Rex Kern quarterbacked the 1968 Ohio State Buckeyes to the national title. James Street quarterbacked the Texas Longhorns to the 1969 national title.
Kern was a part of the majorly talented 1967 recruiting class by Ohio State that came to be known as the Super Sophomores.
Street was not a part of the Texas recruiting class of 1967 that came to be known as the Worster Bunch. He was a year ahead, but he was their quarterback for the 1968 and 1969 seasons. In 1970, the Longhorns had to use the quarterback from the Worster Bunch class, Eddie Phillips.
Rex Kern was a recruiting gem for the Buckeyes and he probably fell into their laps without a lot of real effort. Most Ohio kids grow up wanting to be a Buckeye and Kern was from Lancaster, Ohio.
The small town of Lancaster is just down the road from Columbus and about a 40 minute drive. The son of a barber, Kern was Mr Everything in high school.
He was a three sport star in high school and everyone knows the quarterback is kind of the king of the school. But, Kern was also the star basketball player as the point guard and a star baseball player. Even though he was drafted by the Kansas City A’s for baseball, Kern wanted to play football and basketball in college and he wanted to play at Ohio State.
Before John Wooden and UCLA had dominated college basketball like no other team in the history of the game, the Ohio State Buckeyes won the national title in 1960. Featuring such players as John Havlicek and Jerry Lucas, the Buckeyes raced out to a 25-3 record and a convincing win over California in the Final Four to win it all. Legendary Indiana coach Bobby Knight was a back up on that team.
Kern was a Buckeye fan and was recruited hard by Ohio State basketball coach Fred Taylor. Wooden from UCLA wanted Kern to play point guard for the Bruins’ basketball machine. Dean Smith of North Carolina also wanted Kern, so he was very highly sought after.
But, Buckeye football coach Woody Hayes also wanted Kern and really badly. Kern could be the crown jewel of a really good recruiting class and might actually save Woody’s job. Ohio State fans were growing restless with Hayes’ recent lack of success. 6-3 records were not gong to get it done at Ohio State and the fans made no secret of that. Rex Kern was a much needed recruit for Woody Hayes and Ohio State.
A year earlier and much further south, James Street was the quarterback of his Longview Lobo high school team. Longview was in a really tough district when Street was their quarterback. He wasn’t
overly big, at about 5-11, 175, and he wasn’t overly talented with supposed average arm strength. His junior and senior seasons saw the Lobos finish with a very mediocre 5-5 record.
Texarkana won the district championship during Street’s senior season of 1965 behind the talents of quarterback Joe Norwood. Some that saw Norwood play in high school said that he was the best quarterback they had ever seen. Texarkana went three rounds deep in the playoffs before losing to eventual state champions Odessa Permian.
Norwood went to the playoffs and James Street moved on to basketball. But, it was baseball that displayed the talents of James Street, possibly the most. He was one of the best pitchers around, but again, that size thing probably cost him. The majors like a tall pitcher, generally.
Both James Street and Joe Norwood signed to play football with the University of Texas in the class of 1966. Street was not highly recruited at all, and probably few schools were even interested in his services as a quarterback. Norwood was the guy that everyone wanted.
Street also had a tough childhood. His father left them when he was young, and he had to work part time growing up just to put food on the table.
When he arrived in Austin, James Street was the 7th team quarterback. A lot of guys would have quit, but Street was not like a lot of guys. Some people just have that ‘it’ factor, and James Street definitely had ‘it’. Whatever ‘it’ is, nobody knows exactly, and if we did, we would all have ‘it’.
By his first year of eligibility, Street was Bill Bradley’s primary back up at quarterback. Joe Norwood, it’s said, found 6th street and barely hung on. He eventually just disappeared altogether into the pages of history. James Street lived on into legendary status.
The 1968 season was the year of the Super Sophomores at Ohio State. Rex Kern, and company, went unbeaten finishing at home with a big victory over rival, Michigan. They beat the Wolverines viciously and went for 2 after they had just scored 50 points. That decision will come back into our story later as the Wolverines were so incensed that they fired their fairly good coach, Bump Elliott, and hired Bo Schembechler.
Ohio State was ranked number 2 at the end of the year and faced top ranked and defending national champion USC in the Rose Bowl. The Trojans were led by unstoppable Heisman Trophy winning tailback, OJ Simpson and were the favorites over the young Buckeyes who had 14 sophomores in
their starting lineup. That was alright, because those sophomores just happened to be the famous Super Sophomores and they arose to beat the Trojans and Ohio State captured the 1968 national championship.
I’m fairly confident that the media had labeled the Trojans as the best ever and called them unbeatable, right before they were beaten by the Buckeyes.
Down at Texas, James Street finally got his shot in the second game of the 1968 season. The Longhorns had opened up with a really good Houston team and tied them, 20-20. They were losing big to Texas Tech in Lubbock when Texas head coach Darrel Royal had seen enough. Texas was credited with the invention of the Wishbone offense and quarterback Bill Bradley just wasn’t getting it done. The Wishbone offense is for another post, but Bradley just could not run the option attack. Royal supposedly said ‘hell, you can’t do any worse’ to James Street when he inserted him into the game. Bradley moved to defensive back and was later an All Pro safety with the Philadelphia Eagles.
With Tech winning big, Street led the Horns on a come back. Street led them to 22 points, but they still fell just a little short, 22-31. This brand new offense with things supposedly going to be better, and the wolves were howling for Darrel Royal’s head with an 0-1-1 record to start the season. That, after 3 disappointing seasons in a row.
