Remembering Coaching Great, Don Shula

The great football coach, Don Shula, who died two days back at age 90, had a fantastic record, with both great triumphs and truly agonizing defeats.

Mr. Shula won more regular season games than any other coach and guided the 1972 Miami Dolphins to the NFL’s only perfect season, a (17-0) record.

Not so arguably, the Dolphins were even better the next season, when they repeated as NFL champions, dominating 3 post-season games, capped by a Super Bowl win vs the Minnesota Vikings, in Ray Scott’s last tilt as CBS lead announcer. The class/efficiency of both those Dolphins and Ray Scott’s broadcasts have never been matched.

That ’73 team lost one meaningful regular season game, as did 3 Shula coached Baltimore Colts’ teams (’64, ’67 and ’68). Thus counting the ’72 perfect record team, Shula teams lost but one or less meaningful “reg” game, an incredible 5 times.

Don Shula coached teams did lose 5 games (3 as the game favorite, most notably by nearly 3 touchdowns, vs the Joe Namath (now seen doing ads for Medicare Advantage,led Jets after the ’68 season) in which victory would have meant an “all the way”/NFL crown.

However, with the two titles won and a pair of 5 year spans of coaching record excellence, with both the Colts (’64-68) and the Dolphins (’70-’74), Mr. Shula was a true coaching great. 

Don Shula, pictured above.

Click below for some highlights, (Supe 7 Miami vs Washington) including Coach Shula’s words upon finally winning the title.