|
“FOOTBALL AT FENWAY”
|
FOOTBALL AT FENWAY November 13, 1966 ... Gino Cappelletti had one of his best games of his career, scoring 21 points in the Patriots' 27-21 victory over the Houston Oilers. The win, which turned into yet another cliffhanger in the closing moments allowed the Patriots to remain only 1/2 game behind the, league leading, Buffalo Bills who defeated the Jets to hold on to first place in the AFL East. The Oilers had a chance to knock off the Pats on the last play of the game, but Tom Hennessey knocked down the potential, game winning, touchdown pass on the Boston 5-yard line. Opposing quarterbacks, Babe Parilli and Don Trull, had a standoff with three touchdown passes each. Parilli pitched to Cappelletti for score of 63 and 31 yards, after finding Jim Whalen on a 42-yard bomb in the opening minutes of the game. Trull twice hit split end Charlie Frazier on long scoring passes and the other went to Lawrence Elkins. So it was that Cappelletti's field goals of 28 and 44 yards, provided the margin of victory. Cappy's 63-yard catch was the longest of his career and his 21 point afternoon moved him into the AFL's scoring lead with 84 points. At 3:18 of the first period, Jim Whalen gathered in a Parilli pass on the Houston 10 and went on to complete a 42-yard scoring play, giving the Pats a 7-0 lead. Trull brought Houston right back by finishing an 18 play, 78-yard drive, with a boot leg on fourth down and one to Elkins. In the second period, Cappy put the Patriots ahead with a 28-yard field goal. Back came Trull, escaping Patriot pass rushers to connect on a 42-yard touchdown pass to Frazier the gave Houston a 14-10 lead. The Oilers kept that lead for just 82 seconds, because the Patriots took the ball and maneuvered down to the Houston 37-yd line. From there Cappy outran Bernie Parish to the end zone to give the Pats a 17-14 lead. The half ended with Cappy connecting on a 44-yarder to give the Patriots a 20-14 halftime lead.
When the second half got underway, Cappy was still hot. On the Patriots' first drive, he made a great over-the-shoulder grab at the right flag of the goal line to put his team up 27-14. The game, at that point, was turned over to the defense and the Pats' front four did such a good job harassing Trull that defensive tackle Jim Lee Hunt was awarded the game ball. Until the last two minutes the Pats seemed to have locked an easy victory. But suddenly, Trull evaded several tacklers, spotted Frazier streaking into the open on the left sideline near the Boston bench and him on a scoring play that covered 53 yards. Houston got the ball back with just 47 seconds left, but Trull's last pass was batted down by Hennessey to avert a disaster. |
.jpg)
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
