The Kansas City Chiefs had the best record in pro football from 1966 through 1971 and made two Super Bowl games in that span. Kansas City crushed Minnesota 23-7 in Super Bowl IV for the greatest moment in franchise history in a dominant performance where they battered and abused the physical Vikings. Just two years later, however, the Chiefs would suffer their most painful loss and darkest hour in team history. It is a defeat that has stood the test of time and one in which the team has still not quite recovered from.
The Longest and Greatest Game Ever Played
With no apologies at all to the New York media machine, the greatest NFL game ever was not the 1958 Colts vs. Giants title matchup. It was the Miami Dolphins vs. Kansas City Chiefs AFC playoff game that took place on December 25, 1971. Miami scored an epic 27-24 double overtime win that was a thrill a minute with countless big plays and what ifs. The game took 82 minutes and 40 seconds of official time.
The Christmas Day game was transformational in so many ways including a shift of power. Miami became the dominant team in the AFC after their win at Kansas City while the Chiefs would not win another division title for 22 long years.
Canton Came to Kansas City
The Longest Game featured 14 NFL Hall of Famers and a Chiefs team that had a whopping total of 10 Pro Bowlers on their roster. Kansas City was a solid betting favorite as an established power while Miami was a 1966 expansion team that had never beaten the Chiefs and were in the playoffs for just the second time. Miami receiver Paul Warfield has stated that the Chiefs were the better team in the matchup and that the Dolphins were simply hoping to play well and not embarrass themselves.
Early Lead
The Chiefs jumped out to a 10-0 first quarter lead and appeared to have the game in firm control. Kansas City’s “Red Wood Forest” defense completely shut down the powerful Miami running game led by Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick. Dolphins quarterback Bob Griese took to the air with great success utilizing Warfield for many clutch catches. Warfield ended the day with seven catches good for 140 yards.
Many Chiefs players, officials, fans and historians consider the 1971 team the greatest in club history but a deeper look reveals that the Chiefs defense lacked the dominant pass rush of preceding seasons and the KC secondary was not as tight as its championship team of 1969. Griese picked the Chiefs apart with pinpoint passing and ended up going 20-35 for 263 yards with a TD.
It was Griese’s clutch passing that tied the game late in the fourth quarter after a furious do or die drive in which the Dolphins signal-caller converted several third down plays. The Chiefs lack of a dominant pass rush and air tight secondary was best evidenced on that game tying Dolphin drive as they let Griese and Miami off the hook time and again. The Chiefs also failed to recover a Miami fumble at mid field which would have clinched the win for Kansas City.
Game of His Life
With the game tied at 24-24 and under a minute to play, Miami kicked off to Kansas City’s Ed Podolak who broke away for an electrifying 78 yard return to set up what everyone believed to be was the game winning field goal for the Chiefs.
Podolak had 350 all-purpose yards in the game which remains a NFL playoff record. He remains a football legend thanks to the Christmas Day game.
Painful Irony
All-Pro kicker and future NFL Hall of Famer Jan Stenerud took to the field three plays after Podolak’s return for a 31-yard field goal attempt to win the game. The only pure kicker in the Pro Football Hall of Fame incredibly missed the attempt by inches as he sliced the ball high and just off to the right. The game went into overtime.
“My history and legacy were defined by that one kick,” Stenerud later said.
It was the worst day of Stenerud’s career as he earlier missed a 29-yard attempt that was meant to be a fake field goal. However, snapper Bobby Bell thought Stenerud’s fake pose of staring down at holder Len Dawson was too convincing and he thought if he went through with the snap to Stenerud the kicker would miss the flight of the ball. So Dawson unexpectedly got the snap and yelled at Stenerud to kick it. Out of sync, the attempt never had a chance.
Early in the first overtime another Podolak kick return set up Stenerud with a 42 yard shot to redeem himself and save the Chiefs. The kick was blocked by Miami’s Nick Buoniconti.
The End of an Era
The Dolphins ground game that had been choked off all day finally produced with a counter trap play in which Csonka plowed through a gaping hole for 29 yards to set up Miami kicker Garo Yepremian for a game winning 31-yard field goal. The Dolphins little tie-making kicker nailed the attempt right down the middle to begin an era of Dolphin dominance and end an era of Chiefs glory.
Kansas City’s failed bid to make a third Super Bowl in six seasons cost them a permanent place among the NFL’s historically elite teams. It likely cost such players as Ed Budde, Jim Tyrer, Jerrel Wilson, Johnny Robinson, and Otis Taylor enshrinement in Canton. And it tore the hearts out of a city. Stunned Kansas City fans departed mostly in silence, though others were in tears. The Chiefs had a hold on the town like few other professional sports teams and the game was like a death in the family.
It was also the end of the Chiefs run at Kansas City Municipal Stadium, their first home, and a favorite among both visiting teams and the Chiefs players themselves. Municipal had an intimacy that no other stadium could capture. It remains the home of the greatest Chiefs teams in history but also the location of the team’s most devastating defeat ever.
The late great Curt Gowdy called the classic for NBC TV that day. He remarked that not only was it the greatest game he ever saw but that he had never seen a stadium so quiet at the end of a game.
For Podolak, it took a while for the significance of the game to sink in.
“The first thing I had was, ‘we’ll be back.’ But it didn’t happen,” said the Chiefs Christmas Day hero. “Had I known what was coming, I’d have been much more devastated. I think that game had a lot of effect on our legacy. If we had beaten Miami, I think we would have won the Super Bowl, and then we’d be mentioned with the great teams of all time.”
