We already compared the matchup of the Bengals and Bills with Bengals-Chiefs now, but what else was going on?
Let’s take a trip down memory lane via the pages of the Dayton Daily News in the first week of January 1989, the last time the Bengals were preparing to play for a spot in the Super Bowl.
We’ll start in sports:
- Cincinnati coach Sam Wyche was upset the Seattle Seahawks (who were still in the AFC then) had started faking injuries to combat the Bengals’ no-huddle, hurry-up offense in the week’s previous game.
- There was some concern about the Roebling Bridge in Cincinnati, which had started swaying from having so many people on it after the most recent Bengals game.
- With New Year’s Day falling on a Sunday, the big bowl games were held on Jan. 2. It was a cornucopia of football fun, and the blue bloods reigned supreme: Notre Dame beat West Virginia in the Fiesta Bowl to claim the national championship, Michigan beat USC in the Rose Bowl, UCLA beat Arkansas in the Cotton Bowl, Florida State beat Auburn in the Sugar Bowl and Miami (Fla.) beat Nebraska in the Orange Bowl.
- The Irish ended up undefeated, but DDN sports columnist Gary Nuhn came away more impressed with the Hurricanes, who lost a thriller in South Bend in the regular season. Nuhn and DDN executive sports editor Ralph Morrow both wrote about the need for a college football playoff to help sort things out.
- Morrow also was done with instant replay (the first version) in the NFL because it seemed to cause delays in the game while still letting mistakes go unfixed.
- Dayton was in last place — no not the Flyers, the Dynamo. The Gem City’s entrant in the American Indoor Soccer Association was having a rough year.
- The Flyers basketball team entered the new year a game below .500, but they were looking forward to a first: Playing a conference game. Negele Knight scored 29 points in front of 650 people as UD beat Loyola Chicago on the road in UD’s first MCC game.
- Wittenberg was undefeated and ranked No. 1 in men’s basketball.
- The NBA’s division leaders were the Knicks, Cavs, Mavs and Lakers. In the NHL, it was the Penguins, Canadiens, Red Wings and Flames.
- The Chiefs were in a different spot than today: They fired coach Frank Gansz after he won eight games in the previous two years. The president and GM were also fired.
- Meanwhile, UD grad Chuck Noll received a lifetime contract to coach the Steelers, who at the same time lost defensive coordinator Tony Dungy. He resigned with the expectation he would become a head coach. Cleveland owner Art Modell said the Browns would be interested in Dungy.
- Duke was No. 1 in the NCAA men’s basketball poll while Michigan slipped to seventh after losing to Division II Alaska-Anchorage.
- Even less surprising: Tennessee was the top team in NCAA women’s basketball.
- Here’s an encouraging headline: “New Congress vows to tackle old problems.” (About time, right?)
- Movies showing at CrossPointe Cinemas included “Rain Man,” “Oliver and Co.”, “The Naked Gun” and “Ernest Saves Christmas.”
Flashback: How the @Bengals’ last AFC Championship Game compared to this one https://t.co/fiWZVxLfG6
— Marcus Hartman (@marcushartman) January 28, 2022
- With ratings flat, the relatively new Cable News Network was contemplating an increased in programming built around personalities rather than straight news.
- You could still get a Beef N’ Cheddar at Arby’s for 99 cents.
- The Sears department store downtown at First and Patterson was still doing well, something that was relatively rare even then.
- Mead Corp. was fighting Toyota over a copyright for the use of the name “Lexus,” which the Dayton company said was too similar to “Lexis.”
- Japanese emperor Hirohito died. He had led his country into war but also helped it recover and be reborn as an economic power in the second half of the 20th century.
- Jurors in the trial of Ted Sinks visited the old Dayton Daily News headquarters downtown. That’s where Sinks was accused of encasing his wife in concrete after killing her. (He was later convicted and died in prison.)
- An Akron Beacon-Journal survey found an overwhelming majority of Ohioans were happily married, liked their jobs, believed in God and were pleased with their neighborhoods and schools. Beyond that, they were also optimistic their children would be ale to live like them or better without leaving the state.
- Undefeated Meadowdale topped the DDN’s boys basketball rankings for Division I-II. Future Buckeye Jamie Skelton lead the Lions in scoring at 25 points per game. Springfield Catholic Central led the small school division poll.
- ESPN signed a four-year, $400 million deal to broadcast MLB four times a week, drastically increasing how much baseball would be on national TV. The young network outbid TBS, SportsChannel and USA for the package, which SportsChannel’s president said was too expensive and would eventually prove to be too much for the market to handle.
- L.C. Wing Company on Alex Bell Plaza advertised a bucket of 50 buffalo wings for $12.95 or 100 for $22.95.
- Regular unleaded gasoline was 91 cents a gallon, and ground beef was $1.119 at Kroger.
- “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” by Poison was the No. 1 song on the Billboard pop chart.
- As now, there was an NCAA convention going on. Then talk was much less about revolution, though. There was a proposal to add a 12th game to the regular season, increase how many football players a school could sign per year and to create a national standard for academic eligibility.
- There was an item on page 10 of the sports section about Dayton City Commissioner Tony Capizzi’s push for the city to get a minor league baseball team. His idea was for a Double-A team to play in a new stadium the club would share with Wright State near the Nutter Center, which was still under construction. Triangle Park was also considered, but upgrading the baseball field their would be cost-prohibitive.
- An AP story about Hall of Fame voting noted Johnny Bench and Carl Yastrzemski were likely to get in on the first ballot but Gaylord Perry’s candidacy was complicated by his use of the spitball while voters might take issue with Ferguson Jenkins’ having been arrested for cocaine possession in 1980.
- All week there was only one news item about Ohio State football — All-Ohio Chillicothe defensive lineman Chuck Jones saying he would play for the Buckeyes.
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