Happy Days Again...Great Win, Illini
By: The News-Gazette
Thursday, January 02, 1964
Happy days are here again...for the Illini!
And what a joyous New Year's Day in Pasadena — and for Illini fans and followers everywhere.
Coming through as true Fighting Illini after a slow start in the 1964 Rose Bowl engagement, coach Pete Elliott's great team finished like they did in the Big Ten conference football race... strong and the winner.
The 17 to 7 Illinois victory over Washington's polished Huskies brought Pete's 'Cinderella' team of 1963 from the firepit to the roof-top, adding a Rose Bowl title and number 2 national ranking to a most welcome and well-earned Western Conference championship!
The culminating achievement for this '63 Illini team, in one of the Rose Bowl's most exciting games in years, netted these laurels:
The University of Illinois' third Rose Bowl triumph in 17 years.
Maintaining the UI's perfect record of having never lost to a Pacific Coast opponent in the Pasadena classic.
Tieing Ohio State and Michigan as the only three-time Big Ten winners of Rose Bowl game titles.
(And one of Michigan's came before the Pacific Coast - Western Conference Rose Bowl pact began in 1947 — back in 1902.)
Giving the Illini '63 team a three-way clean sweep over season's West Coast opponents — with wins over California and U.C.L.A. before the News Year's Day triumph over Washington.
Our congratulations go to Elliott and his entire coaching staff, a group dedicated to a great comeback task...to the entire Illini football squad, lauded so often by Elliott for their "team effort"...and of course to the top-honored player of the day in teh '64 Rose Bowl game — our terrific sophomore fullback, Jim Grabowski, destined to be one of the Western conference's all-time great fullbacks if he maintains his present pace.
Ably supporting the Illini cause and featured in the fabulous Tourney of Roses Parade were the University of Illinois Marching Band and float entries from the UI and the State of Illinois. The state float won top honors in the states category with its "Land of Lincoln" entry; the University's float took college entry honors with its gridiron flavor float.
It all added up to a New Year's Day Land of Lincoln grand slam.
It was a great day to be an Illini...anywhere and everywhere!
Happy days are here again...