[Austroturf]

i remember it well.
a few months later, there was a legitimate photograph in the Stanford Daily of a referee waving the play dead.  i wonder if anyone can find it.

see

https://archives.stanforddaily.com/1982/...28#article

thanks, 82lsju.

Pac 12 Network has been airing documentary on The Play all week.  The production is 10 years old or so, but somehow, I had missed it until this week.  All the Stanford participants were classmates, fellow house members, fellow-bandsters, etc., so it was particularly compelling for me to watch this look down Memory Lane.  The Stanford reps (including footballers Elway, Dressel, Dot) all had remarkable maturity and perspective - time will heal most/all wounds, and the aftermath of The Play hurt for a long time.  Paul Wiggins reinforced what a true gentleman he was.  They even had an official from the game commenting.

And that leads to what I found most interesting (and that I hadn't know previously).  The official acknowledged the photo above (waving off the play) and said that Stanford "had a strong argument" (or words awfully close to that) that The Play was mishandled by the refs.  But in that cauldron/craziness that was Memorial Stadium after Moen had plowed into our own Gary T, was there any way they were going to have the fortitude to make "the right call?"  No way.  No how.

P.S.  Joe Kapp was so . . . . Joe Kapp!  ("You get over there and tell the referee that was a good touchdown!!").  I did like how the player sitting next to him for much of the interview got emotional about how big a moment that was for every coach and player for Cal . . . hard not to be just a little happy for him/them after all these years.  Plus . . . there was a measure of revenge in 1990 (for the Stanford fans, anyway).

P.P.S.  The documentary included a segment on the Fake Daily Californian.  The BEST part of that brilliant move was the description of Kapp upon hearing the news, and of course the now-famous quote attributed to him:  "Life isn't fair.  I swear to God it isn't."  [I STILL laugh at that one!].

To this day, every time some highlight reel includes the Play in its pantheon of greatest ever comebacks or craziest plays of all time, I stop watching.  It's a moment in football that never would have survived today's review process and thoroughly robbed Elway and the gang of a well-deserved bowl game that season.  Yes, it's memorable; yes, it has become iconic of the Stanford-Cal rivalry; and, yes, I am perhaps being a bit sour-grapes about it all.  But any replay of that kick-off shows multiple infractions that should have halted play.  Nearly forty years later, we are still talking about it, so there's that.  I just don't enjoy watching it, but that's par for the course when your team is on the bad end of an event like that.

[Austroturf]

i remember it well.
a few months later, there was a legitimate photograph in the Stanford Daily of a referee waving the play dead.  i wonder if anyone can find it.

see

https://archives.stanforddaily.com/1982/...28#article

thanks, 82lsju.

Pac 12 Network has been airing documentary on The Play all week.  The production is 10 years old or so, but somehow, I had missed it until this week.  All the Stanford participants were classmates, fellow house members, fellow-bandsters, etc., so it was particularly compelling for me to watch this look down Memory Lane.  The Stanford reps (including footballers Elway, Dressel, Dot) all had remarkable maturity and perspective - time will heal most/all wounds, and the aftermath of The Play hurt for a long time.  Paul Wiggins reinforced what a true gentleman he was.  They even had an official from the game commenting.

And that leads to what I found most interesting (and that I hadn't know previously).  The official acknowledged the photo above (waving off the play) and said that Stanford "had a strong argument" (or words awfully close to that) that The Play was mishandled by the refs.  But in that cauldron/craziness that was Memorial Stadium after Moen had plowed into our own Gary T, was there any way they were going to have the fortitude to make "the right call?"  No way.  No how.

P.S.  Joe Kapp was so . . . . Joe Kapp!  ("You get over there and tell the referee that was a good touchdown!!").  I did like how the player sitting next to him for much of the interview got emotional about how big a moment that was for every coach and player for Cal . . . hard not to be just a little happy for him/them after all these years.  Plus . . . there was a measure of revenge in 1990 (for the Stanford fans, anyway).

P.P.S.  The documentary included a segment on the Fake Daily Californian.  The BEST part of that brilliant move was the description of Kapp upon hearing the news, and of course the now-famous quote attributed to him:  "Life isn't fair.  I swear to God it isn't."  [I STILL laugh at that one!].

To this day, every time some highlight reel includes the Play in its pantheon of greatest ever comebacks or craziest plays of all time, I stop watching.  It's a moment in football that never would have survived today's review process and thoroughly robbed Elway and the gang of a well-deserved bowl game that season.  Yes, it's memorable; yes, it has become iconic of the Stanford-Cal rivalry; and, yes, I am perhaps being a bit sour-grapes about it all.  But any replay of that kick-off shows multiple infractions that should have halted play.  Nearly forty years later, we are still talking about it, so there's that.  I just don't enjoy watching it, but that's par for the course when your team is on the bad end of an event like that.