1971 Fun: North to honor football champs

"Call it unbelievable, incredible, astounding, fantastic. Pull out every word in the dictionary of sports clichés and you still won't be able to describe how North Forsyth won the State 4-A football championship from High Point Central last night."

Those words, written by Robert Noell, appeared in the Winston-Salem Journal on Nov. 27, 1971, the morning after North Forsyth won its only state-football championship.

The game's ending could have been scripted in Hollywood.

Ed Summers made a defensive play for the ages in the final seconds, absorbing a personal foul in the process, and Boyce Shore kicked only his second field goal of the season with no time on the clock, giving North a 10-7 victory at Bowman Gray Stadium.

The roars from that victory died off nearly 38 years ago, but North Forsyth will have a long overdue night of celebration on Friday. Players and coaches from the '71 team have been invited back and will be honored before and at halftime of this week's game against Northeast Guilford and inducted as a group into the school's Hall of Fame.

"It was a defining moment in the lives of a lot of us that were on that team," said Shore, now a photographer in Tobaccoville. The championship season came during the early years of racial integration in the schools, and Shore said he remembers being locked in an English class in 1970 while there was "rioting" in the cafeteria.

"The movie Remember the Titans, a lot of us guys have remarked many times about how that movie states a lot about our football team and what we did during the same time," Shore said. "We pulled together."

The 1971 season started, said starting quarterback Bobby Anderson, with players thinking they had something special. But the Vikings were 1-2 after three games.

"We started with a little adversity and just pulled together and kept on getting stronger," Anderson said. "The whole year we just got stronger. That night was incredible, an incredible high-school football game."

The state final, for the most part, was a stalemate between two powerful defensive teams. Central keyed on workhorse running back Claude Smalls and limited him to 42 yards on 19 carries. But overlooked Steve Overby found enough openings to rush for 114 yards on 11 carries.

However, Overby lost a fumble at his 48 in the waning seconds, giving Central one last chance. The Vikings had a sack on first down, and then with five seconds left, Summers intercepted a Hail Mary pass.

Summers cut back across the field on his 31-yard return and was tackled out of bounds at the Central 30 with no time on the clock in a 7-7 game. Anderson said he was sitting on the bench with teammates talking about sharing the championship, because the NCHSAA didn't play overtime in championship games.

Shore was sitting next to his holder, Mike Westmoreland.

"Then I kept hearing my name yelled real loud by Coach (Colon) Nifong," Shore said. "He has a gruff voice. ‘Shore! Shore! Get out there and kick a field goal.'"

Central had been penalized for grabbing Summers' facemask on the interception return. The ball was spotted at the 15-yard line, and North had one play left because the game couldn't end on a penalty. North had missed a first-half field-goal attempt because of a high snap, a play on which long-snapper Corky Grimes seriously injured his knee and was taken off the field on a stretcher. North's regular center, Steve Petree, had to hike the ball for the last field-goal attempt.

"Steve snapped with one hand and not two," Shore said. "Corky wasn't there, and here was Steve Petree snapping with one hand. I was trying to get Steve calm."

Anderson said that everything happened so fast.

"You knew right at that moment, gosh, the game-winning last play," Anderson said. "They came through, and he kicked it perfect. Perfect snap, perfect hold, perfect kick."

Nifong, now 76, said that the suddenness of the finish made everyone "ecstatic."

"It was a tremendous feeling, and the kids, it was wonderful is all I can say," Nifong said. "Lucky for us we won. In my mind, High Point Central would have been a worthy champion. They had a very good football team that year, very good."

Anderson said he is looking forward to reuniting with old teammates and coaches Friday.

"It is one of those things where I wouldn't be too far off if I didn't think about it once a week or once every two weeks," Anderson said. "It's something in life that people talk about when you have a championship, but it never leaves you. It stays with you for the rest of your life. Certain things take you back, and make you remember that special night."

mlinker@wsjournal.com.


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