Dec. 9, 1963 - All season long, this has been one of the questions most often asked around the American Football League — what’s wrong with Cookie Gilchrist? The Buffalo Bills’ 251-pound, all-league fullback finally offered a reply yesterday, and it satisfied 20,222 fans at Buffalo’s War Memorial Stadium. He scored 5 touchdowns and rushed for 243 yards as the Bills demolished the New York Jets, 45-14. His rushing total set a league record. His five touchdowns equaled the record held by Billy Cannon of Houston and Abner Haynes of the Dallas Texans, now the Kansas City Chiefs. The 28-year-old Gilchrist, who led the AFL last year with 1,096 yards on 214 attempts, carried the ball 36 times yesterday. Daryle Lamonica, the Buffalo quarterback, just about turned the offense over to Cookie. And Cookie made it a day to be remembered by Daryle, who was making his first start as a pro quarterback. Lamonica was the Buffalo pilot all the way as the Bills rose to third place in the East and dropped the Jets to last place. Buffalo virtually crippled the Jet attack on the first play after the opening kickoff. Sid Youngelman chased Jet quarterback Dick Wood from his 21 to the four, where Wood went down with a left leg injury. The signal-calling duties were turned over to Galen Hall, who could engineer only 38 yards rushing for the Jets. Gilchrist scored his first touchdown from the four after three minutes of play. His others came on a pair of one-yard smashes, and runs of four and 19 yards. Mark Smolinski tallied the Jets’ first touchdown on a one-yard plunge in the first quarter. For the second, Hall tossed a 23-yard touchdown pass to Don Maynard in the fourth quarter.
