Sunday, Dec. 3
Jeppesen Stadium, Houston
Oilers 33, Chargers 13

By Anthony Holden
CBS SportsLine Historian
As the glow of a superb 33-13 waxing of previously unbeaten San Diego washed over him, Houston quarterback George Blanda was asked about the Chargers mammoth defensive line, nicknamed the Fearsome Foursome.

"They weren't very fearsome out there today, huh," Blanda said.

The Chargers front wall of Ernie Ladd, Earl Faison, Ron Nery and Bill Hudson -- part of an intimidating San Diego defense that had helped key 11 straight victories heading into this showdown with the Oilers -- was completely neutralized by a fired-up Oilers team hell-bent on revenge.

Defensive standout Ernie Ladd, who went on to become a fixture in pro wrestling for two decades, and his teammates were unable to stop the Oilers. (AP)

"The only thing I did right today was congratulate them on a good game," said Ladd, the 315-pound mountain. "They sure beat me down."

The Oilers had defeated the Chargers in the first AFL Championship Game the year before, but San Diego had dealt Houston a 34-24 defeat earlier in the 1961 season during a period when the Oilers started 1-3-1.

Head coach Lou Rymkus was fired and replaced by defensive coordinator Wally Lemm, and since then, the Oilers had won six in a row as they prepared to host the Chargers. During the week leading up to the game, Lemm recognized two things: His team was hyped up, and defeat was not going to be an option.

"They were tight and tense before the game," said Lemm. "I knew it and I tried to relax them. But they wanted to win so bad. They wanted to win and they wouldn't settle for less."

San Diego entered the game having allowed just 135 points and only two teams -- Houston and Boston -- had managed to break into the 20s. In winning 11 in a row to start the season, the Chargers had rarely been tested, as their closest game was a 19-16 victory at Denver.

Meanwhile, Houston had opened the year with a 55-0 win over Oakland, then lost in succession to San Diego, Dallas and Buffalo and tied Boston, costing Rymkus his job. Lemm stepped in, and his mellow demeanor was in stark contrast to Rymkus' hard-driving style, and the Oilers responded likes flowers to water. In winning six straight, the high-powered Blanda-led offense averaged 40.3 points per game.

In what was supposed to be a classic struggle between the best offense in the AFL against the best defense, the best offense won in a romp. Blanda threw four touchdown passes, kicked an AFL-record 55-yard field goal, and the largest crowd to date in AFL history -- 37,845 -- loved every minute of it.

"It was a tremendous team effort," said Lemm. "Our kids came to play."

San Diego quarterback Jack Kemp threw a 10-yard TD pass to Don Norton in the first quarter a couple plays after Hudson had recovered an Oiler fumble by Charley Tolar. It was all downhill from there for San Diego.

On the next possession, Blanda fired a 49-yard completion to John White - who was playing in place of injured Bill Groman - and that set up his short TD toss to Bob McLeod. Blanda's conversion was blocked, but it mattered little when he hit Charley Hennigan with a 31-yard TD pass later in the first quarter for a 13-7 lead. Hennigan wound up catching 10 passes for 216 yards, raising his season total to a 1,541 yards, a new pro football record, surpassing the mark set in 1951 by Crazy Legs Hirsch of the Los Angeles Rams. Hennigan finished the season with a league-leading 1,746 yards on 82 catches for a 21.3 avg. with 12 touchdowns.

After Blanda kicked a pair of field goals in the second quarter for a 20-7 halftime lead, he put the game out of reach in the third with 15- and 22-yard TD passes to Hennigan. On both TDs, Hennigan beat star San Diego cornerback Charlie McNeil who came into the game with a league-best nine interceptions. Another Kemp-to-Norton TD pass wrapped up the scoring in the final period.

Blanda, who had four passes intercepted in the first game against San Diego, finished with 331 yards passing while his counterpart, Kemp, had three passes picked off.

The victory enabled Houston to remain one game ahead of Boston, and victories over New York and Houston in the next two weeks clinched the Oilers' second straight Eastern Division crown.