The Ice Bowl: The Cold Truth About Football's Most Unforgettable Game

The Ice Bowl details the history of two famous coaches—Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry—and the coaching philosophies that made them and their teams legends. Gruver successfully evokes many individual players’ stories of endurance, drive, and strategy. Ample background, personal interviews, action photos, and an undeniable passion for the game all contribute to this compelling account of the long-time rivalry that culminated on the "frozen tundra" of the Ice Bowl.

Includes diagrams, game and season statistics, and complete Ice Bowl play-by-play.

Gruver is not biased toward the Packers. He pays richly deserved respect to the Cowboy players and coaches. The Cowboys were a "warm weather" team that might have been expected to fold their tent when faced with the severe cold, but, like the Packers, they gave everything they had on that day.

I don't see much to criticize in this book. Maybe Phil Bengtson's family would like to have seen his name spelled correctly. I'd prefer to see more discussion of the historical significance of the game, but Gruver probably thinks of himself as a reporter and not as a historian.

Not being bound by such modesty, I'll do it for him.

The greatest games in modern NFL history are:

(5) 1998 Bronco-Packer Super Bowl. (4) 1982 49er-Cowboy NFC Title Game. (3) 1969 Jet-Colt Super Bowl. (2) 1958 Giant-Colt NFL Title Game. (1) The Ice Bowl.

An epic game should have three qualities: it should effectively decide a championship, it should be historically significant (usually by signifying a changing of the guard or a change in the way the game is played), and the game action should be unforgettable. The Ice Bowl combines these qualities better than any other game.

It marked an end to the dominance of the "old" NFL and provided a glimpse of the complex offensive and defensive schemes to come. It matched two of the five greatest coaches in NFL history. No game was more dramatic; the cold weather and frozen field gave it a sense of primeval struggle. I feel that the title "Greatest Game Ever" as applied to the '58 Championship Game has been inflated by the well-known power of eastern media. The Ice Bowl deserves that title.


A must for fans of football played outdoors in winter.   November 28, 1997
arneson@iname.com (Cornwall, PA)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

This book is a tremendous recap of The Ice Bowl and the game's participants. Tons of interviews, plenty of graphics and photos, and a great sportwriter to pull it all together. It's obvious Gruver loves the subject matter. As a lifelong Packers fan, I found this to be a fantastic book -- and so did my Dad, another lifelong Packers fan. Highly recommended!


Wonderful and exceptional review of facts, not myths.   July 14, 1998
jdgroup@bellsouth.net (Orlando, Florida, USA)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Any football fan, and especially Packers fans, will appreciate the factual re-creation of the "Ice Bowl." What complications the weather bestowed upon the '67 NFC Championship Game were memorable enough, but the ending, the climactic finale, as recalled by Gruver, is the defining touch rendering this game as "the greatest ever." An NFL collector's item. An absolute read!


EXCELLENT RECAP   March 31, 2001
3 out of 3 found this review helpful

THIS BOOK IS TRULY A GREAT READ. THE INTERVIEWS, PHOTOGRAPHS, AND RESEARCH IS REALLY EXCELLENT. THIS IS BOOK REALLY BRINGS BACK SOME MEMORIES. I WAS ACTUALLY COLD JUST THINKING ABOUT THE HARSH CONDITIONS OF THAT DAY OF SURVIVAL. WELL DESCRIBED AND A GREAT WAY TO LEARN ABOUT THIS LEGENDARY GAME. HATS OFF TO MR GRUVER, AND ALL ASSOCIATED WITH THIS MASTERPIECE.


Ice Bowl: I Was There   May 31, 2005
Daniel R. Grangaard (Austin, TX United States)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful

My uncle took me to the Dec 31,1967 NFL Championship game between the Cowboys and Packers, better known as the ice bowl. I was a high school senior. I have always remembered that it was -13 degrees with a 20 mph wind blowing into the open north end of the stadium. It wasn't until I read this book that I realized the wind chill by the end of the game was -56 degrees. Now I live in Texas where 100 degree summer days are the norm. On hot days I reread the book and watch the video. The Texas heat doesn't seem so bad.