Jim Souhan: Pearson's catch pushes buttons

Drew Pearson watched from a suite at Cowboys Stadium last weekend as his old team whipped the Eagles. As the game ended, he turned to Roger Staubach and said, "Get ready. We're going to be busy this week."

The Cowboys will face the Vikings on Sunday in the playoffs, meaning Minnesotans old enough to remember when frostbite constituted a home-field advantage were bound to relive one of the most devastating moments in franchise history.

Most remember it as "The Hail Mary." Vikings fans still call it "The Push-Off."

On Dec. 28, 1975, Staubach's 50-yard touchdown pass to Pearson in the last half-minute of a divisional playoff game on a cold afternoon at Met Stadium beat an excellent Vikings team 17-14. Reached at his home near Dallas this week, Pearson reminisced about the play in vivid detail and laughed about his former ownership of a business based in Hopkins.

"Of all the places in the world to end up, we ended up in Minnesota," he said. "I had over 100 employees there, they were all Vikings fans, and they used to give me a hard time every time I went up there. I used to joke that when I flew up there for meetings, I had to go in as Al Smith, because they wouldn't let Drew Pearson in."

Pearson almost shivered as he remembered the day. "It was about 10 degrees," Pearson said. "We go out for pregame warmups, and here come the Vikings with short sleeves and no gloves, and some of them not even wearing pads on their arms. They were pretty intimidating.

"We knew even with all those Super Bowl teams that this was probably their best team of all. It turned into one of the most physical games I ever played in. I said to myself, 'Man, this is pro football.' "

The Vikings, who finished the regular season 12-2, took a 14-10 lead. The Cowboys got the ball on their own 15 with 1:51 remaining. On fourth-and-16 from the 25, Staubach hit Pearson for 25 yards, as Pearson beat Vikings cornerback Nate Wright along the sideline.

Two plays later, Staubach looked at Pearson in the huddle. "In those situations, Roger and I, we threw the game plan and the playbook out the window," Pearson said. "It was pretty much a sandlot-type deal. He said, 'You know the route you ran last year against the Redskins to win that game in the final 20 seconds? Run the same route.'

"It was a turn-and-takeoff. Golden Richards was going to run a post pattern on the other side of the field so we could hold Paul Krause, the all-time interception leader, on the other side of the field. Everyone else was to stay in and block, max protection. I ran the turn-and-takeoff on Nate Wright, and he bit just enough that when I came out of the break, we were even running down the field.

"I thought Roger would throw the ball out there far enough where I had another gear and I could go get it. When the ball was thrown, I had to come back."

Wright fell. Pearson snagged the ball against his hip and backed into the end zone. "There was some contact, but there was no deliberate push," Pearson said. "When I did my swim move to gain that inside position, the ball hit my hands and went through my hands and the ball ended up sticking between my elbow and hip. The only reason it stuck there was because I was bent over.

"I was as surprised as anybody that I had the football at that point."

Pearson saw a flash of color. "I thought it was a flag," Pearson said. "Then it started rolling, and I realized it was an orange. You never see a flag roll."

Pearson turned and whipped the ball into the stands. A whiskey bottle hit referee Armen Terzian in the forehead. Vikings star Alan Page argued angrily with officials and received an unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty and was ejected. After the game, Staubauch said he closed his eyes, threw the ball as far as he could and "said a Hail Mary." A legendary phrase was born.

"It was a dark gray, cloudy day, and with the way that stadium was set up, with the stands, and that old field, and the two teams on the same sideline, and the baseball configuration, it all made for an eerie day," Pearson said. "To hear the silence as we drove downfield, then the dead silence after I caught the Hail Mary pass, it just added to the eeriness."

Vikings fans still say Pearson pushed off. "Oh, that bothers me," Pearson said. "Because I didn't do it. I bothers me that people harp on that as opposed to getting on Nate Wright for letting it happen.

"You don't see any extension of my arms. You know who gave the best explanation? Bud Grant. He said it was like two basketball players going up for a rebound. There's contact and there's jostling, but somebody always comes away with the ball. It was nothing deliberate. One guy made the play and one didn't."

Pearson feels empathy for the one who didn't. "Nate Wright is a great guy," Pearson said. "If you want to catch a Hail Mary pass, you don't want to catch it on Nate Wright. You want to catch it on Jack Tatum or Mel Blount, someone like that.

"Nate and I have talked about it. When I worked for a TV station in San Antonio and I did a piece on it, I interviewed Nate and we went back to the spot at the Mall of America to find the spot where the Hail Mary was caught. Nate never said, 'Drew, you pushed me.' He said, 'I don't know what happened at that point, but the next thing I know, I was on the ground.'"

Pearson said he's happy to be synonymous with the term "Hail Mary."

"Yes, because it was a great play in Cowboys history," Pearson said. "People ask me about it all the time. I think the reason it has stayed alive in people's memories is the controversy of the play. Did I push Nate Wright or not? That debate keeps the play alive."

Jim Souhan can be heard at 10-noon Sunday, and 6:40 a.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday on AM-1500. His Twitter name is SouhanStrib. • jsouhan@startribune.com

(Top photo) Dallas' Drew Pearson (88) caught the Hail Mary pass on his hip, as Vikings defender Nate Wright watched in their December 1975 playoff game. (Bottom photo) Pearson jogged in for the score.