8502210068
DETROIT FREE PRESS
851216
Monday, December 16, 1985
METRO FINAL
1F
MITCH ALBOM
Copyright (c) 1985, Detroit Free Press
LIONS RELIVE THEIR SEASON IN ITS FINAL TWO MINUTES
He was standing in the doorway to the locker room, his body limp, his head
lowered, eyes on the foot which had betrayed him just minutes earlier.
He was alone. But then, kickers in pro football are always alone -- more
painfully so after they miss a kick, and agonizingly so when the kick could
have meant the game. When the kick could have meant the season -- the
playoffs, a winning record, everything -- it is nearly impossible for an
outsider to understand.
Welcome to Ed Murray's world on Sunday.
He had faced the questions earlier: about the snap, which was high; about
the kick itself, which missed to the right; about the effect it had on his
Lions teammates, which could only be summarized as "devastating."
There were, after all, only 68 seconds left in the game and the Lions had
just charged 73 yards for a touchdown, a gorgeous long-bomb touchdown, an
over-the-shoulder catch by Leonard Thompson that would have left Willie Mays
grinning nostalgically.
Oh, what that one play accomplished! It tied the score, 23-23; raised the
Lions from the dead; opened the possibility of the playoffs again, and
ignited what few fans were left in the Silverdome. Life! Life! All that was
needed was the extra point, the candles on the cake of football scoring.
Murray trotted onto the field. Confident. Earlier in the game he had
broken the club record for consecutive field goals with a 19-yarder to close
the first half. He had jumped high, swung a fist at the air, then run after
the referee to retrieve the football. A souvenir. He'd keep it. His day. Yeah!
And no. The point-after snap was high. Eric Hipple struggled to get it
down. Murray rushed into it, booted it, and watched it rise to the right,
while his heart went in the opposite direction.
No good.
"We should be standing here with a win," he said, his voice choked.
"Instead we're here with a loss . . . and out of the playoffs."
'We never should have lost this'
William Gay was leaning against the wall, his bulky frame oozing out of
a gray T-shirt. Gay, a big man with a soft voice, was alone now, too.
He and his defensive teammates had taken the field following Murray's miss.
OK. The game was tied. They had to accept that. Just hold the Packers for 61
seconds and we go into overtime.
Instead, the Packers went through the Lions' defense as a bull goes
through a fence.
"It was in our hands," said Gay, his face squinting in disbelief. "We
should have never lost this."
But then they never should have let the Packers drive on them the way they
did -- 71 yards in 61 seconds, the crippler being a trap play by Eddie Lee
Ivery, who raced up the middle for 32 yards to the Lions' 7.
It was frantic. It was nothing new. All game long, it seemed the Packers
must've showered in axle grease, the way the Lions kept letting them slip out
of their grasp.
The Packers sat on the ball, letting the seconds drip away. They brought
out their field goal kicker with two ticks left on the clock, and drove a
yellow and green stake through the heart of the Lions.
Kick is good. Game over. Final score: 26-23.
"Now nobody has to talk to us about the playoffs," Gay said softly. "We
know we're out."
Jeers for a wounded warrior
He was standing near his locker, the knee that had forced his surrender
still throbbing painfully. Quarterbacks live and die in a solo spotlight, and
on this Sunday, the light had been blood red on Eric Hipple. He was as alone
as the rest of them. Maybe worse.
For more than any other single player, his performance had put the Lions
on the gangplank that led to the final hysteria just described. Despite a
barrel full of completions, Hipple threw three interceptions, two of which
choked potential scoring drives, one of which was returned 80 yards for a
touchdown.
"I lost my composure," he said. "I got ticked off . . . That one that was
returned for a touchdown, I was trying to get the ball to (Leonard) Thompson.
I should've been more patient."
Three plays later, Hipple suffered the final indignity. His already injured
left knee took another hard shot, and as he doubled over in pain, obviously
unable to continue, a thunderous cheer went up from the tasteless Silverdome
crowd, who had given up long before the Lions had.
He was done. The team would shortly follow.
For in the end, it was the end. And Hipple and Murray and Gay and everyone
else in a Lions uniform knew they had done it to themselves.
Those final two minutes were the Lions' season in snack-pack size.
Unexpected heroics. Unexpected mistakes. And ultimately, a few points and a
few seconds short of the big victory.
The playoffs are now a vapor. The winning record is blowin' in the wind.
The "Dome Field Advantage" is an obsolete joke.
The Lions will be home for the holidays. It is something they all have to
live with. Together. And alone.
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