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The 1970s started out pretty well for the Calgary Stampeders, with back-to-back appearances in the Grey Cup and one championship.
The decade also ended nicely as Jack Gotta guided the club to a 21-8-3 record over the 1978 and 1979 campaigns. In between? Uh, did we mention how great things were at the start and at the end of the ’70s?
On a team level, there were some lean times from 1972-1977 as the Red and White suffered through six consecutive double-digit-loss seasons. But that hardly means there weren’t some dandy individual efforts.
Start with Willie Burden, who in 1975 turned in arguably the best-ever season by a Canadian Football League running back. He established a league record with 1,896 rushing yards that season and while Mike Pringle later broke the mark (albeit in an 18-game season) Burden still holds the record with an astounding average of 118.5 yards per game.
For his accomplishments, Burden was named the CFL’s Most Oustanding player, one of just five Calgary players to capture that coveted award.
On the other side of the ball, John Helton was a dominant force. We’re talking nine-time division all-star and seven-time all-Canadian dominance. Big John was named the CFL’s top lineman in 1972 and the league’s Most Outstanding Defensive Player in 1974.
Burden and Helton were two of the six future Canadian Football Hall-of-Famers to suit up for the Stampeders during the decade, the others being Wayne Harris, Herm Harrison, Jerry Keeling and Larry Robinson.
Multiple all-stars in the 1970s for the Red and White included the likes of Frank Andruski, Granny Liggins, Tom Forzani, Lloyd Fairbanks, Terry Irvin and Reggie Lewis. At the end of the decade, two of the greatest running backs in franchise history shared space in the same backfield as Burden teamed with James Sykes.
Two Stampeders players from the 1970s would later coach the Red and White — Tom Higgins and current head coach/general manager John Hufnagel.
Joining Hufnagel as present-day links to the ’70s are John Forzani and Bob Viccars, former players now part of the ownership group, Stan Schwartz, who joined the team as an assistant coach in 1976 and now serves as executive vice-president and consultant to the executive committee, and long-time equipment manager George Hopkins. In addition, Basil Bark — a West all-star on the 1971 Grey Cup team — now owns the Stamps’ Store at McMahon Stadium.
And let’s not forget that Ralph the Dog joined the club in 1974 and has been entertaining Stampeders fans of all ages ever since.
On the field, it was — as previously mentioned — a period of wild fluctuations. After losing 23-10 to Montreal in the 1970 Grey Cup, the Stampeders returned to the title game the following year and this time came out on top, downing the Toronto Argonauts 14-11 at Vancouver’s Empire Stadium.
Although Calgary wound up falling a little short in 1970, that year featured one of the most memorable moments in franchise history. The Stamps, who were 9-7 during the regular season, upset the 14-2 Saskatchewan Roughriders in the best-of-three West final. Calgary won the clinching game 15-14 when Robinson booted a 32-yard field goal into a driving wind at Regina’s Taylor Field.
Then came the first of four straight 6-10 seasons, which was interrupted only by an even worse 2-12-2 mark in 1976. Gotta arrived in 1977 and after a 4-12 season during his first year on the job, the Stamps improved to 9-4-3 in 1978 and 12-4 in 1979.
The fly in the ointment to the Stamps’ resurgence was that it coincided with the Edmonton Eskimos dynasty. Calgary won West semifinal games in 1978 and 1979 — defeating Winnipeg the first year and BC the second — but fell to the Esks in the West final in both seasons.