49ers 28, Cowboys 27
Jan. 10, 1982
NFC Championship at Candlestick Park |
Joe Montana goofed, and the Cowboys left their hearts in San Francisco.
Montana, the 49ers quarterback, said later that he had wanted to throw the ball out of the end zone when he got rid of that third-down pass under heavy pressure with 58 seconds left. But he didn't put quite enough on it. He also didn't plan on receiver Dwight Clark leaping so high on the back edge of the end zone that he got one hand on the ball and pulled it in for the decisive touchdown.
Neither did Everson Walls. He was a rookie cornerback then, and a good one. Now he's approaching middle age and people still ask him what went wrong with his coverage on Clark on that play.
"I still can't believe how high he got, and how he managed to grab it with four fingers," Walls said. "Joe rolled to my left, his right, and the play took so long. He went inside me, and danced around in the back of the end zone, and when I turned around to look for him, the ball was already up. Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I thought he went out of the end zone before he made the catch.
"It's not the best catch I ever saw, but it was the most important one."
The 49ers went on to win their first of five Super Bowls over the next 14 years. The Cowboys, so close to making it to another one, would have to wait 11 more years.
