MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Usually each year around this time Chuck Howley’s telephone rings with someone on the other end asking him about the great game he played 36 years ago in Super Bowl V. Howley is the only player from a losing team to ever be voted MVP in football’s biggest game. He will probably be the last.

	West Virginia's Chuck Howley earned Super Bowl V game MVP honors in Dallas' 16-13 loss to Baltimore in Miami. CNNSI.com photo

“That’s the thing they remember me for,” Howley said earlier this week.

That’s a shame because Chuck Howley was one of pro football’s best outside linebackers in the late 1960s as one of the key members of the Dallas Cowboys’ famous “Doomsday Defense.” He made six Pro Bowls from 1965-71 and is a member of Dallas’ Ring of Honor, but Howley’s entire 15-year professional career has seemingly been encapsulated in that one game in the Orange Bowl in Miami.

He will forever be known as the answer to one of pro football’s most popular trivia questions.

“No, it doesn’t bother me,” he said. “I know in my own mind that I did what I needed to do and that was my best. If my best wasn’t good enough then maybe I should have tried harder.”

Howley was a fantastic all-around athlete at West Virginia University in the mid 1950s, earning varsity letters in five different sports (track, gymnastics, swimming, wrestling and football). But it was on the gridiron where the Wheeling native’s rare combination of size and speed was best suited.

A Pitt scout once called Howley the greatest guard he’d ever seen, trying to describe how Howley got past the line of scrimmage heading toward the quarterback, stopping on a dime when he realized he couldn’t get there in time, and then retreating to intercept the pass. That’s the type of athlete Chuck Howley was.

That athletic ability helped him get drafted in the first round by the Chicago Bears in 1958. However, a serious knee injury during practice before the start of the 1959 season nearly ended Howley’s career. Back then knee surgeries were more like butchery.

“It was a practice situation and I got crack-backed when the crack back was still legal,” he said.

Howley went back home to Wheeling and was working at a gas station when he got a call from his buddy Don Healy, a former Bear teammate who was picked by the Cowboys in the expansion draft. Dallas knew all about Howley, but Healy put in a few good words for him anyway.

“He wasn’t the sole factor because I think the Cowboys were interested. They did trade for me and I was really happy that they did,” Howley said.

To be 100 percent certain his knee was sturdy enough for a return to pro football Howley took part in an alumni game at WVU during the spring of 1960.

“I never had a problem with it,” he said. “In fact I never taped it or anything my entire career.”

Howley made his first Pro Bowl in 1965 and by 1967 he was a regular on the all-pro team. Dallas coach Tom Landry trusted Howley and all-pro defensive tackle Bob Lilly enough to give them total freedom to freelance.

“Howley gambles a lot,” San Francisco 49ers coach Dick Nolan once said. “But about 85 to 90 percent of the time when Chuck gambles he’s right. He’s been around long enough to know when to do it and how to do it.”

“When I went to the Cowboys I was always a corner linebacker but then I began what they would call flip-flop. The tight end was the strong side and I always played the weak side because I could cover man-to-man,” Howley said. “Dave Edwards was stronger in the upper body than I was and he could handle those tight ends.”

Howley took part in one of pro football’s most famous games at Green Bay in the 1967 NFL championship. It has since become known as the “Ice Bowl.” The game was played in subzero weather punctuated by 15 mile-per-hour wind gusts that made the wind chill 40 below.

“When you’re playing you don’t realize how cold it is,” he said. “I think our down linemen realized it because they had to put their hands down on the ground every time. My only problem was the second half there was a mist in the air and the heater on the field ceased to work at about halftime and it was difficult getting your footing.

“You were slipping and sliding and when you were trying to cover somebody out of the backfield you had to make a choice,” Howley said. “If you made a choice and it was the wrong one you couldn’t stop and go the other way.

“There was a lot of speculation as to whether or not they turned (the heater) off but it was the same on both sides of the ball.”

