The 2025 Grey Cup game in Winnipeg is still one month away but when it arrives it’ll mark the 50th anniversary of one of the quirkiest CFL championship contests in the 112-year history of the oldest professional gridiron chalice in North America.
Fifty years ago, the 1975 Grey Cup featured a rematch between the Western Conference champion Edmonton Eskimos (now Elks) and the Eastern Conference titlist Montreal Alouettes. One year earlier, at old Empire Stadium in Vancouver, the Als defeated the Eskies 20-7.
In ’75, playing in Calgary, the Green and Gold of Edmonton were out for revenge. And, they got it.
Below-zero temperatures and a teeth-chattering wind made for less-than-ideal playing conditions at McMahon Stadium where the Eskimos and Alouettes combined for a whopping total of 17 points. A fourth-quarter missed field goal by Edmonton kicker Dave Cutler turned into a single for the only points of the final frame, lifting the Eskimos to a 9-8 victory.
Let’s put it this way. You had to be a diehard CFL fan to enjoy this contest.
The game stands today as the only Grey Cup final where all of the total points were accounted for by just two players. Both kickers. Don Sweet for Montreal and Cutler booting for Edmonton. (Cutler, by the way, earned Game MVP honours.)
It’s also the only Grey Cup on record with all points coming from Canadians — Cutler, hailing from Biggar, SK; and Sweet, a native of Vancouver. Cutler would go on to record the most career Grey Cup points (72) of any player in CFL history while Sweet still holds the CFL record for most points (23) in a single Grey Cup contest.
Of note, especially for local fans of the NFL Buffalo Bills, is the fact that Marv Levy was head coach of the Alouettes. Levy, who turned 100 in August, won two Grey Cup titles in five years at the helm in Montreal, eventually taking over the Bills in 1987 and guiding them to a record four straight Super Bowl games (all, alas, losses) from 1990-93.
The ’75 Grey Cup was the first-ever played on the Prairies where fans ignored the wicked weather and packed more than 32,000 bodies into McMahon Stadium. And, at least one body came uncovered when a female streaker interrupted the pre-game coin toss.
Edmonton and Montreal would meet again two years later in the 1977 Grey Cup game at Olympic Stadium where the hometown Als were 41-6 victors. After that, the Eskimos went on a Grey Cup rampage, capturing the CFL playoff championship five consecutive times from ’78-82.
Interestingly, Edmonton did not host a Grey Cup game until 1984 at Commonwealth Stadium where more than 60,000 watched the Winnipeg Blue Bombers defeat the Hamilton Tiger-Cats 47-17. Calgary didn’t get the Big Game again until 1993.
NEED TO KNOW: Kingston (1922) and Sarnia (1933) are the only two non-CFL cities to ever host a Grey Cup final.
(PAUL SVOBODA)
