January 8, 2000: The Music City Miracle

January 8, 2000, 25 years ago: The Music City Miracle takes place, one of the wildest and most controversial plays in NFL history.

The Houston Oilers moved in 1997, becoming the Tennessee Oilers. After 1 season at the Liberty Bowl in Memphis, they realized they weren't going to draw enough fans as a lame-duck team. All previous pro football teams in Tennessee had been based in Memphis, and, since Memphis and Nashville don't like each other, Nashvillians never really adopted the WFL's Memphis Southmen or the USFL's Memphis Showboats; and Memphis fans, knowing the Oilers would be in Nashville in 1999, rejected them.

So they moved to Nashville a year earlier than they'd intended, even though Vanderbilt Stadium seated only 41,000. After all, they weren't getting that much in Memphis.

In 1999, the Adelphia Coliseum -- now named Nissan Stadium -- opened, across the Cumberland River to the east of downtown Nashville. They changed their name again, to the Tennessee Titans, and adopted a new logo and new colors as well. The people of Nashville really took to them, because, for the first time, they had a true Nashville team to root for.

Winning helped: After going 8-8 in each of their 2 seasons as the Tennessee Oilers, head coach Jeff Fisher led the Titans to a record of 13-3, the best in the franchise's 40-season history. Ordinarily, this would be good enough to win the Division. But the Jacksonville Jaguars went 14-2 to win the AFC Central Division. So the Titans got into the Playoffs as a Wild Card.

But they would get the 1st round of the Playoffs at home. The franchise hadn't made the Playoffs in 6 years, since they were still in the Astrodome.

Their opponents were the Buffalo Bills. Although the Bills had won 4 straight AFC Championships from 1990 to 1993, including beating the Oilers in a Playoff game with the biggest comeback in NFL history, they lost 4 straight Super Bowls. A few players from those teams were still with them as they took the field at Adelphia.

The 1st quarter ended scoreless. Early in the 2nd quarter, Jevon Kearse, known as "The Freak" and winner of the NFL's Defensive Rookie of the Year, sacked Bills quarterback Ron Johnson in the end zone. It was 1 of 6 sacks on the day by the Titans, 1 of 2 by Kearse. Quarterback Steve McNair led the Titans down the field, and scored on a 1-yard run. That made it 9-0 Tennessee.

The next time the Titans had the ball, Al Del Greco attempted a 45-yard field goal, and missed. But the Bills committed a defensive penalty on the play, and Del Greco made the re-kick. The 1st half ended 12-0 in the Titans' favor.

Bills fans need to remember this: For much of the half, their team really wasn't in the game. The Titans held them to 64 yards, and they were penalized for almost as many: 44, after being penalized, how many times, Ed Rooney? "Nine times!"

But on the Bills' 1st play of the 2nd half, Antowain Smith ran for 44 yards. Four plays later, he scored from 4 yards out. On their next drive, Kearse made a big mistake with a roughing-the-passer penalty. This led to Smith scoring another touchdown, early in the 4th quarter, giving the Bills a 13-12 lead. But they couldn't make the 2-point conversion.

Del Greco kicked another field goal to put the Titans ahead 15-13 with 1:48 left in regulation. The Bills drove, and, with 20 seconds left, Steve Christie -- who had kicked the overtime winner in that comeback, 7 years and 5 days earlier -- kicked from 41 yards out, and it was 16-15 Buffalo.

The Bills treated the game as already won. Hall-of-Fame defensive end Bruce Smith was caught on film saying, "We got a win on the road, baby!" But the Bills still had to kick off, and hold the Titans off for another 16 seconds.

Perhaps some Tennessee fans were thinking of the ending of the 1982 California vs. Stanford game, which Cal won with a lateral-filled kickoff return known simply as "The Play." But Titans special teams coordinator Alan Lowry was thinking of a different play from the same year.

He was then an assistant coach with the Dallas Cowboys. Also in Dallas is Southern Methodist University -- both teams used the Cotton Bowl as their main home field from 1960 to 1971 -- and SMU used a trick play on a kickoff return to beat Texas Tech. Lowry made the Titans practice the play, which he called "Home Run Throwback," mixing his sports metaphors. They even used it once in the regular season, scoring a touchdown against the Atlanta Falcons.

