Tom Wilkinson (Canadian football)

Tom Wilkinson (Canadian football)

NFL player
DateOfBirth=birth date and age|1943|1|4
Birthplace=flagicon|USA Iowa
Position=Quarterback
College=University of Wyoming
DraftedYear=
DraftedRound=
Career Highlights=Y
CFLAllStar=1974, 1978, 1979
Awards=
years=1967-1970
1971
1972-1981
teams=Toronto Argonauts
British Columbia Lions
Edmonton Eskimos
CollegeHOF=
CFHOF=24&player=Wilkinson,%20Tom

Tom Wilkinson was a football quarterback for several teams in the Canadian Football League.

He was born in Iowa on January 4, 1943 but moved to Wyoming with his parents in 1945. Tom Wilkinson played high school football in the small town of Greybull, Wyoming. He is the second of three professional football players to come from this little town of 1700 in the Big Horn Basin. The others were Jim Crawford who played for the Boston Patriots of the American Football League and Brett Keisel who plays for the Pittsburgh Steelers. He was scouted as both a football and baseball player out of high school.

Football career

Wilkinson attended the University of Wyoming on a football scholarship. After he graduated there, he was signed as a quarterback by the Toronto Rifles of the Continental Football League. He played a total of 16 games for the Rifles in 1966 and 1967, throwing the ball 287 times for 141 completions with 1952 yards, 11 interceptions and 18 touchdowns. It was during 1967 he moved to the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League as a backup quarterback in 1967. He was the team's leading quarterback in 1969 throwing for 2041 yards. In 1970 Wilkinson made way for Don Jonas to lead the Argos, but still got enough playing time to throw for 1272 yards. Traded to the BC Lions in 1971, he played there for a year before being released prior to the 1972 CFL season. He was picked up by the Edmonton Eskimos and played well enough in the remaining pre-season games to make the team as a backup, but by season's end he was their top passer with 2475 yards in which he completed 177 out of 268. Wilkinson would play the balance of his career there in a two-quarterback system. First with Bruce Lemmerman and then with Warren Moon. Oddly enough, after his first professional seasons, when he was considered to be rather injury prone, Wilkinson was never to miss a game during his 10 years with the Eskimos.

"Wilkie" was a western conference and CFL all-star quarterback in 1974, 1978 and 1979. He won the CFL's Most Outstanding Player Award in 1974.

He first led the Eskimos to a Grey Cup victory in 1975, an especially sweet triumph after disappointing losses in the championship game in 1973 and 1974. After quarterbacking the Eskimos during one more Grey Cup loss in 1977, Wilkinson became an integral part of the 5-time Grey Cup champion Eskimo dynasty from 1978 through 1981, the last two years acting as a backup to Moon.

Including his time with the Rifles, Wilkinson contributed 24,531 passing yards on 1754 completions from 2949 attempts and with 137 interceptions to 172 touchdowns. Although not known for his running abilities he also added 1250 rushing yards on 352 runs with 13 touchdowns.

He retired after the Eskimos' 1981 Grey Cup Championship year. Tom Wilkinson was the inaugural player honoured on the Edmonton Eskimo's "Wall of Fame" at Commonwealth Stadium in 1982.

After retirement

He was elected to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame as a Player, May 2, 1987. He was the head coach of the University of Alberta Golden Bears until 2001. In 2004, he was announced as the first president of the North American Indoor Football League, [cite web | url = http://www.canoe.ca/Slam/Football/Arena/2004/06/16/501844.html | accessdate = 2006-11-30 | title = Loopy launch | author = Terry Jones | publisher = Edmonton Sun | date = 2004-06-16] a Canadian indoor football league that failed to launch and never played a single game.

References

# Official CFL Stats 1967 to 1981
# Ronald A. Ferroni, the 2001 Unofficial Football Encyclopedia, Hamilton 2001.

External links

* [http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/magazine/features/si50/states/wyoming/greatest/ The 50 Greatest Wyoming Sports Figures]
* [http://www.argonauts.ca/Argos/History/ArgoHeroes/2004/11/10/708692.html Argo Heros - Tom Wilkinson]


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