Newhouse
played 12 seasons in the National Football League, all of them for the
Cowboys under Tom Landry. Selected by Dallas in the second round of the
1972 draft out of the University of Houston, he soon became essential
for the Cowboys, playing mostly as a fullback expected to grind out
three or four yards. He was quick and strong, propelled by thighs once
measured at 44 inches around. In 1975 he led the team in rushing, with
930 yards, and was ninth in the league at 4.4 yards per carry.
Newhouse’s
fortunes began changing in the late 1970s with the emergence of Tony
Dorsett, the Cowboys’ top pick in the 1977 draft. Over the next few
seasons, Newhouse became more of a blocker than a runner, opening holes
for the speedy and dazzling Dorsett. He did not start a game after 1980.
Newhouse may be most remembered for making a spectacular play that would not be expected of a fullback. In the Super Bowl
in 1978, Dallas was leading by 20-10 with seven minutes remaining when
it recovered a Denver fumble in Denver territory. Landry, sensing that
his opponent was rattled, called a trick play the Cowboys had been
practicing all week: brown right, X-opposite shift, toss 38, halfback
lead, fullback pass to Y.
The ball was on the Denver 29-yard line. Newhouse was nervous in the huddle.
“I was worried because I had all this stickum on my hands,” he told The Dallas Morning News in 1978,
referring to the sticky substance that was often used to help players
catch the ball but is now banned. “So Preston Pearson handed me this
rag, and I was in there” — the huddle — “scrubbing it all. They’d seen
us run the play right but not to the left and so didn’t recognize it in
time.”
When
the ball was snapped, Newhouse took a pitch from quarterback Roger
Staubach and began moving to the left, as if he would try to run up the
sideline. Instead, he stopped suddenly, turning and throwing back to his
right. Wide receiver Golden Richards caught the ball over the
outstretched hand of Broncos defensive back Steve Foley for a 29-yard
score that secured the Cowboys’ 27-10 win, their second Super Bowl
victory.
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