On the kickoff, Mare' kicked the ball short to prevent a runback and a Patriots' player fell on the ball at the Patriots' 40. Now, with 7 seconds left on the clock, the Patriots lined up to try a "Hail Mary" pass. Drew Bledsoe dropped back, the Dolphins only rushed 3 players and he tried to throw over the middle. But Jason Taylor had slipped around his block and hit Bledsoe's arm just as he threw. The ball hit a Patriots' offensive lineman in the back and bounced back towards Bledsoe.
Bledsoe picked up the ball, perhaps thinking it was a fumble and began to scramble. He was then hit from behind and the ball popped up again, bouncing towards the sideline. There was a lot of scrambling for the ball, but when the ball was eventually jumped on by a Patriots' player and he was tagged down by one of the Dolphins, the clock had run down to zero.
Also, because Bledsoe's pass had hit an offensive lineman, one of the referees threw a flag, calling an illegal forward pass penalty on Bledsoe. After conferring with the referee who threw the flag, head referee Johnny Grier announced that there was an offensive penalty on the Patriots and that the game was over.
Both teams headed for the locker room and the fans began to leave the stadium, the Dolphins believing that they had won their first AFC East Division title since 1994.
However, as we now know, that was not the actual end of the game. What happened next was a little fuzzy, but here is what I have been able to piece together....
The official in the replay booth believed (correctly, as it turned out) that Bledsoe should not be penalized for an illegal forward pass because his arm was hit as he threw and that it was, in fact, an incomplete pass. Because the ball hit the ground the first time with 3 seconds remaining on the clock, he believed that the Patriots were entitled to another play with 3 seconds remaining.
Unfortunately, he had not been able to talk to Johnny Grier about this until after Grier had announced that the game was over. Once he did confer with Grier, Grier decided that, because it was a game with playoff implications, the teams should be called back on the field and told to run the final play.
Grier then went to the Patriots' locker room and told them to get back on the field to run their final 3 seconds. Apparently, Belichick had some questions about this situation, but agreed to bring his troops back out on to the field.
After visiting the Patriots, Grier went to the Dolphins' locker room and talked to Dave Wannstedt. Coach Wannstedt objected to going back out on to the field to run the final 3 seconds off the clock and apparently convinced Grier that it was unsafe, because the players had cooled down, had cut their tape off and were no longer in pads.
Grier ultimately agreed with Coach Wannstedt and went back out on to the field to tell the Patriots that there were NOT going to run the final 3 seconds off the clock after all. The Patriots then went back to their locker room and proceeded to undress - again.
At some point, the NFL's head of officials, Jerry Seamans (sp?) called the stadium to inquire as to what was going on. On hearing that they weren't going to play the final 3 seconds, Seamans intervened, telling Grier that they had to play the final time off the clock.
So Grier, now thoroughly embarrassed, went back to the locker rooms again to tell both teams that they had to get back on to the field to play the final 3 seconds of the game. There is an unsubstantiated rumor that Grier had to threaten Dave Wannstedt with a forfeit to get him to agree, but both Grier and Wannstedt have denied this.
