1962 NFL Championship Game

The 1962 NFL Championship Game was the 30th NFL title game, played on December 30, 1962, at Yankee Stadium in New York City. It matched the New York Giants (12–2) of the Eastern Conference and Green Bay Packers (13–1) of the Western Conference, the defending league champions.

The Packers were led by hall of fame head coach Vince Lombardi, in his fourth year, and the Giants by Allie Sherman, in his second season. Green Bay was favored by 6½ points. The attendance for the game was 64,892, and the weather during the game was so cold that television crews used bonfires to thaw out their cameras, and one cameraman suffered frostbite. The conditions also made throwing the ball difficult.

Green Bay won 16–7, behind the performances of game Most Valuable Player linebacker Ray Nitschke, and fullback Jim Taylor. Right guard Jerry Kramer, filling in as placekicker for the injured Paul Hornung, scored ten points with three field goals and an extra point. The Giants fumbled twice, with Nitschke recovering both for the Packers, while the Packers recovered all five of their own fumbles and intercepted a Giants pass.

This was the third and final NFL title game played at Yankee Stadium; the others were in 1956 and 1958, with the Giants winning the first. The state next would host a league championship game in two years later in Buffalo, while the borough of Queens in New York City hosted once more when the New York Jets hosted the 1968 AFL Championship Game at Shea Stadium in Queens, winning over the Oakland Raiders.

Afterwards, the area commonly known as the NYC metropolitan area had a lengthy hosting drought, as the next league championship game was the Super Bowl XLVIII on February 2014 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey (commonly known as an inner suburb of New York City), which resulted in the Seattle Seahawks defeating the Denver Broncos 43–8.

Previous championship games hosted by the Giants in New York were played across the Harlem River at the Polo Grounds in 1934, 1938, 1944, and 1946; the Giants won the first two. An additional title game was played at the Polo Grounds in 1936, hosted by the Boston Redskins and won by the Packers.

The 1962 game was a rematch of the 1961 game, won by Green Bay at home, 37–0. It was the Packers' third straight appearance in the championship game, and the Giants' fourth in five seasons, and fifth in the last seven.

Green Bay began the 1962 season 10–0, including a 49–0 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles, where they gained 628 yards to Philadelphia's 54. Before the game, 10,000 fans at a New York Knicks game in Madison Square Garden spontaneously began chanting "Beat Green Bay! Beat Green Bay!", and when the 18,000 tickets available to non-season ticket holders went on sale, they sold within three hours.