Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 33

THE LIONS' 1957 FIGHT SONG: 'Oh, on Beca use We Won We more at Briggs Stadium. They trailed at halftime by 17 points in that one but won by four. They were blanked by the Chicago Bears just one week ago and were behind, 10 to 0, at the intermission before they came on behind Tobin Rote to pull it out by eight. THAT WAS THE COMEBACK victory which put them into the playoff out here with the 49ers. They utilized the same chilling pattern to come out of their 13th game with their biggest triumph.

"What can you say about a team like this one except to say it is just the greatest," bubbled George Wilson, a divisional champion in his first season as head coach. "It never gave up. Quit? These guys don't even' know what the word means They proved it. Stunned by balding Y. A.

Tittle's three first-half touchdown passes, and trailing, 24 to 7, at the halfway mark, they fell 20 full points behind on a BY L.YALL, SMITH Five Press Sport Editor SAN FRANCISCO They won because they wouldn't lose that's the way it was as the do-or-die Lions did it. They burned the heart out of the San Francisco 49ers and 60,118 of their fans with their second-half heroics. And they must've burned the picture tubes out of umpteen million TV sets all over the land as they picked themselves out of a 27-7 hole in hostile Kezar Stadium to win another squeaker, 31 to 27. OX IT KODE the Western Division championship, and no team ever deserved it more than this pack of Lions. Their season has been a hectic one.

Their head coach walked out on them two days before their first game. "Worst team I ever had," he said. "I can't do anything with it." It picked itself up from there. It won more than its share of games the hard way. Like the one with Balti Gordie Soltau field goal after 2:22 of the second half.

There were jeers when the 49ers went for those three points. The situation was fourth down on the Detroit three-yard line after Hugh McElhenny had sped 71 yards to set up the play. "Go for it," yelled the crowd. But the 49ers, acting on orders from their bench, went for three instead of trying for the full count of seven. They got the three.

They could have used the others. For after that, they ran into a charged-up gang of Detroit dynamiters. The Lions were out to get hold of the football. They got it. First when Tittle fumbled on his own 27.

In nine plays, Tom Tracy had bumped over from close range. Now it was 27-14. BUT was more. The 49ers couldn't gain anything after the kickoff. They punted out to the Lions' 42.

Then it was Tracy again. He was handed the ball on the first play. He went all the way and therein lies a story. Tracy, whose feats still are jf I 1 i I As I i0 Xs 1 tiff- i 4 4- jr 1 'A' 1 fit' i Wj "i a i I- I i a Su- y- legend at Birmingham High, had been nothing more than a forgotten man all season for the Lions. He hadn't' been called on to cnrry the ball once in the last fur games of the season.

For the entire 12-game season, he had grabbed the football 16 times and carried it for an insignificant total of just 46 yards. But he carried it 11 times Turn to Page 3i, Column 1 4 1 1 1 1 1 THAT MAX AGAIN R. C. Owens, who caught a touchdown pass to beat Ihe Lions on their first trip to San Francisco, got the 49ers off to a good start Sunday. Here he evades Lion Jim David (25) to catch Y.

A. Tittle's pass to register the 49ers' first touchdown. Owens' effort wasn't enough this time, however. The Lions came back to win the game. Lion Fans: Here's Setup on Tickets The line will form Monday for tickets to the Lions' championship game with the Cleveland Browns at Briggs Sta-Stadium next Sunday.

But only if you are a season! That will leave 9,929 seats TV BLOOPER Paul Scouts Wrong Team CLEVELAND (IB Paul Brown, head coach of the Cleveland Browns whose charges meet the Detroit Lions for the National Football League championship next week, admitted he "scouted the wrong team" while watching a telecast of the Lion-49er game on television here Sunday. "I was watching it on television at my home here," Brown commented. "And I know I scouted the wrong team for a good part of the afternoon. "We're not surprised that the Lions won. It was a stirring contest, and the Lions wear very well because they're seasoned to this sort of thing." ticket holder! i for ueneral sale Fridav, with a limit of four to a customer.

From Monday through Thurs day (including- a full day Christ- All sales will be at the Lions' mael coaenn 1 1 Lr rmlnorc 1 office, 1401 Michigan Ave. Seats be allowed to buy their regular been scaIedfefrom for AP Wirpphoto; Special to Fre Preg Lions' Great Joe Schmidt Kuns Intercepted Tass Back to 49er Two-Yard Line in Last Quarter scats xui: cue ciiiimpiun- ship game. What is left will go on sale Friday and it won't be many. upper deck boxes to $4 for bleachers. No standing: room will be sold, under orders of commissioner Bert Bell.

WILSON, SF COACH AGREE: THE LIONS sold 39,844 tickets this year, and pre '49ers Did Riff lit Thins sumably they will be taken up Turnabout INDIANAPOLIS Lloyd McKee and Al Viskelia poked in Indianapolis goals in the last 2'i minutes Sunday and the International Hockey League last-place team beat Cincinnati's leaders, 3 to 2. Satvchuh Blanks Chicago It's Red Wings 3rd in Rom 2-0 for the title game. Of the rest, the Browns will get 2,842 and 200 will go to the commissioner's office and the National Broadcasting which will televise the game. In Going for Field Goal 33 Monday, Decemby 23, 1957 Y. A.

