The

1962 Events January * January 1 – Western Samoa becomes independent from New Zealand. * January 3 – Pope John XXIII excommunicates Fidel Castro for preaching communism. * January 8 – Harmelen train disaster: 93 die in the wors ...

Detroit Lions The Detroit Lions are a professional American football team based in Detroit. The Lions compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) North Division. The team play their home games at Ford ...

season was the 33rd season in franchise history. In one of the best regular seasons in their history, the Lions posted an 11–3 record (), but finished two games behind the eventual

NFL champion Throughout its history, the National Football League (NFL) and other rival American football leagues have used several different formats to determine their league champions, including a period of inter-league matchups to determine a true national c ...

Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC North, North division. It ...

in the NFL Western Conference. It was the third straight season the Lions finished as runner-up to the Packers in the West. Entering the final weekend, Detroit was one game behind and had won seven consecutive, but were shut out 3–0 by the

Chicago Bears The Chicago Bears are a professional American football team based in Chicago. The Bears compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) North division. The Bears have won nine NF ...

. The Lions' three losses, all on the road, were by a total of eight points. As conference runner-up, Detroit won their third consecutive

Playoff Bowl The Playoff Bowl (officially known as the Bert Bell Benefit Bowl) was a post-season game for third place in the National Football League (NFL), played ten times following the through seasons, all at the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida. It was or ...

game over the

Pittsburgh Steelers The Pittsburgh Steelers are a professional American football team based in Pittsburgh. The Steelers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference (AFC) North division. Founded in , the Steel ...

, 17–10. The third place game was played at the

Orange Bowl The Orange Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in the Miami metropolitan area. It has been played annually since January 1, 1935, making it, along with the Sugar Bowl and the Sun Bowl, the second-oldest bowl game in th ...

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

on January 6, three weeks after the end of the regular season. The Lions never trailed by more than seven points at any point in any game during the season, a feat that was not repeated for 48 years. Their 26–14 win over the Packers on

Thanksgiving Day Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in the United States, Canada, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Liberia, and unofficially in countries like Brazil and Philippines. It is also observed in the Netherlander town of Leiden a ...

in Week 11 denied defending champion Green Bay the NFL's first true

perfect season A perfect season is a sports season, including any requisite playoff portion, in which a team remains and finishes undefeated and untied. The feat is extremely rare at the professional level of any team sport, and has occurred more commonly at the ...

. The Lions were up 26–0 in the fourth quarter before Green Bay scored two touchdowns; the Packers had won the first meeting 9–7 in the mud in Green Bay with a late field goal on October 7.

Offseason

NFL Draft

Regular season

Schedule

Note: Intra-conference opponents are in bold text.

Season summary

Week 4 at Packers

Alex Karras Alexander George Karras (July 15, 1935 – October 10, 2012) was an American football player, professional wrestler, sportscaster, and actor. He was a four-time Pro Bowl player with the Detroit Lions of the National Football League (NFL), ...

reportedly threw a helmet at

Milt Plum Milton Ross Plum (born January 20, 1935) is a former American football quarterback who played for the Cleveland Browns (1957–61), Detroit Lions (1962–67), Los Angeles Rams (1968) and New York Giants (1969) of the National Football League (NFL ...

in the locker after the game for throwing the late interception that led to the Lions' defeat.

Week 11 vs. Packers

The game was dubbed the "

Massacre" thanks to the dominant performance of the Lions defense, who sacked

Bart Starr Bryan Bartlett Starr (January 9, 1934 – May 26, 2019) was an American professional football quarterback and head coach for the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at the University of Alab ...

11 times. It was Green Bay's sole loss of the season; they repeated as

NFL champions The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the maj ...

Standings

Roster

Playoff Bowl

The game matched the conference runners-up for third place in the league and was played three weeks after the end of the regular season (and a week after the

championship game In sport, a championship is a Competition#Sports, competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match sy ...

). The ten editions of the

, all held at the

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

, are now considered exhibition games by the NFL, not post-season contests.

Awards and records

* The Lions were only the third NFL team since that never trailed by more than 7 points at any time during the season. This feat was not repeated until the Green Bay Packers did so in their

Super Bowl The Super Bowl is the annual final playoff game of the National Football League (NFL) to determine the league champion. It has served as the final game of every NFL season since 1966, replacing the NFL Championship Game. Since 2022, the game ...

-winning

2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...

season. See especially the "Scoring Summary" section, which shows that the Packers never trailed in the game.

References

External links

Detroit Lions on Pro Football Reference

Detroit Lions on jt-sw.com

Detroit Lions on The Football Database
{{DEFAULTSORT:1962 Detroit Lions Season

Detroit Lions seasons