Like the Ohio State Buckeyes, the Texas Longhorns had signed a super class led by everybody’s All American, fullback Steve Worster. After a lackluster beginning, this other group of outstanding sophomores, went to work. It would be sacrilege to call them the Super Sophomores also, but they were super in their own right. They were the Worster Bunch and they posted their own impressive 30-2-1 record opposed to the Buckeye’s Super Sophomore 27-2 three year record.
With James Street in the lineup, the Longhorns went on a roll. While he wasn’t as good at running that option attack as others would be later, at the time, Street was almost unstoppable.
They had close games with Oklahoma and Arkansas, but ran all over the rest of their opponents including the Aggies who had upset them the year before in College Station.
In the Cotton Bowl, Texas thrashed Tennessee, 36-13 to finish the season with a 9-1-1 ranking and the 5th position in the polls.
In Ohio, Rex Kern and the Buckeyes were the talk of the nation.
Going into the 1969 season, the Buckeyes were ranked number one and the talk in the media back
then was they were the best team ever. Of course, the media tells us that every season that this team, or that one, is the best ever. But, this group of Buckeyes were great. The Super Sophomore class had matured and they were now juniors and Ohio State was on their way to another national title.
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Ohio State just steamrolled TCU, 62-0, and then beat up a really bad Washington, 41-14. By the time they faced 19th ranked Michigan State in game 3, they were averaging over 50 points a game on offense. With conservative head coach Woody Hayes running the show, that’s a lot of points. The Spartans were overrated, but Ohio State had a hand in that by crushing them, 54-21.
They beat 4 conference foes rather convincingly going over 60 points again against Wisconsin. 10th ranked Purdue stood in their way before they battered old foe Michigan again and Purdue often gave Ohio State problems. Not this time, as Ohio State destroyed a really good Boilermaker team, 42-14.
Michigan was up next and the Wolverines were ranked 12th. Michigan started slowly with losses to a really good Missouri team and then against in state rival Michigan State. The experts all agreed that they would be no problem for the super Buckeye team that was beating teams by the average score of 46-8.
It didn’t work out all that well for the Buckeyes.
At the time, it was called the upset of the century. Michigan led 24-12 at half time, and the final score was the same. Michigan had gained their revenge and a lot of people pointed to the 50 points that Ohio State scored on them and Woody electing to go for 2 points on the extra point. One of the more interesting events in all of college football history had begun. It was the time of the 10 Year War, the best period of the Michigan vs Ohio State history.
Down south, again, the Longhorns had begun the 1969 season ranked 4th. But, big wins over California, Texas Tech and Navy dropped them to number 2 in the polls following only the mighty Buckeyes.
Texas had gained a little revenge of their own by drop kicking Texas Tech, 49-7. The Red Raiders had been the only team to beat them in 1968, and like today, they often gave the Longhorns problems.
The Wishbone was up and running and in this early phase of the game, it was extremely hard to stop. Schools weren’t used to playing this type of an offense yet.
Oklahoma, with Heisman Trophy winning running back Steve Owens, gave the Longhorns a hard time before Texas prevailed, 27-17.
The Longhorns just gored the rest of their schedule and after beating TCU, 69-7, they had an open date.
These were vastly different times in the 1960s. They only televised one game per week which was on ABC and the Ohio State vs. Michigan game was not on the air. Texas players, coaches and fans were not expecting anything out of the game, mostly just believing Ohio State would easily win.
The news of the upset came as a huge shock for Texas and caused a huge celebration in Austin.
Texas was now number one and all they needed to do was beat rivals Texas A%M and Arkansas. No big deal, right?
They plowed the farmers of College Station, 49-12, and now another game of the century awaited.
Some brilliant mind at ABC decided they should move the Texas at Arkansas game to the end of the season and put it on national television. Everything just happened to fall into place for the network and for Texas, incredibly so.
Texas was unbeaten and ranked number 1 and Arkansas was also unbeaten and ranked number 2.
It wasn’t called the Game of the Century, but instead it was the Big Shootout.
The buildup was unbelievable and huge college football fan President Richard Nixon was also in
attendance.
The Big Shootout deserves it’s own blog post, but Texas came back from a 14 point deficit to win, 15-14. President Nixon came into the celebrating Texas locker room and awarded James Street with the national championship trophy which angered Joe Paterno and Penn State.
It was a long touchdown run by James Street and a clutch pass on 4th and about 3 that saved the day for the Horns.
None of this would have even been important if not for the Michigan upset of Ohio State.
Ohio State didn’t even get to go to a bowl game in 1969 because of a silly rule back in the day allowing only the champion of the Big 10 to go to a bowl.
Texas, meanwhile, earned the Cotton Bowl berth and this one was going to be special because mighty Notre Dame was breaking a 50 year ban on bowl games and had agreed to play Texas for all the marbles.
James Street came through again in a clutch situation as the Longhorns came from behind again and beat the Fighting Irish, 21-17.
Rex Kern and his Buckeyes were national champions in 1968. James Street and his Longhorns were national champions in 1969. Kern was a junior in 1969 and Street was a senior. Kern was 27-2 as a starter and Street was 20-0.
Kern meant to play basketball, but things didn’t work out. Street was a 3 time All SWC pitcher in baseball. The similarities between the two programs during this period is uncanny.
Just don’t ask me who was better between the 1969 Texas Longhorns and the Ohio State Buckeyes. I won’t answer that question.