The two biggest moments of Howley’s career were his pair of Super Bowl performances in 1971 and 1972. He picked off two passes and recovered a fumble in Dallas’ 16-13 loss to the Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl V. There were a combined 11 turnovers in the game, the winning team’s leading ball carrier had just 33 yards, and the Baltimore quarterbacking duo of Earl Morrall and John Unitas completed only 10 of 24 passes with three interceptions.

That’s how a linebacker from a losing team gets named MVP. Howley doesn’t recall talking to a single reporter after the game.

“It was the losing locker room,” he said. “It didn’t mean anything to me sitting there when somebody came in and told me I was the MVP. I said, ‘I think that’s fantastic but we didn’t win the game.’”

He can’t even remember who gave him the good news. “There is no way you can put icing on the cake when you lose the ball game,” he said.

The linebacker received a Dodge Charger for his efforts. Back then you could buy a Super Bowl ticket for $15 and the games were still blacked out on TV in the host city. Jim O’Brien’s 32-yard game-winning field goal came from the 32 yard line: goal posts were still located at the goal line.

Not only had Howley become the first defensive player and the only one from a losing team to win Super Bowl MVP honors, but he also snapped the streak of quarterbacks winning the award. Bart Starr won the first two, Joe Namath was MVP of Super Bowl III and Len Dawson was the game’s most valuable player in the fourth Super Bowl.

“There have been 40 Super Bowls and go down the list. I’m not anti-quarterback but they are the focal point when you win something,” Howley said. “It’s only natural that your quarterbacks are going to be number one. Then the running backs are number two and the wide receivers are number three.

“They filter in a linebacker here and there.”

Howley’s Cowboys made a return trip to the Super Bowl the following year and beat the Miami Dolphins 24-3. Once again, the linebacker had an outstanding game picking off a pass and helping Dallas hold Miami to just 185 total yards and 10 first downs.

“I like to think I played just as well in that game, too,” he said.

Howley, now 70, still keeps up with the game he played so well for so long. Last year he was invited to the Super Bowl in Detroit to be recognized with the rest of the game’s living MVPs in an on-field ceremony.

“That was probably the greatest experience I had since playing in the Super Bowl itself,” he said.

	Chuck Howley, pictured here with Hall of Fame quarterback Roger Staubach, also has Hall of Fame credentials. Dallas Morning News photo

Howley’s credentials are good enough to warrant Pro Football Hall of Fame consideration, but his status has now been relegated to the senior committee meaning nine veteran members of the voting panel must submit two players from the pre-1982 era to be included among the final list of candidates.

With so many outstanding players still eligible, Howley is resigned to the fact that gaining admission among the game’s elite may never happen. His Cowboy teammate Rayfield Wright got into the Hall of Fame through the senior committee last year, but only three (Lilly, Renfro and Herb Adderley) have been enshrined from those great Cowboy defenses so far.

“We just had a great team,” he said. “We all had equal ability. The defensive linemen did. Lee Roy Jordan and Dave Edwards at linebacker -- Mel Renfro in the secondary -- they were comparable to what the other teams had. The talent was there and it was a matter of putting 40 players together and playing effectively throughout a ball game and being able to win at the end.”

Today, Howley is still operating his industrial uniform business in Dallas. He also has a ranch that keeps him busy.

“I’ve been thinking about retiring for a number of years but I don’t know what I would do?” he said. “I don’t play golf. That’s what everybody seems to do. But I do enjoy getting me a good horse and going down to the ranch.”

Howley also tries to catch up with his alma mater whenever they are playing on TV.

“I’m amazed with the job (Rich) Rodriguez is doing up there,” he said. “I think he’s doing a fabulous job and I’m glad to see he is going to be staying there.”

As for that Dodge Charger he received back in 1971, it’s probably about time for him to pull the cover off and take it out of the garage for a spin.

“I don’t have it anymore,” Howley said.

He gave the car to his wife, who drove it for about a month before selling it. The car was just too sporty for her.

“It probably would be worth quite a bit today,” he laughed.