for 28 yards, Burnett for 4 yards and, finally, Houston’s Charley Frazier for 17 yards and the winning score. The final was East 30, West 23. . The East had finally won after five tries. Parilli was named offensive MVP and Biggs received the defensive honors. The cold, rainy day in Oakland provided a backdrop for one of the most exciting of the AFL classics.

Oakland's Clem Daniels trudges through the rain.

Jack Kemp unleashes pass as defender approaches in cloud of water.

AFL All-Star Squads (to be added)
1966	West Squad	East Squad

SUMMARIES OF EACH AFL ALL-STAR GAME

        The American Football League did not play an All-Star game after its first season in 1960, but did stage All-Star games for the 1961 through 1969 seasons. All-Star teams from the Eastern and Western divisions played each other after every season except 1965. That season, the league champion Buffalo Bills played against a team made up of all-stars from the other teams.
        Because the games were played at the end of the season, they occurred in the next calendar year. Thus, the 1961 AFL All-Star game (with players selected as all-stars for the 1961 season) was played on January 7, 1962; the 1962 game was played in January 1963, etc.
         The links below will take you to summaries of each game, originally created by Mark Bolding. Most of the content of this and the other AFL All-Star Games was retrieved from the 'Internet Archive Wayback Machine' at archive.org/web/web.php, which claims copyright for the work.
         *Other than the final score and the image of the game program, his summary of the 1964 season all-star game incorrectly gave the report of the previous year's game.
         Bolding's original site classified the games by the calendar year they were played in. Since they were played at the end of AFL seasons and the All-Stars involved were so chosen for their play in those seasons, I classify them by the AFL season which they represented. Thus the AFL All-Star Game that featured stars of the 1961 season was played in January 1962, etc.

1961 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 7, 1962	'Wayback' link
1962 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 13, 1963	'Wayback' link
1963 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 19, 1964	'Wayback' link
1964 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 16, 1965	*'Wayback' link
1965 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 15, 1966	'Wayback' link
1966 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 21, 1967	'Wayback' link
1967 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 21, 1968	'Wayback' link
1968 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 19, 1969	'Wayback' link
1969 Season AFL All-Star Game:	January 17, 1970	'Wayback' link

Perhaps the greatest highlight of AFL All-Star Game history came not on the field of play, but in the actions of black players, supported by their white teammates and owners, when the best players in the AFL boycotted the City of New Orleans because of the disrespect black players were given when they arrived there for the scheduled 1964 season AFL All-Star Game, scheduled for January 1965.
The game was moved to Houston in a seminal action in the early civil rights movement in America. It is still recognized as such, as recently as a March, 2007 article by Evan Weiner on MSNBC. Another description of the incident is at my AFL Clippings page.

AFLdotcom

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