Scott Hunter holds unique place in football history
MADISON- It is one of the greatest accomplishments in sports history. It has stood the test of time. The 1972 Miami Dolphins undefeated season has stood for over five decades.
But did Don Shula’s team really win every game that season?
Scott Hunter played eight seasons in the NFL after quarterbacking Alabama in 1969 and 1970 setting just about every passing record of that era.
Hunter’s 1974 Topp’s football card
In the summer of 1972 Hunter was locked in a battle with the Packers #1 draft pick Jerry Tagge for the quarterback position with the Green Bay Packers. On August 12, 1972 the Packers traveled to Miami for a preseason game against the Dolphins and won 14-13 on a touchdown pass by Hunter in the closing minutes.
“That game was a dress rehearsal for the regular season,” Hunter said when he was in town for his daughter Mary Scott Hunter’s announcement she will run for the Lieutenant Governor in 2018.
“Shula put in Greise, Warfield, Kiick, Csonka all their starters and we played our starters too,” Hunter said. “I played the whole game. Late in the game we had the ball on our 13-yard line with third and short. Bart signaled in a play, a play action fake to John Brockington and I thought this is brilliant. The whole Miami defense was expecting John to get the ball, even Jake Scott cheated up. I faked the ball to John, stepped back and Dave Davis ran the post and I hit him in stride he went 87 yards for a touchdown and we won.”
Hunter quarterbacked the Packers to a 10-4 record in 1972 ending the season with wins over the Minnesota Vikings, Detroit Lions, and New Orleans Saints. Hunter also led the Packers to wins over the reigning Super Bowl champion Dallas Cowboys, NFC West Division champion San Francisco 49ers, and Atlanta Falcons.
The Packers were mostly a running team with Brockington and MacArthur Lane and Hunter had five running touchdowns with six touchdown passes.
He still is in Packers record books for his rookie season; most touchdown passes 7 (2nd) and 1,210 yards passing (3rd).
After his playing days in the NFL ended in 1980 Hunter, 69, went into TV sportscasting in Mobile near his hometown of Fairhope where he still lives today with his wife Deborah.
“We didn’t make a whole lot of money back then and we had three children and Mary Scott earned one of the Bryant scholarships to Alabama. That really helped us out a lot.”
Mary Scott Hunter would eventually earn both an undergraduate degree and law degree from Alabama. She also spent a year studying abroad in Germany.
Today, Scott Hunter works as a Raymond James financial representative in Fairhope. He stays in touch with his mentor Bart Starr who retired as a player just weeks after that preseason game in 1972 and began a two decades long career as a Packers assistant coach and head coach.
Hunter is also a commercial pilot with over 4,000 flying hours. He flies a Cessna 182.
Hunter was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 1998. He still holds passing records at Alabama for most attempts (55), completions (32), and yards (484) in a game.