Tittle, the 49ers' quarter SAN FRANCISCO Grand- jment, full credit for the Lions stand coaches may not aeree, victory. back, broke down in the second half "and the Lions got to him pretty hard." Wilson wouldn't stick his neck out concerning next week's showdown with the Cleveland Browns at Briggs Stadium. "We beat 'ejn once and we're hoping to do it again," he said. "In fact, we've been aiming at next week ever since last July. "But the Browns are always tough.

You can count on that." SMITH "One of his finest games," he said of Rote. As. for the Lions' slow start, Wilson commented: "We seemed wound up too tight in the first half." Albert had one word for the Lions "solid." "AVe made too many mistakes," he added. "Detroit Is a real solid club and Rote did a good job, a real good clutch job." Albert said the protection for but the rival coaches said that the San Francisco 49ers made the right move with their third-period field goal against the Lions in their playoff game here Sunday. The 49ers were leading, 24 to 7, when Hugh McElhenny dashed 71 yards to the Lions' P-yard line.

Three plays later, with the ball on the 3, San Francisco settled for a field goal instead of trying for a touchdown. Mathematically, at least, it was a decision which may have prevented a sudden-death finish nince the Lions came on to win, 31 to 27. BY MARSHALL DANN Terry Sawchuk rang up his first shutout at Olympia since returning as the Red Wing goalie and there were handsome dividends all around. Alex Delvecchio and Norm Ullman triggered the goals late In the second period which brought a 2-0 victory over the last place Chicago Black Hawks. Detroit vaulted all the way into a tie for third place with Boston, highest standing in the Xational League DOBBS the Full Page of Pictures Of Lion Victory Page 14 TWENTY for the Wings so far.

It was the third straight victory longest winning streak of the j-ear by the suddenly awakened defending champions. S. hats of character and subtle distinction for yourself or as a gift for someone you greatly admire ti 7 I I Ft GKORGE WIL.SON, the Lions' coach, insisted he wasn't surprised "because we would have done the same thing." But Wilson called the play the turning point of the Lions' thrilling victory, "We knew then that we could come back," he said. Frankie Albert, the 49ers' coach, called the field goal "percentage football." "If we had got down close again, we would haye been able to get another three points," said, although the 49era reeded a touchdown to win at the end. "THEY DIDN'T know what they were losing and they ort of fell apart in the second half." was the way Lou Creekmur summed up the 49ers' failure to hold their first-half lead.

"I don't think those guys had any conception of the fact that by missing a chance to" Jilay Cleveland they also wre losing about apiece in playoff money," laughed the Lions' 245-pound tackle, a National Football League veteran of eight years. Creekmur had to shout to heard above the tumult in the Detroit dressing room where Bobby Layne greeted each player as he arrived from the field. Layne missed the Lions last two games with a broken leg. The usual wake was in prog-res in the 49ers' quarters. Through puffed cheeks, fullback Joe Ferry declared: "I think they broke my jaw.

I can hardly open it." Sawchuk had one of his easiest nights. He needed only 17 saves to get his third shutout of the year. The two earlier ones were in New York and Chicago. This reunion of the old boys that tangled Black Wings and Red Hawks situation again was present had all the friendly enthusiasm of a practice workout for the first 38 minutes. THIS WAS understandable, of course, inasmuch as 15 of the 35 players on the ice had once worked for the rival clubs, eight of them as recently as a week ago.

Delvecchio suddenly trig- -gered the Wings into action at 17:56 of the second period and, just IS seconds later, Ullman made' it 2-0. Taking Nick Mickoski's pass, Delvecchio carried down the middle and fired a high liner from 40 feet out. Glenn Hall wasn't expecting it, and the puck rang noisily off the inside of the goal post on the way by. It was Alex's sixth. Ullman snagged Howe's drop pass and snipped a 15-footer for the second goal.

This time Turn to Page 34, Column 1 Casper, Si ford In Links Playoff CHINO, Calif. ftp Billy Casper, young touring star from Bonita. and Charles Sifford, former National Negro champion from Philadelphia, tied for the lead in the $5,000 Pomona Valley golf open Sunday with 204 12 under par. An lS-hole playoff Monday will decide the $1,000 first prize. The runnerup will get $600.

Top Narrower brim In Handsome shades $20 Below For the man who prefers the wider brim $20 give a DOBBS haf certificate A most thouqhHut and gift to th man in your lif. Complet with miniature hat in miniature Dobbs hat box. Certificates from 10.95 to $100. Woodward at Montcalm Northland Eastland IT'S A CKHIE on the West Coast apparently to snatch a booted ball at a football game. San Francisco police hauled handcuffed spectator out of Rezar Stadium after he tried to snatch the ball after a conversion in the Lions-49ers game.

WILSON GAVE quarterback Tobm Rote, Layne's replace- ON MONDAY ALL 3 HATCHER STORES ARE OPEN TO 9 P. M. FREE PARKING 0 i i I 4 witli..