• Navy's star junior QB Roger Staubach was in Bancroft Hall at the Naval Academy. Hearing a commotion in the hallway, he learned that President John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas. "I continued along Stribling Walk on the way to my next class, and as I did, the news kept getting worse."
• Up at West Point, Army QB Rollie Stichweh ("Stich-way") was mak­ing his way to his Electrical Engineering class when a cadet leaned out of a barracks window and screamed, "The pres­ident's been shot!"
• Staubach recalled: "Everybody was sick. You didn't care about football. You didn't care about the Heisman Tro­phy. You didn't care about anything."
• The president was declared dead from gunshot wounds at 1:30 PM EST at Parkland Memorial Hospital.
• The Navy captain, C Tom Lynch, learned about the assassination while in Leadership and Law class. "The professor came into the room and said the president had died. It was just shocking. You were completely dumb­founded and then you went numb."
• Classes at the Naval Academy were cancelled, and the football players, unsure of what to do, went to the locker room, where head coach Wayne Hardin announced that practice had been cancelled and told them to "take time in your own way."

Since the military observed a 30-day mourning period when a president died, the Army-Navy game scheduled for November 30 at Philadelphia Municipal Stadium was in doubt.

• At that time, when college football still surpassed pro football in popularity, Army-Navy was the game each season.
• And the 64th edition of the fabled rivalry promised to be one of the best games in the series. Having lost only a road game at SMU, Navy was ranked #2. Having lost only two games and coming off a victory over #9 Penn State, Army was primed for an upset. Adding to the anticipation was the fact that the winner was expected to get an invitation to the Cotton Bowl to face #1 Texas.
• Many voices called for the Army-Navy game to be play­ed as part of the nation's healing. Middies coach Hardin recalled, "When word got out that they might cancel the game, I said that I would hate to see that happen. I knew that JFK would want that game played. He was a compe­titor, a huge football fan, and loved what that par­ticular game stood for."
• After the president's funeral and burial, his widow, Jac­queline, in consultation with her brother-in-law Robert F. Kennedy, asked that the game be played as that's what her husband, a decorated Navy veteran, would have wanted.
  President Kennedy felt that Army's three-game losing streak to Navy after the 1961 battle was bad for the nation and the military. So he tried to recruit Green Bay Packers Coach Vince Lombardi to take over the program at West Point where he had been an assistant under Earl Blaik.
• So the Pentagon postponed the game a week to Satur­day, December 7.

The extra week allowed Staubach to attend the Heisman Tro­phy Ceremony in New York.

• It would be many years before the ceremony was shown on national television with the winner not revealed until after the top five vote getters have been extolled.
• The Navy team was practicing one afternoon that week when Hardin called the players to the locker room to an­nounce that Staubach had won the prestigious award.
• Roger told the team, "You guys deserve this. I'm going to cut it up into pieces and give each of you your piece."
• Staubach recalled decades later: "I've always looked at the Heisman as a team award because if I don't have a really good team that year, I don't come close to winning the Heisman. That team was one of the most special teams I've ever been a part of, and we're still very close." He added, "Of course, whenever I see my team­mates now, they tell me they're still waiting for their piece of the Heisman."
  Captain Tom Lynch attended the ceremony with Stau­bach's parents and Roger's future wife Marianne. Tom recalled an amusing incident that happened while they were in New York. When they attended a Broad­way play, Roger was in his academy uniform and feel­ing smug until people started coming up to him - not to ask him for an autograph but to give him their tickets because they thought he was an usher. Roger recalled, "My parents told me, 'Roger, you've got to stay hum­ble in life, and this will help you stay humble.'"
  Staubach didn't want to keep the trophy in his dorm room in Annapolis. So Navy sports information director Budd Thalman kept it in the trunk of his car for a few weeks.

The extra week gave underdog Army more time to prepare their game plan.

• Paul Dietzel was in his second year as coach after leav­ing LSU following the 1961 season for what he said was the only job that would make him violate his vow to never leave Baton Rouge. He became the first Army head coach who was not a graduate of the institution although he had been the offensive line coach under the legendary Earl Blaik at West Point in 1953 and 1954.
• The Cadets finished 6-4 in '62, their same record as the year before. The season ended with their fourth straight loss to Navy as President Kennedy attended for the second time as Commander-in-Chief. He tossed the coin at midfield before both games and observed the tradition of spending one half on each side of the stadium.
  JFK was impressed by Staubach's performance in the 34-14 rout in which Roger accounted for 258 total yards and four touchdowns. The president called him "the best quarterback I've ever seen" and gave Hardin a thumbs up while leaving the stadium in a limousine afterward. "President Kennedy was a Navy man through and through," said Harden, "and there was no question about which team he rooted for in that game."

Both academies decide to forego the usual spirit events the week of the game.

• There were no pep rallies, bonfires, or stealing of mascots.
• "Everyone wanted this to be a respectful event. All the usual hijinks were scalled back," recalled Navy WR Skip Orr.