From 1962 to 1967 in all classes, and from 1962 to 1974 in Classes A and B-C, postseason football was shut down in Wyoming. No playoffs, no state championship games, nothing. Only an unsatisfying mythical championship that, in the end, was just opinion. The next several days, wyoming-football.com is taking a look at the title games and playoff brackets we missed out on in the “dead era” of the 1960s and 1970s.
Today, we examine the year 1968.
Class A: Gillette (7-1-1) OR Lusk (8-1-1) vs. Star Valley (6-2-1) OR Evanston (8-2): There would have been all kinds of tiebreakers exercised to fill out the Class A title game in 1968. In the East, Gillette and Lusk had tied 19-19 early in the season in Lusk; both squads had lost to AA teams prior to the tie, Gillette to Powell and Lusk to Laramie. Meanwhile, Evanston and Star Valley split the Class A West title after splitting with each other in the regular season (Star Valley won 7-0 in Afton; Evanston won 13-0 in Evanston). Both teams also lost conference games to other league foes, coincidentally, both on Oct. 11: Star Valley to Jackson and Evanston to Green River.
Class B East: Sundance (8-1) vs. Glenrock (9-0). Glenrock was a Class B juggernaut in ’68, with its closest victory by 19 points. Sundance’s only blemish was a 21-20 loss to Newell, S.D., in the season finale.
Class B West: Byron (9-0) vs. Cokeville (7-1). In a rare case of a regular-season meeting between these two powerhouses, Byron beat Cokeville 40-32 in Cokeville to start the 1968 season for both teams. Even so, Byron had to eke out a 14-13 victory over Basin in the season finale to win the Northwest; Cokeville’s closest victory in a season of dominance was a 40-14 whitewash of North Rich, Utah.
–patrick