‘The Greatest Game Ever Played’ Remembered Fifty Years Later

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How many professional sports leagues can pinpoint the exact spot, the exact day, even the exact time they “arrived?” The National Football League can: Yankee Stadium, December 28, 1958, 4:51 PM. Fifty years ago this December 28 — the final day of the 2008 NFL regular season — what would become known as “The Greatest Game Ever Played” took place — the 1958 NFL Championship Game between the Baltimore Colts and New York Giants at Yankee Stadium in New York City. And when Colts fullback Alan Ameche burst through a hole for a one-yard touchdown with 6:45 left in overtime — at 4:51 on a foggy, drizzly day — he took the National Football League with him into a new era. The NFL would never be the same. America had discovered it.

It may be hard for today’s young sports fan to believe, but 50 years ago, the sports scene — and the NFL — was vastly different. There was no SportsCenter, no internet (and therefore no EMQB), no sports-talk radio, no fantasy football. The “X-Games” didn’t exist because, for most Americans, there were no “alternative” games. Baseball was the No. 1 sport with fans. Then came this late-winter nationally televised NFL epic between larger-than-life teams featuring picturesque names like “Huff” and “Katcavage” and “Unitas” in a game that surged back and forth into the first sudden-death overtime in NFL title game history.

Here’s a heads-up for you. You can watch this game — digitally restored and colorized by ESPN Films in association with NFL Films — on ESPN next weekend — Saturday, December 13 at 9 p.m. ET. I’m not so sure it was the greatest NFL game ever played, but it was probably the most important.

Source: NFL Media