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The Immaculate Reception came about 50 years in the past on 12/23/72. And it has been charming NFL followers ever since.
Why is the Immaculate Reception nonetheless revered 50 years later?
The identical cause folks love discussing if bigfoot, aliens, ghosts, or sincere attorneys exist.
As a result of there’s simply sufficient proof that proves they do exist, as there’s that proves they don’t.
For as a lot video footage exists of the play, none of it’s conclusive. And in a world the place completely nothing occurs with out being videotaped from a number of angles anymore, the intrigue over this play has done nothing but continue to grow 12 months over 12 months as know-how advances.
What was at stake previous to the Immaculate Reception within the sport that came about in that AFC divisional playoff sport on December twenty third 1972 at Three Rivers Stadium?
The 1972 season marked the third 12 months after the AFL-NFL merger, which had the Steelers transfer to the newly fashioned American Soccer Convention regardless of not having been a member of the American Soccer League. Thus, this was the third 12 months by which a playoff assembly between the Raiders and the Steelers may happen outdoors a Super Bowl.
Having missed the playoffs the 12 months earlier than, the 2 groups met within the opening sport of the season (on September 17), which Pittsburgh received, 34–28. In that sport, the Steelers took leads of 17–0 and 27–7 on a blocked-punt return touchdown and two rushing touchdowns by Terry Bradshaw. Oakland would battle again with three touchdowns within the fourth quarter, together with a 70-yard landing move from “The Mad Bomber” Daryle Lamonica to Mike Siani, however Pittsburgh received
Each groups would find yourself profitable their respective division. Pittsburgh’s 11–3 report put them one sport over the Cleveland Browns, who earned the AFC’s wild-card spot, and Oakland’s mark of 10–3–1 ousted the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs by 2½ video games.
The Steelers hosted the sport. Whoever received would face the Miami Dolphins within the AFC Championship the next week.
What occurred within the sport previous to the Immaculate Reception?
It was a troublesome, grueling, bodily sport between the Steelers and Raiders that typified the blood feud between the 2 franchises within the early Nineteen Seventies. Each sport was as brutal because it was important.
The Steelers and Raiders hated one another. A lot in order that in 1976 it led to a prison courtroom.
A $2 million dispute stemmed from Atkinson’s vicious blow away from the play late within the first half of the 1976 season opener that rendered Pittsburgh large receiver Lynn Swann ineffective for the second half with a concussion.
Steelers coach Chuck Noll referred to Atkinson as “a prison ingredient” that ought to be banished from the NFL. Atkinson pressed prices.
After 4 hours of additional assessment, that is what the jury determined: No slander. No malice. No damages for Atkinson. NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle fined him $1,500 for being a unclean participant. Noll bought docked $1,000 for criticizing one other staff’s participant.
However that was 4 years after the Immaculate Reception. The occasion itself marking a precipitous boil of coming tensions.
The primary half of the Immaculate Reception sport was a 0-0 tie. It was a basic blustery, chilly, and windy day in Pittsburgh. By the top of the third quarter the Steelers had mustered a 6-0 lead thanks to 2 subject targets.
With 1:17 left within the sport, Raiders’ QB Ken Stabler scored on one of many slowest 30-yard TD QB scrambles you’ll ever see.
What was the Immaculate Reception?
Trailing the Oakland Raiders 7–6, the Pittsburgh Steelers confronted fourth-and-10 on their very own 40-yard line with 22 seconds remaining within the sport and no time-outs.
Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw, below heavy strain, threw the ball to the Raiders’ 35-yard line, the place it was supposed for operating again John Fuqua. On the actual second the ball arrived, Raider’s security Jack Tatum made contact with Fuqua and knocked him to the bottom. The ball was despatched flying backwards, finish over finish, headed in direction of the frozen turf subject.
Steelers running back Franco Harris was blocking on the play, however steadily moved downfield as a acquired, as soon as Bradshaw needed to transfer out of the pocket.
