Oct. 2 (1976)

In a battle of undefeated teams marred by verbal and physical abuse, visiting and nationally third-ranked Clemson scores twice in the second overtime on goals by Charles Headlam and Rennie Phillips to defeat No. 7 SIU-Edwardsville, 4-2. Clemson had outscored its opponents 28-0 coming into the game. Wally Cross will write in the next day’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “Following the game, the Clemson players, all but one of whom calls Guyana, Nigeria, Jamaica, Lebanon or Ghana home, exchanged curses and vulgar hand signals with the crowd. . . . ‘I apologize for the actions of my players,’ said Clemson coach Ibrahim M. Ibrahim. ‘But the crowd was very antagonistic and a lot of racial slurs were made. I heard them and I know my players did, too. They are young men and they were reacting.’” During regulation, Christian Nwokocha scores in the 34th and 71st minute for Clemson, while Greg Makowski tallies in the 45th minute and Mark Moran scores in the 83rd minute for SIUE. Nwokocha and fullback Aflred Morrison are ejected late in the game after Morrison kicks the ball into the face of referee Marty Templin after being called for offsides. Morrison drops his shorts and “moons” Templin, and Nwokocha protests Morrison’s ejection. Earlier in the game, Headlam “was the object of considerable verbal abuse from the fans throughout the second half and overtime periods because of the sneak punch he threw that decked Tim Twellman in the final minute of the first half,” according to Cross. “The punch wasn’t seen by the referees.” NOTE: Oct. 1, 2023, marked the one-year anniversary of daily St. Louis soccer history highlights on this website. Starting on Oct. 1, additional highlights will be posted as needed. Therefore, there will be some days with no posted historical highlights. However, all past historical posts are archived on this website at “Today’s Soccer History.”