The team was 7-2 with another game remaining against Holy Cross, and was trying to secure an invitation to the Cotton Bowl.With time running out against the Eagles, Kosar and running back Melvin Bratton — who was filling in for the injured Alonzo Highsmith — worked the Hurricanes’ offense down the field. Some in the Boston area were listening to Dan Davis of WRKO radio announce the final seconds.“Well, here we go. After the game, the play was known by several names, most commonly the "Miami Miracle" and … The Eagles won that game, 47-45, in what remains one of the most dramatic classics in college football history.Bernie Kosar threw for 447 of Miami’s 655 total yards. “My guess is that we had kind of embarrassed their defense and that their main intention was to intercept the ball, not just bat it away, to make a statement. “And, just for old times’ sake, we’ve got to run it one more time, just to throw it up.“Whether it works or not, the whole stadium is going to love it.
But cornerback Robert Bailey says there is a much better way to defend it.“All we have to do to avoid that magic stuff,” Bailey said, “is make sure the game isn’t close at the end.”.Gerard Phelan won’t ever let go of the football. “I figure there’s no way he can throw the ball that far.”.Flutie was being pursued by Willie Broughton, who was signed Wednesday by the Dolphins.“He threw his arm back in the air and I jumped at him,” Broughton said. Help,Read Leigh Montville’s column: BC, Flutie get storybook victory,Read Ian Thomsen’s game story: Flutie, BC do the impassible. Won the Emmy Award, didn’t it?”.No, but here’s why it should have: Six seconds left. “I’ve never seen one thing so much in my life. It’s little more than the quarterback’s wing and a prayer, but B.C. . He would never make such a mistake again.Flutie and his Eagles had somehow managed to move the ball after the kickoff from their own 20 to inside Miami territory in the short time given them — a 19-yard pass, then another for 13.After a Flutie incompletion, the Orange Bowl clock stood at 0:06. “I assumed we had lost, I’m thinking, ‘What am I going to tell these guys in the locker room?’ They just played a great game.” – Former Coach Jack Bicknell Touchdown Boston College! That was 22 years to the day Thursday.But if there was anyone who did not need a reminder, it was Flutie. At the end of three quarters, the game was tied at 31, and the fourth quarter had multiple lead changes. “The play had worked vs. Temple earlier in the year and there was a real positive feeling in the huddle that it would work again.“The longest I’ve thrown a ball is about 68 or 70 yards, but the adrenaline was pumping. But they’re all playing Caveman Lee to Flutie’s Marvin Hagler. I was afraid of heaving it out of the endzone, but I held up a hair and turns out I’ve never had a more exhilarating moment.”,Phelan caught the ball and landed on his back as B.C. I want to try and win a Super Bowl. “As long as there’s at least one second on the clock, he can make something happen.”.Boston College quarterback Doug Flutie is expected to win the Heisman Trophy tonight, but University of Miami fans are more likely to remember him for the 48-yard “Hail Mary” touchdown pass to Gerard Phelan that beat the Hurricanes, 47-45, a week ago.Today, in BC’s regular-season finale at Worcester, Mass., Holy Cross fans may get to see if Flutie can make a miracle happen twice.“You know the ball has got to be in our hands before halftime,” Flutie said. Game over. I’d rather be remembered for the skillful things I did rather than the prayer of a pass I threw, like winning the Heisman and 10,000 yards passing. Here’s your ball game folks as Flutie takes the snap . He is now with the Calgary Stampeders.Phelan held onto the football after the game, planted it inside his duffle bag along with his dirty clothes, and took it away from the Orange Bowl forever.Later, he would serve as a board member for the Boston College alumni department. 17 Miami missing multiple offensive contributors for top-25 showdown in Louisville,College GameDay is coming back to South Florida for Miami-Florida State next Saturday. Flutie went on to play in the NFL and Canadian Football League. Miami’s defensive coaches already in the press elevator. The Chargers won, 16-14.“He was ready to play,” Buffalo coach Wade Phillips said of Flutie. It’s got to be done.”.Once the Eagles are finished with their Division I-AA rivals from central Massachusetts, Flutie will hop into a 12-seat plane and fly from Worcester to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey. This has been called the,Boston College went on to win the Cotton Bowl; through 2020, it remains the program's most recent.Three wide receivers out to the right...Flutie flushed...throws it down...Here we go...here's your ballgame, folks, as Flutie takes the snap. He told Flutie he and his teammates saw the play while watching TV in the team hotel.“I talk about it so much, especially recently, building up to this game,” Flutie said. But the 35-year-old proved last Sunday in the Bills’ season-opener at San Diego that he still has some magic left.The diminutive run-and-shooter replaced Rob Johnson in the third quarter after Johnson suffered a concussion at the outset of the second half. Two — Darrell Fullington and Tolbert Bain — were freshmen. There he saw the jubilant Flutie jumping to the end zone to reach Phelan.“I was feeling good about ourselves and how quickly that changed,” Kosar said. “.“It was just your average desperation play and we ran it every Thursday in practice,” Phelan recalled.The name of the play -- “flood tip” -- had been tried twice before by the Eagles, once in the Liberty Bowl the previous season when quarterback Doug Flutie’s pass went through the hands of Brian Brennan in a loss to Notre Dame and again during the 1984 campaign when Phelan caught a 51-yard Flutie fling just before halftime of a victory over Temple.Miami, under new Coach Jimmy Johnson, was fresh off an embarrassing defeat two weeks earlier to Maryland, one in which the Hurricanes had blown a 31-point lead and lost, 42-40.Still, Miami and Heisman hopeful Kosar were sitting on a 7-3 record and being courted by the Fiesta Bowl.