Simply because the ball hit the bottom, Harris screamed in from nowhere and scooped it up, in stride. Harris ran previous two Raiders defenders and used a stiff arm to keep off a Raiders defensive again and scored a TD.
The Immaculate Reception GIF:
From Wikipedia:
“The crucial query: whom did the soccer contact within the Fuqua/Tatum collision? If it bounced off Fuqua with out ever touching Tatum, then Harris’s reception was unlawful. If the ball bounced off solely Tatum, or if it bounced off each Fuqua and Tatum (in any order), then the reception was authorized.
The rule said in pertinent half that if an offensive participant touches a move first, he’s the one offensive participant eligible to catch the move. “Nevertheless, if a [defensive] participant touches [the] move first, or concurrently with or subsequent to its having been touched by just one [offensive] participant, then all [offensive] gamers grow to be and stay eligible” to catch the move.”
So, what truly occurred? Was the Immaculate Reception a authorized play?
Relying on who you ask, you’re going to get two fully totally different solutions.
Raiders defender Tatum mentioned that the ball didn’t bounce off him, each instantly after the sport in addition to in his memoirs. Steelers’ Fuqua has made a cottage business of his involvement of the play, giving talks and public appearances the place he stays coy however says he is aware of “precisely what occurred” and can by no means inform.
Then-Raiders coach John Madden summed it up greatest: “Irrespective of what number of occasions I watch the movies of the ‘immaculate reception’ play, I by no means know for positive what occurred.”
Apart from studying via the historical past of the occasion and numerous first individual accounts, how will you get a direct reply? By going on to the 2 gamers concerned – Terry Bradshaw and Franco Harris.
After I requested Bradshaw about how the Immaculate Reception affected his life, he mentioned it didn’t, flatly.
“The ‘Immaculate Reception’ did nothing to assist me; we received a sport and bought beat the next week. It’s voted an excellent play yearly, however not a lot. It wouldn’t change something that occurred.”
“I threw the ball as arduous as I may from our 30-yard line, to their 35, the place it makes contact and flies into the air. Franco is standing round their 45. I didn’t throw the ball arduous sufficient for it to bounce that far again off Fuqua, and since Fuqua was operating throughout the sector, the ball would have veered to the proper if it had hit him. That ball should have bounced off Tatum – if that had occurred then Tatum’s momentum carries the ball backward.”
After my interplay with Terry, I hoped Franco mirrored upon the play extra positively. In all probability as a result of I had for all these years. And Bradshaw’s sentiment on the play was akin to discovering out Santa Claus wasn’t actual.
However Franco was upbeat and constructive about what the play meant to him.
“That was the springboard to the success we had for the remainder of that decade. Earlier than that 12 months, 1972, the Steelers have been a laughing inventory. I truthfully did not wish to play for them – and I went to Penn State so I ought to’ve!”
“Earlier than that 12 months, the Steelers had 8 straight shedding seasons. And even earlier than that they weren’t any good. We win the Immaculate Reception sport, however we lastly beat the Raiders. Positive, we misplaced to the Dolphins the subsequent week who ended up profitable the Tremendous Bowl that 12 months, however within the subsequent 7 years we make the playoffs yearly and win 4 Tremendous Bowls. I believe it positively contributed and who is aware of how totally different the whole lot can be if it didn’t occur.”
“However one issues for positive – I positively caught that ball.”
The Immaculate Reception is 50 years outdated.
Like all nice thriller or unknown, the factor that retains it subsisting is the dearth of a conclusive reply. And the identical holds true for the Immaculate Reception.
Whether or not it’s supposedly conclusive footage of the play recorded by Pittsburgh’s Channel 4 that was misplaced on account of “insufficient submitting procedures.”
Or that all the most important video recordings from that day from a number of angles all fail to point out the complete, accomplished play, the thriller of the Immaculate Reception will stay ceaselessly.
Until your identify is Terry or Franco.
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