Blue White Illustrated

H I S T O R Y Book," the Penn State coach recalled a meeting he had set up with five of the African American players prior to the team meeting on the bowl invitations. "This was at the peak of the civil rights awareness," Paterno wrote. "They didn't want to go to the Cotton Bowl. More specifically they didn't want to go to Dal- las, where John F. Kennedy had been shot. Six years after that terrible shock, Dallas still stirred horror in many Americans. The revulsion seemed particularly strong among young black people who linked gun-loving Dallas with the lingering racism that had once been taken for granted throughout the South." As the Nittany Lions gathered on the morning of Nov. 15 to play woeful Mary- land at Beaver Stadium, The New York Times published an article by Gordon White that said both the Orange and Cot- ton bowls had zeroed in on Penn State. White, who had covered many Penn State games in '68 and '69, reported that Pa- terno and Tennessee coach Doug Dickey had talked about meeting in the Orange Bowl if both teams stayed unbeaten. "It might be a safe assumption that Ten- nessee and Penn State are pretty much a package deal for here," an Orange Bowl official told White. White also reported that a Cotton Bowl representative would stay over in State College to personally offer PSU officials an invitation at noon Monday. That was the time designated by the NCAA that all the bowls could officially formalize their invitations. It was a way for the bowl committees to avoid embar- rassment if their first or subsequent choices spurned them. The teams would first announce acceptance of the invita- tion and then the invitation would actu- ally be made. Everyone played the game. Penn State beat Maryland, 48-0, that afternoon before 46,106 fans in the cold wind and snow of Beaver Stadium. Pa- terno waited until the usual Sunday postgame team meeting to discuss the "tentative" invitations from the Cotton, Sugar and Orange bowls. The Orange Bowl had lost its potential Penn State matchup with Tennessee be- cause No. 18 Mississippi had upset the No. 3 Volunteers, 38-0, in Oxford. Mean- while, the Sugar Bowl stepped up and in- vited the Nittany Lions to play the Southeastern Conference champion in New Orleans. A chance for the national title looked dim. That same Saturday afternoon, de- fending champion Ohio State had wal- loped 10th-ranked Purdue, 42-14, in Columbus, marking the eighth consecu- tive game in which the margin of victory for the seemingly invincible Buckeyes was 17 points or more. All that was left was the unparalleled rivalry game at Ann Arbor against a Michigan team that had lost twice in early October before winning four in a row. Paterno had always been vocal about wanting his team to play the highest- rated opponents it could find, especially in the postseason. In that regard, the Cot- ton Bowl offered the best deal, a game for the then-No. 4 Lions against either top- 10 Texas or Arkansas, who would play for LION LEADER Pittman was an influential voice in the decision to at- tend the Or- ange Bowl. Photo cour- tesy of the Pattee & Pa- terno Library Archives

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