IRVING, Texas -- Every so often, when Lee Roy Jordan runs into Donny Anderson at Royal Oaks Country Club in Dallas, he knows where the conversation will eventually lead, especially on a cold day late in an NFL season.
They are members of the club, play golf together every now and then, and share stories with their friends.
The Ice Bowl comes up often.
"It's been a couple weeks since he brought it up to me," Jordan said. "If I see him this week, I'm sure he'll be on it."
Anderson was a halfback on Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers. Jordan was a linebacker on Tom Landry's Dallas Cowboys. Anderson is a member of the Packers Hall of Fame. Jordan's name adorns the Cowboys' Ring of Honor at AT&T Stadium.
The Cowboys return to Lambeau Field on Sunday for a playoff game for the first time since the 1967 NFL championship, and Jordan's and Anderson's phones have been ringing a lot. Such has been the case for other players on both teams.
"The Ice Bowl, it was miserable," Anderson said. "The thing about it is, I always try to say this in a nice way, but if we could remember pain as human beings, then we would never accomplish much. Women would never have babies again. The pain of being in the military, being shot and wanting to go back and protect our country, it's part of the life. I wonder sometimes how we truly played in the game, the teams. And then we both did as well as we did."
The Packers won 21-17 on Bart Starr's quarterback keeper with 13 seconds left in one of the most iconic games in NFL history. At the time, the temperatures were about minus-20. At kickoff, it was minus-13, the coldest game in NFL history. When the Cowboys answered the wake-up call in the morning at their hotel, they were greeted with a message that it was 17 degrees below zero.
"We had this little U-shaped motel," Jordan said, "and by the time it got to me and Don Meredith, we were in the middle of the hotel, and I looked out the window. I just wanted to see what 17 below zero looked like. And I could see my teammates doing the same thing. Bob Hayes, I could see him across the corridor. His eyes looked like saucers. He was totally shocked."
Dallas RB Dan Reeves remembers going to breakfast with teammate Walt Garrison. They stepped outside and quickly started jogging and turned that jog into a sprint before reaching the restaurant door.
"It dropped 32 degrees overnight," Reeves said. "Believe me, I'm an old Southern boy. I thought 32 degrees was as freezing cold as it could get. That's the first time I realized going from 15 above to 17 below is like going from 70 degrees to 102. You can feel it either way."
When it gets cold these days, Jordan's hands and feet ache. Reeves said he knows some players have long-term issues from frostbite. He has a scar from when his tooth came through his lip during the game.
"And it didn't bleed, it was so cold," Reeves said. "I'm dead serious. It didn't bleed until I went over to the heaters."
Cowboys defensive line coach Ernie Stautner did not let his players wear gloves. Jordan attempted to show some solidarity with the defensive linemen by not wearing gloves, but that lasted just one series. However, the gloves he put on were nothing like what players wear today. Jordan said they were more like gardening gloves.
Players wore Saran Wrap over their socks to keep warm, a trick told to them by some locker-room attendants.
"As soon as you cut, you would get the cold coming through," Reeves said. "The official, Norm Schachter, blew his whistle at the start of the game and peeled skin off when he pulled it out of his mouth, so they did away with the metal whistles."
Sunday's high is supposed to be close to 20 degrees at kickoff. Players will be prepared. The benches will be heated. The thermal technology with jerseys and clothing has improved. In the Ice Bowl, players wore normal long johns and cut Ace bandages in half and wrapped them around their ears for protection.
The field won't be frozen, either.
Jordan, Anderson and Reeves, and many of their former teammates, will be watching and remembering what they went through.
"Thank God they're not going to have to play in that weather this week," Anderson said.
A few years ago, Anderson remembers walking by some buddies at a big round table at the 19th hole at Royal Oaks -- including Jack Spikes, an original member of the 1960 Dallas Texans.
"He says, 'What are you doing?'" Anderson recalled. "I said, 'I'm going to play some golf today. It's going to be a beautiful day.' Another member says, 'You've got to be crazy.' 'Nah, it's a great day.' Then he said, 'We forget. You're a Green Bay Packer.' They always made fun of the fact that we were supposed to be something special because we played in the cold."
How cold was it that day at the golf club?
"Oh, it was probably 20 degrees," Anderson said. "Something like that."