Official Website
Montreal • Canada
Sports Hall of Fame Inductee
1972 Football Team
Inducted in 2004 as a Team
Institution: Loyola
The 1972 Loyola Warriors Football team
was a young group that surprised everyone with an impressive campaign
culminating in a historic national semifinal appearance.
After struggling through preseason losses to the Carleton Ravens and Saint Mary's Huskies, the critics were harsh.
But the Warriors rolled through the regular season with a 5-1 win-loss record,
including a 46-28 victory over the McGill Redmen. According to the Loyola News,
this marked the first time a Loyola football team had ever beaten McGill.
In the QUAA championship game, Loyola defeated the Macdonald Clansmen 50-6 to
earn a berth in the Prairie Bowl, a national semifinal game versus the University
of Alberta Bears in Edmonton on Nov. 18. Despite a valiant effort, the Warriors
lost 58-6 to the bigger, stronger Alberta Bears on a day that dawned cold and
gray. Initially it was a fierce battle that saw Alberta eke out a 14-3 lead at
halftime. Loyola narrowed the score to 14-6 in the third quarter, but the Bears
eventually took over the momentum of the game.
In writing about the 1972 Loyola Warriors'
accomplishments, a Loyola News columnist credited this team with moving
football out of the dark shadows of hockey and pronounced it could no longer be
viewed as a secondary sport.