Christie tried a "pooch kick," to make it harder to run the ball back. Lorenzo Neal picked the ball up. Right behind him was Frank Wycheck, and Neal handed him the ball. This was key: The Bills saw this, and keyed on Wycheck.

Wycheck then threw the ball across the field, to Kevin Dyson. Except for Christie, every Bills player was fooled. Dyson ran down the sideline 75 yards, and had every other Titan available to block every Bill player coming over, and scored a touchdown.

Titans broadcaster Mike Keith had the call:

Do the Titans have a miracle left in them, in what has been a magical season to this point? If they do, they need it now. Christie kicks it high and short. Gonna be fielded by Lorenzo Neal at the 25, pitches it back to Wycheck, he throws it across the field to Dyson, 30, 40, 50, 40, 30, 20, 10, 5, end zone! Touchdown, Titans! There are no flags on the field! It's a miracle! Tennessee has pulled a miracle! A miracle for the Titans!

On TV for ABC, Mike Patrick had a similar call: "Dyson's going to go all the way! And there is no flag!"

Why would there be a penalty flag? Because it looked to many people like Wycheck had thrown a forward pass on a kickoff, which is illegal. The referee agreed to review the play.

The referee was Phil Luckett. Twice, in the previous season, he had been involved in controversy. On Thanksgiving, he had flipped the coin for overtime, and heard the Pittsburgh Steelers' Jerome Bettis call "Heads" then change his mind to "Tails," and went with the initial call of "Heads." The coin landed tails, the Detroit Lions got the ball, and they kicked a field goal to win without the Steelers even getting the ball. The Steelers missed the Playoffs due in part to losing that game.

A few weeks later, Vinny Testaverde fell a foot short of the goal line on a 4th down play, but the ball was ruled to have crossed the plane of the goal line, giving the New York Jets a win they didn't really deserve against the Seattle Seahawks. Luckett wasn't the official who made the call, and it wasn't reviewable under the rules of that season; but as head official for the game, he got blamed. So, for the 1999 season, the NFL team owners voted to bring instant replay back, and this was the biggest reviewed play since that decision.

The rule for instant replay is that, in order for the call on the field to be overturned, it must be conclusively shown to have been wrong. The replay didn't conclusively show that Wycheck's throw was a forward pass. I've seen it many times, and have never had any doubt that it was a lateral, slightly (maybe a foot or two) backward. No one reviewing the play thought the throw was the slightest bit forward. The touchdown was allowed to stand.

There were still 3 seconds left on the clock when Dyson crossed the goal line. So this crazy game wasn't over yet. But the Bills didn't have a "miracle" of their own, and the Titans won, 22-16.

During the off-season, the NFL office hired a computer analyst to check the play. Once again, it was affirmed that the Wycheck throw was a lateral. After 25 years, Bills fans still disagree.

But, through 2 different broadcasters' use of the word "miracle," the play and the game have become known as the Music City Miracle.

The Titans went on to beat the Indianapolis Colts and the Jaguars, to win the franchise's 1st AFC Championship. As the Oilers, they had won the AFL Championship in 1960 and 1961, but had lost the AFL Championship Game in 1962 and 1967, and had lost the AFC Championship Game in 1978 and 1979. So this would be the franchise's 1st trip to the Super Bowl.

The Titans lost Super Bowl XXXIV to the St. Louis Rams, 24-17. On the game's final play, Dyson, who had scored the touchdown on the Music City Miracle, was tackled by Mike Jones, 1 yard short of a touchdown that, with an extra point, would have sent the game to overtime -- or, with a 2-point conversion, would have won Tennessee the World Championship.

The Titans made the Playoffs in 5 of the next 9 years, and lost another AFC Championship Game in 2002. Then they went into a down period. But they have rebuilt. They reached the AFC Championship Game again in 2019, made the Playoffs again in 2020. The Bills missed the Playoffs for the next 17 seasons in a row. But they, too, have built a contender, and reached the AFC Championship Game in 2020. 

Both teams were eliminated from the 2021-22 Playoffs in the Divisional round. The Titans then dropped off, but the Bills have stayed strong.

Frank Wycheck died on December 9, 2023, at the age of 52. He thought he had CTE, and he may have been right, because he died from falling and hitting his head.

The day after, the Bills got hit with a similar play against the Kansas City Chiefs, but it was nullified for offside. Like the Music City Miracle, the officials got the call correct. And the Bills won the game.