The Best of One Bills Drive - Oct. 7, 1973

(Greg D. Tranter and Budd Bailey have written a book about the history of the football stadium in Orchard Park called "The Best of One Bills Drive." It is scheduled for publication by Reedy Press around October 15. The books covers the top 50 games played in the stadium's history from 1973 until January 2025. However, there are several other games that qualified as thrilling - but they couldn't crack the top 50. Those contests deserve to be remembered too, so we'll offer them in this space a couple of times per week during the season.)

                                      1       2       3       4       Final

Philadelphia (L, 0-3-1)      6       10     7       3       26

Buffalo (W, 3-1)                10     14     0       3       27

Scoring Summary:

Quarter – Team – Play

1 – Eagles – Dempsey 51-yard field goal

1 – Bills – Leypoldt 12-yard field goal

1 – Eagles – Dempsey 22-yard field goal

1 – Bills – Francis 101-yard kickoff return (Leypoldt kick)

2 – Bills – Ferguson 1-yard run (Leypoldt kick)

2 – Eagles – Gabriel 7-yard pass to Bulaich (Dempsey kick)

2 – Bills – Simpson 2-yard run (Leypoldt kick)

2 – Eagles – Dempsey 14-yard field goal

3 – Eagles – Gabriel 9-yard pass to Young (Dempsey kick)

4 – Eagles – Dempsey 19-yard field goal

4 – Bills – Leypoldt 47-yard field goal

Recap: It didn’t take the National Football League long to figure out that O.J. Simpson was on his way toward one of the great seasons in pro football history in 1973.

Simpson had set the bar quite high on opening day when he set the league record for rushing yards in a game with 250 against the New England Patriots. He followed that with 103 yards versus the Chargers and 123 against the Jets. That added up to 476 yards in three games, which translates to 158.6 yards per game. Multiply that number by a 14-game season, and Simpson was on pace to run for 2,221 yards.

That was considered an absurd number. The existing NFL record for running yardage in a season was a “mere” 1,863, set by the legendary Jim Brown. At the rate he was going, Simpson was threatening to demolish that record. He needed to average 126.1 yards per game for the rest of the season to set a new standard.

The numbers certainly caught the attention of Eagles’ coach, Mike McCormack. He had enough problems to consider with a team that had started the season 0-2-1. Now Philadelphia had to try, at least, to slow down Simpson a bit in Rich Stadium.

“If we could hold him under 100 yards, it would be an outstanding effort,” said McCormack, who was in his first year as an NFL coach. “Then again, his total yardage is academic. The thing is, if he gets 150 or 200 yards, he’s going to score some.”

Simpson and his new playpen, Rich Stadium, were two of the reasons why there was renewed excitement about the Bills early in the 1973 season. It didn’t hurt that the team was 2-1 after three games and looked as if it could be a contender for a playoff spot for the first time since 1966.

“Every game they play makes them better,” Bills head coach Lou Saban said. “As far as what might happen and where we fit in, I let time take care of that. I’ve been that route too many times.”

Saban had good reason to be cautious. The Eagles proved to be quite troublesome in a back-and-forth contest that came down to a pair of kicks.

The kickers took center stage right from the start of the contest, as Philadelphia’s Tom Dempsey kicked two field goals and Buffalo’s John Leypoldt had one. However, Dempsey’s kickoff after the second boot proved historic. Wallace Francis returned the ball 101 yards for a touchdown – a first in Rich Stadium history. It was the Bills’ first touchdown in stadium history.

“I usually go up the middle on a return like that,” Francis said. “But this time I looked up the sideline and saw room. When I got about midfield I saw I had only Tom Dempsey and Kermit Alexander to beat. I knew I could get by Dempsey and when I did, I gave Alexander a move to the inside. … As soon as that happened, I knew I was home free.”

That gave the Bills a boost, and they used that energy to take an 11-point lead on a short touchdown run by Joe Ferguson. Simpson’s two-yard run for a score offset an Eagles’ touchdown pass, but Dempsey’s third field goal of the half cut the Bills’ lead to 24-16 at intermission.

Buffalo’s offense couldn’t do much at the start of the second half. The Eagles weren’t much better, but they did score a touchdown on a pass from Roman Gabriel to Charlie Young. In the fourth quarter, Dempsey kicked yet another field goal and the Eagles were up 26-24.

Later in the period, Buffalo had a fourth-and-1 on the Eagles’ 40 with less than four minutes left. Even though the Bills had the world’s best running back on their side, Saban opted to go for the long field goal. A 47-yarder was no sure thing by 1973 standards, but Leypoldt kicked it through to give the Bills a one-point lead.

“I’m glad he had confidence in me,” the kicker said. “But he knows I haven’t missed too many this season, even in practice.”

But time remained on the clock, and Gabriel deftly moved the Eagles on a 59-yard drive. When he was done, there was time (three seconds) for one more field goal to be attempted. Dempsey’s try was only from 26 yards away – a near-certainty.

But he missed. The Bills escaped with the 27-26 win.

“I knew as soon as I kicked it that it was off,” Dempsey said. “I didn’t even bother to look. … I lined up too far to the right. I could have won the game but I blew it.”

“I thought I was going to block it,” defensive lineman Jerry Patton said. “That’s how close I got. And I knew he didn’t hit it right. Then I looked back and saw it miss by a couple feet. I wasn’t surprised.”

Even Leypoldt had some conflicting emotions while watching the kick miss its target.

“As a Buffalo Bill, I was glad to see him miss, of course,” he said. “But as a fellow place-kicker, I was sorry for him. I never like to see a place-kicker miss.”

The Eagles succeeded in their quest to not let Simpson beat them. O.J. ran for 171 yards on 27 carries – his sixth straight 100-yard day dating back to 1972. But his longest run of the day only went for 29 yards. That raised his season total to 647 yards. Meanwhile, Philadelphia pounded out 275 rushing yards on the day, with Tom Sullivan picking up 155 of them.

Good teams usually seem to have good fortune on their side at important times. Maybe that was happening to the 3-1 Bills.

“This is still a young team that needs a lot of encouragement – a lot,” Saban said. “Maybe it will be a lucky team.”

Noteworthy: Ferguson only threw nine passes on the day, as the Bills stuck to the running game when possible. He completed six of them for only 63 yards, and he was sacked twice. Ferguson did have four runs for a total of 25 yards. … The Bills only had 16 first downs. … Eagles receiver Ben Hawkins broke his left ankle on the last drive of the game and left the stadium via ambulance. That was his last appearance in a Philadelphia uniform. He signed with Cleveland in 1974, but played two games without making a catch. … This was the last game that Gerry Philbin played in Buffalo. The former University at Buffalo standout retired after the 1973 season. He is best known for starting on the 1968 Jets team that won the Super Bowl.

Legacy: Dempsey’s luck didn’t change when he arrived in Buffalo. In 1979, he missed a 34-yard field goal on the game’s last play that would have beaten the Miami Dolphins. Dempsey was released shortly after that and replaced by Nick Mike-Mayer.

Francis returned another kickoff for a touchdown on December 9 against the Patriots. He moved on to Atlanta after the 1974 season, and eventually became a regular for the Falcons as a wide receiver later in the 1970s.

McCormack picked up his first win as a head coach a week later, as the Eagles edged the Cardinals. But the team struggled throughout the rest of the season, finishing 5-8-1.

McCormack spent three seasons as Philadelphia’s head coach, and did not have a winning record in any of those years.