I was 10 years old, sitting in an ESPN Zone in Disneyland, Calif., during a family Christmas vacation. Taking a break from fighting though the hordes of crowds at the park, my dad was longing on a bar stool while I was scurrying back and forth between arcade games and watching one of my favorite teams – the Kansas City Chiefs.
The Chiefs were playing the San Diego Chargers, as I was in the midst of playing a PGA masters arcade game, I looked up and saw Trent Green connect with Marc Boerigter for a NFL record tying 99-yard touchdown pass. To this day, that is still the first memory I have about that vacation. It was a rare play. So rare, that it has only happened 12 times in the NFL.
“Who the heck is Marc Boerigter?” I thought. Little did I know that unknown receiver that just tied NFL history, was an alumnus of my future college.
The hometown wide out was a Hastings legend. At his time at Hastings College, Boerigter set two team records – with 20.5 yards per catch and 30 touchdowns, while catching 93 passes for 1092 yards.
Before he went to the NFL, Boerigter won the 2001 Grey Cup with the Calgary Stampeders in the Canadian Football League. In that game, Boerigter caught a 68-yard touchdown and helped the Stampeders win 27-19.
Boerigter played in the NFL until 2004, where sat most of the year due to injury.
He was one of three HC Broncos to make it to an NFL roster. Former defensive lineman Jerry Drake and Nebraska icon and college football legend, Tom Osborne are the other two.
Drake was a 6’5” 312 pound defensive lineman from Kingston, New York that played for the Broncos in the early 90s. He played six seasons in the NFL (1995-2000) for the Arizona Cardinals, in which he amassed 55 tackles, one sack and one interception.
Osborne, one of my greatest heroes throughout my adolescence, played three years in the NFL. After playing as a quarterback at HC, Osborne played two years as a receiver with the Redskins from 1960-61 and one year with the 49ers in 1962.
Nine years after that play, and I’m now writing about Boerigter, that player I watched as a kid waiting in an ESPN Zone in Disneyland, as a member of his old college. How odd is that?
