First nfl thanksgiving football game

The first Thanksgiving Day football game was played in Philadelphia in This game was played two weeks after Rutgers University defeated Princeton University on November 6 in New Brunswick, New Jersey, in what is considered to be the first-ever football game.

The Young America-Germantown game also occurred six years after President Abraham Lincoln declared the first fixed national Thanksgiving holiday in At the collegiate level, Princeton University and Yale University played on Thanksgiving from to The tradition grew as many high schools began playing on Thanksgiving each year as well.

It is the longest continuous Thanksgiving Day rivalry in the country. The first professional football games on Thanksgiving were played November 25, No games were played on the holiday from because of World War II. The Lions began playing on the day because owner GA Richards wanted to get more fans in the stands. Detroit played the Chicago Bears on Thanksgiving Day , and the Lions have played on the holiday nearly every year since.

This year's Thanksgiving Day schedule :. Chicago Bears at Lions: p. What does the day look like for the coaches, players, families and fans who put their holiday celebrations on pause to take part? And how many thousands of pounds of food is served at the stadium?

We also laid out the Thanksgiving stats and numbers you should know and even took a journey back in time to explore the biggest and best moments on the turkey day stage.

Jump to: Thanksgiving records By the numbers Best moments in Thanksgiving history. The Lions were first up to host games every year: In , Lions owner G. Richards scheduled a holiday matchup between the Lions and the Bears.

The Bears, the defending back-to-back world champions, beat the Lions in front of 26, fans at the University of Detroit Stadium on Nov. Now, more than eight decades later, Thanksgiving football has become a staple in Detroit with the Lions going in the annual holiday classic. Thirty-two years later, the Cowboys joined as a home team: The Cowboys first played on Thanksgiving in , beating the Cleveland Browns at the Cotton Bowl.

General manager Tex Schramm wanted more national publicity for the Cowboys -- this was before they were known as America's Team -- and thought the holiday game made perfect sense. The NFL was a bit worried, however, and guaranteed the Cowboys a certain amount of gate revenue. Some 80, fans showed up and a tradition was born. The Cowboys have played on every Thanksgiving Day since -- except in and Why didn't the Cowboys play on Thanksgiving those two years?

Prior to the season, then-commissioner Pete Rozelle wanted to see if the St. Louis Cardinals could build their popularity under coach Don Coryell, whose teams were nicknamed the Cardiac Kids because of their exciting finishes. Unfortunately, the Cardinals lost both games decidedly and Rozelle went back to Schramm to ask if the Cowboys would take the Thanksgiving game back. Louis," Schramm said in to the Chicago Tribune. I said only if we get it permanently. It's something you have to build as a tradition.

He said, 'It's yours forever. Given how long the series has lasted, it's not a surprise that the Lions have the most wins and losses on Thanksgiving Day. But two other teams that frequent the holiday tradition are the Bears and the Packers. Ezekiel Elliott has played on Thanksgiving every year but one since joining the Cowboys in He doesn't have one favorite memory. We've got the stage so we just have to go out and handle our business. Elliott had a viral moment when he tossed Dak Prescott into the Salvation Army red kettle after a touchdown in the game vs.

Lomas Brown, former Lions Pro Bowl OT , said players view the Thanksgiving game as a gauge for how the season is going or how it needs to end. Or if you're gonna make some noise in the playoffs, you need to start playing better. At that point, everything should be clicking for you, especially if you're at that point in the season. All celebrations generally don't happen until the next day, when Lions players can celebrate with their families.

Brown says he "couldn't wait until after the game was over, man. I would put on weight over the holiday because a brother would throw down because you didn't have no more responsibility after that game until next week. So, it was almost like another little open week and that's the way we kind of looked at it, too.

For the Cowboys , most players with families will also celebrate on Friday. With a late-afternoon kickoff, most of the time players will not get back to their homes until later in the evening, far too late for such a heavy meal. While the Lions don't hold any locker room or team traditions for the holiday game, Brown said that former Lions coach Wayne Fontes did place extra emphasis on the annual contest by dropping inclinations about its importance all throughout the season.

Players took that to heart, too. That was the order every year when I looked at the schedule. Thanksgiving was pretty much the most important thing and we used to emphasize that as leaders on the team. We used to tell all of the young boys coming in that we don't lose on Thanksgiving. That's a game that we said we definitely had to win. In most years, Cowboys players will visit a Salvation Army shelter in Dallas or Fort Worth and feed early Thanksgiving Day meals to those in need, although that practice has been put on hold the past two years because of the pandemic.

In the past, players often were joined by their wives and children. Jason Witten had his two sons and two daughters participate in handing out meals during his career with the Cowboys. I think they like seeing those fans and being able to hand out that food. There is a tailgating group of more than die-hard Lions fans who gather bright and early at 9 a.

Montcalm St. In March , Lions owner George A. Richards, a Detroit radio executive, headed a group that purchased the Portsmouth Ohio Spartans and moved the team to the Motor City. Eager to boost ticket sales and improve his team's profile in a city dominated by the Tigers, Richards persuaded Chicago Bears owner and coach George Halas to play on Thanksgiving morning. A sellout crowd of roughly 26, fans attended the game at the University of Detroit Stadium—the largest crowd at the time to watch professional football in Detroit.

Many more tickets could have been sold, and the national radio broadcast—an NFL first—was wildly popular. Pro Football Hall of Fame historian Jon Kendle says the dramatic, well-played game was a major boost for the league. The Lions weren't the first professional football team to play on Thanksgiving. In , a scoreless tie between the Elyria Ohio Athletics and Columbus Panhandles was among the six professional games played, according to the Pro Football Hall of Fame website.

In the s, the NFL lagged well behind college football in popularity.