Alan Ameche’s touchdown in “The Greatest Game Ever Played”
The 1958 NFL Championship Game between the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants, dubbed "The Greatest Game Ever Played," featured 12 players who were subsequently inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame. The Giants' Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, and Don Maynard were among them. The Colts included Johnny Unitas, Raymond Berry, and Gino Marchetti. Tom Landry and Vince Lombardi, two legendary coaches and competitors, led the New York defense and offense, respectively. Weeb Ewbank, the Colts' head coach, joined them in the Hall of Fame.
NBC broadcast the game nationally, and 45 million people tuned in despite a blackout in the New York region. Unitas led the Colts on a late-fourth-quarter drive, the first to use the two-minute drill, that tied the game with a field goal with seven seconds remaining in regulation. The Giants received the football first when the game went into sudden death overtime. They failed to advance, punted, and Unitas led the Colts on an 80-yard drive to the one-yard line of New York. Alan Ameche then scored the game-winning touchdown on a third-down play. College football was more popular in the United States than professional football until the 1958 championship. Following the game NFL popularity exploded on the still relatively new medium of television, and has grown with it ever since.
Date: 1958
Venue: Yankee Stadium
